Operation Varsity Blues: The College Admissions Scandal
Netflix | Release Date (Streaming): March 17, 2021 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
70
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 17 Critic Reviews
Positive:
14
Mixed:
3
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
83
Entertainment WeeklyLeah GreenblattMar 11, 2021
Most illuminating are the various journalists, attorneys, witnesses, and admissions counselors who testify to the case Read full review
80
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzMar 17, 2021
It’s a movie as much about white privilege as it is anything else, an examination of the incredible advantages the wealthy have — advantages that don’t prevent them from cheating anyway. Read full review
80
The New York TimesAmy NicholsonMar 17, 2021
The gripping documentary Operation Varsity Blues: The College Admissions Scandal shifts the spotlight back to Singer, played in re-enactments by Matthew Modine with dialogue taken directly from wiretaps, to understand how a flip flop-clad former basketball coach rebranded himself as an academic glad-hander for the 1 percent. Read full review
75
Movie NationRoger MooreMar 20, 2021
It’s a healthy reminder that fighting corruption, even in something as mundane as college admissions, is vital to society’s health, that Americans need to at least believe there’s a “level playing field,” and that not guaranteeing that is how we mediocre our way from the top of the world to Banana Republic in just a generation. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comBrian TallericoMar 17, 2021
The unique approach mostly works, although it does leave a few questions unanswered regarding a case that’s kind of still unfolding. Most of all, Smith succeeds by capturing how this isn’t a case about an individual or the many parents who worked with him to cheat the system, but how the system itself is deeply broken. Read full review
75
The PlaylistChris BarsantiMar 16, 2021
The true drama in the admissions scandal is not the ringleader or the celebrities and hedge-fund magnates who hired him but what this Hunger Games scenario means for all the children whose parents cannot afford his services. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubNoel MurrayMar 16, 2021
What becomes clear in this film—if it wasn’t obvious already—is that sometimes the ways in which the rich and powerful thrive have nothing to do with merit. Sometimes they just buy access to people like Singer, who are good at selling their customers a story they can tell. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleMar 15, 2021
As a piece of filmmaking, the trick of Operation Varsity Blues is that it provides first-rate entertainment even as it incites sputtering rage. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperMar 12, 2021
Operation Varsity Blues: The College Admission Scandal is a documentary, yet Matthew Modine does some of the most oddly compelling work of his career in a fully realized performance in this movie. Read full review
75
TheWrapAlonso DuraldeMar 11, 2021
Even with the re-enactments, this is a pretty straightforward documentary. It’s nonetheless valuable for the way that it takes a complicated story and breaks it down into understandable pieces. Read full review
70
Wall Street JournalJohn AndersonMar 19, 2021
There are degrees of villainy in “Operation Varsity Blues,” but it’s hard to peg the privileged, bribe-paying parents as the worst of a bad lot. Besides, they have to live not just with their criminal convictions but with those wiretapped conversations, in which they reveal what they really think of their own children. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterInkoo KangMar 11, 2021
The script’s skillful tension makes it easy to forgive Operation Varsity Blues its occasionally clunky missteps. At least it tells a tale as old as time — of the insatiable rapacity of those who already have more than anyone else — with novel relish. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesRobert AbeleMar 11, 2021
The best nuggets come from the interviews, as when a lawyer remarks that when it comes to white-collar criminals, they historically have no filter on the phone. Read full review
67
IndieWireEric KohnMar 12, 2021
Operation Varsity Blues provides more than proof that the American educational system is broken; it shows how many people want it to stay that way. Read full review
60
Rolling StoneDavid FearMar 17, 2021
The creative workaround does drop you into the middle of the shady-as-hell action in a way that, say, recordings playing over a close-up of a grainy photo does not. But it also starts to become more than a little distracting, and you find yourself tuning into the performances instead of the particulars of the case. Read full review
50
Chicago TribuneNina MetzApr 21, 2021
I’m not saying the film needed to be formally experimental. But as it is, the documentary feels deeply pointless. Read full review
50
CNNBrian LowryMar 17, 2021
Despite the can't-miss subject matter, Operation Varsity Blues: The College Admissions Scandal makes a near-fatal misstep, heavily using dramatic recreations in a way that leaves this Netflix production somewhere between Lifetime movie and documentary. The salacious aspects of the scandal still earn a passing grade, but due to the unwieldy hybrid format, just barely. Read full review
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