| | Release Date: August 15, 2025 | CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION | ||
|
Positive:
15
Mixed:
0
Negative:
0
|
Critic Reviews
Nov 26, 2025
“My Undesirable Friends” captures dark times with some of the funniest people you’d ever hope to have as sisters-in-arms. Defiant, emotional and life-affirming, the film presents us with endearing patriots who love their country but hate its leaders, sucking us into a riveting tale with a powerful undertow.
Read full review
Aug 22, 2025
Loktev’s accomplishment in this extraordinarily human cinematic document is to simply keep filming—to cling fast to her camera, and to keep it focussed on the remarkable sight of young people showing exemplary courage. In doing so, she keeps faith with the words of another speaker, pledging solidarity with dissidents everywhere: “Evil is not eternal, and truth will surely win.”
Read full review
RogerEbert.comAug 22, 2025
For all five hours, Loktev’s camera is positioned close to her subjects, much like a friend in the same room, lending the project an intimacy and empathy that it would have otherwise lacked. And the length allows us to really get to know these people, feeling their frustration and their tension. It becomes our own. We don’t just see it. We feel it in our bones.
Read full review
IndieWireOct 8, 2025
While five-plus hours of mostly hanging out in strangers’ apartments might seem like an increasingly tedious invitation, Loktev ends up justifying the running time as her “undesirable friends” soon become ours as well. Smartly structured so that different “foreign agents” take centerstage from episode to episode, we’re forever kept on our toes (right through to a finale that hints at a part two, currently in the works).
Read full review
Next Best PictureJan 2, 2026
Despite the constant threat of censorship (or worse), the reporters still manage to find joy and even humor in their daily lives. That comedic energy grows increasingly dark and even apocalyptic as the situation becomes more perilous, but “My Undesirable Friends” shows that the power of human connection and the fight for justice and freedom endure even in the most oppressive settings.
Read full review
Oct 8, 2025
At times the movie feels so raw and unedited, it’s as if Loktev dumped all her footage onto the table without shaping it into a definitive cut. Perhaps a leaner two-hour version would have yielded something more dynamic, though the point of My Undesirable Friends isn’t to entertain us, but to capture every detail of a democratic movement that was doomed to fail.
Read full review
Aug 21, 2025
It’s devastating in its delineation of how brutally a determined and unrestrained state can strip citizens of their essential rights, and exhilarating in the way they draw strength from one another. In other words, it’s about as important and timely as it’s possible for a movie to be.
Read full review
Current Movie Releases
By MetascoreBy User Score
