Never Goin' Back
A24 | Release Date: August 3, 2018 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
62
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 19 Critic Reviews
Positive:
13
Mixed:
6
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
80
The GuardianJake NevinsAug 2, 2018
Watching Never Goin’ Back, it’s easy to see the frames of reference Frizzell pulled from, besides her own teenage escapades. But the film also defies easy categorization; it’s not consistently funny enough to be a comedy, nor lively enough to be a drama. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperAug 8, 2018
Kudos to writer-director Frizzell for demonstrating a sharp ear for comedic dialogue, a fine sense of storytelling as a director — and for incorporating Michael Bolton’s “How Am I Supposed to Live Without You?” as well as Barry Manilow’s “Mandy” into the soundtrack. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comGlenn KennyAug 3, 2018
Never Goin’ Back would make a good drive-in movie, if drive-ins were still a thing. It’s breezy, benignly outrageous, equal parts grotty and sweet. Read full review
75
The PlaylistKimber MyersAug 2, 2018
Anarchic and daring, Never Goin’ Back is a tale of adolescent female friendship that is somehow ballsier than your standard dude-driven buddy comedy. Frizzell’s film is as fearless as her heroines, and it refuses to judge them for their bad behavior. Read full review
75
IndieWireEric KohnAug 1, 2018
Less moment-to-moment funny than committed to a sustained pitch of devilish glee, Never Goin’ Back couches its silliness in a credible milieu of American malaise. The women may never understand how they might find a better place, but the movie makes the case that their unending commitment to getting there might be good enough. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesKatie WalshAug 2, 2018
Anchored by a pair of effervescent and authentically lived-in performances from Mitchell and Morrone, Never Goin’ Back is a sweaty, silly summer adventure, and a sincere shout-out to the power of best friendship. Read full review
70
The New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisAug 2, 2018
By rights, Never Goin’ Back should be a chore to sit through. The jokes are dated, the behavior tasteless and the setups tired. Yet the movie has a ramshackle charm that’s due entirely to its vivacious leads, whose mutual devotion and easy, unlabeled sexuality feels endearingly innocent. Read full review
70
Village VoiceAbbey BenderAug 1, 2018
Writer-director Augustine Frizzell, making her feature directorial debut, is attuned to the giddy intimacies of female friendship, and Mitchell and Morrone are a charismatic pair. Read full review
70
VarietyPeter DebrugeMay 11, 2018
Inspired at least in part by stunts Frizzell pulled when she was her characters’ age, this raucous parade of humiliation and embarrassment packs all the appeal of an outrageous anecdote hilariously retold by someone who can scarcely believe they ever did something so stupid. Read full review
68
TheWrapRobert AbeleAug 1, 2018
Never Goin’ Back, which Frizzell has admitted is in ways an honest, personal reckoning with incidents in her own fumbling adolescence, has something many comedies simply fail to care about: a spark-filled joie de vivre about the stupidity of youth that lifts it above many more cynically crass (and typically male) examples of the genre. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleMarjorie BaumgartenAug 8, 2018
Never Goin’ Back and its overworked tropes should, by all rights, be a trifle of a film, but what Frizzell and her two leads deliver is more fun than a floating party boat. Read full review
63
Slant MagazinePeter GoldbergJul 30, 2018
Writer-director Augustine Frizzell's film is funny and surprisingly tender, if at times frustratingly uneven. Read full review
63
Movie NationRoger MooreJul 25, 2018
A scruffy, raunchy and random farce. Read full review
58
The Film StageJose SolísAug 3, 2018
For all the times I applauded the film based on its sociological achievements, I found it deeply unsatisfying artistically. Read full review
58
Film Journal InternationalMaria GarciaAug 1, 2018
Marking her feature debut, Frizzell’s direction is competent, but her screenplay, which is semi-autobiographical, is a series of vignettes that narrowly add up to a narrative. Read full review
50
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliAug 10, 2018
It’s supposed to be a screwball comedy but someone forgot to include the laughs. Read full review
50
Film ThreatNatalia WinkelmanAug 2, 2018
You can expect the same defecation and drug humor that crud up comedies of this ilk. Of course, its vacuity is intentional, and maybe we could always use more movies of the women-behaving-badly variety. But there’s also a real danger in perpetuating this type of teenage girl; it propagates the idea that, for women, defiance is power, radicalism is freedom, and being really hot is often all you need to survive. Read full review
42
Entertainment WeeklyChris NashawatyAug 1, 2018
The two leads have chemistry and a rebellious sort of charisma. Too bad they’re given such wheezy clichés to work with. Read full review
40
The Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthyMay 11, 2018
This is one of those films that, if shown overseas, could potentially make people think that the U.S. is going down the tubes even faster than imagined. Everyone in it — adolescents and grown-ups, too — is beyond stupid and content to remain that way. Read full review
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