Offside
Sony Pictures Classics | Release Date: March 23, 2007 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
85
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 25 Critic Reviews
Positive:
25
Mixed:
0
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
80
The Hollywood ReporterKirk Honeycutt
Women's roles and the eternal fight to expand their rights in Iranian society get a light, hugely entertaining treatment in Jafar Panahi's Offsides. Read full review
80
VarietyDeborah Young
In his most accessible and spontaneous picture, ranking Iranian helmer Jafar Panahi reveals unsuspected comic gifts barely visible in his dramatic festival winners "The White Balloon," "The Circle" and "Crimson Gold." Read full review
90
Village VoiceJ. Hoberman
Offside is blatantly metaphoric and powerfully concrete, deceptively simple and highly sophisticated in its formal intelligence. Read full review
91
Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum
Jafar Panahi's wonderfully funny, outspoken shaggy-dog story, a light counterweight to his sadder 2000 feminist drama "The Circle." Read full review
88
PremiereGlenn Kenny
The masterly Panahi concocts a spellbinding, often corrosively and/or warmly funny story in which love of both country and sport tries to, but doesn't quite, transcend dogmatic and ingrained difference. Read full review
70
SalonAndrew O'Hehir
There's a commitment to half-improvised, ground-level realism that lends the picture news value and an obvious urgency. Read full review
91
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
The interaction between soldiers and captives becomes a microcosm for an entire culture. It's a wisp of a movie but it has stayed with me longer than much supposedly weightier fare. Read full review
70
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
The delicately subversive Mr. Panahi makes his subjects perfectly clear -- the stupidity of authority, and the hypocrisy of discrimination. Offside is surprisingly entertaining, and edifying to boot.
80
Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan
A charming, character-driven film that conveys enormous feeling for its people Read full review
80
The New York TimesA.O. Scott
While the gist of Offside is the same (as "The Circle"), its tone is more insouciant, as it celebrates the guile and toughness of its heroines while casting a sympathetic glance at the ethical quandaries facing their jailers. Read full review
88
TV Guide MagazineKen Fox
Poignant and sometimes downright hilarious, much of the film unfolds in the small area outside the arena -- an "offside" penalty box for women who just won't behave. Read full review
75
New York PostV.A. Musetto
The story is good-natured, but Panahi's message is serious: That ludicrous rules turn Iranian women into third-class citizens. And what better way is there to get that point across than through sports and laughter? Read full review
88
New York Daily NewsElizabeth Weitzman
Director Jafar Panahi has long been an eloquent and passionate representative for Iranian women. But judging by this deeply poignant comedy, they may not need a mouthpiece much longer. Read full review
91
The A.V. ClubNoel Murray
It's a sports film unlike any other, and a political film that makes the personal profound. Read full review
80
New York Magazine (Vulture)David Edelstein
As the political rhetoric between Washington and Tehran becomes dangerously overheated, Offside offers an intimate antidote: an affectionate glimpse into the cultural schisms that young Tehranis face every day. Western audiences will cheer the rebellious girls on. Read full review
88
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
In the midst of his many other achievements here -- his documentary realism, his wry humanism, his allegorical subtlety -- Panahi even manages to redeem the good name of toilet humour. Read full review
100
Chicago TribuneMichael Wilmington
Jafar Panahi of Iran is one of his country's great filmmakers, and Offside is his best movie to date. Read full review
100
Chicago ReaderJonathan Rosenbaum
So accessible and entertaining. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleG. Allen Johnson
Although its message is deadly serious, is is filled with wit and winning characters. Read full review
88
Boston GlobeJanice Page
As funny as it is sharp. Read full review
83
Portland OregonianShawn Levy
Within this simple structure, Panahi manages at once to celebrate and critique his nation's passions, sexual politics, sporting heritage, laws, morality and class system. It's a fictional feature but, like many Iranian films, it feels uncannily real, particularly in its final rousing minutes. Read full review
80
Washington PostAnn Hornaday
Along with such colleagues as Abbas Kiarostami and Moshen Makhmalbaf, Panahi has perfected the art of realist filmmaking, Read full review
83
Seattle Post-IntelligencerBill White
There is more comedy than outrage in this critique of sexual inequality in Iran. Read full review
89
Austin ChronicleMarrit Ingman
This is Iranian cinema at its most accessible: a bit slow even in its 92 minutes, with more environment than story, but deeply immersive and thought-provoking, and quite often funny. Read full review
88
Philadelphia InquirerCarrie Rickey
Exhilarating, exuberant and drolly funny. Read full review
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