Our Kind of Traitor
Roadside Attractions | Release Date: July 1, 2016 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
57
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 30 Critic Reviews
Positive:
13
Mixed:
16
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
80
Arizona RepublicRandy CordovaJun 30, 2016
Director Susanna White keeps things low-key and absorbing, as the action moves from Marrakesh to London to Paris to Switzerland. Read full review
80
Time Out LondonDave CalhounMay 11, 2016
Once you get past some bumps in the road of believability, Our Kind of Traitor turns into a brisk, energetic drama, with Anthony Dod Mantle’s photography adding interesting layers to a fairly straightforward plot. Read full review
75
Christian Science MonitorPeter RainerJul 1, 2016
Which is not to say the movie is anything less than diverting. It’s just that diverting is often all it is. Read full review
75
Rolling StonePeter TraversJun 30, 2016
No knock on McGregor and Harris — fine actors both — but they never hold us rapt the way the plot demands. Read full review
75
Entertainment WeeklyLeah GreenblattJun 23, 2016
The film, while gorgeously shot, is schematic and wholly implausible. But Skarsgård saves it; wild and funny and ferociously alive, he’s a crucial bolt of color in all that tasteful gray. Read full review
67
The A.V. ClubJesse HassengerJun 29, 2016
Director Susanna White, on only her second feature, jazzes up the proceedings to match the skill of actors like McGregor, Harris, and Skarsgård. Most notable is her smart use of cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle. Read full review
63
Movie NationRoger MooreJul 12, 2016
The intrigues are rather routine in ways that point out that perhaps the director of a “Nanny McPhee” movie wasn’t the best choice for this. But McGregor, Harris, Skarsgard and Lewis give fair value and give this the lived-in feel of even the most far-fetched LeCarre plots. Read full review
63
Philadelphia InquirerTirdad DerakhshaniJul 1, 2016
Our Kind of Traitor strains credulity: The world it attempts to depict - international organized crime - is too large, too unmanageable and too easily caricatured. Read full review
63
RogerEbert.comGlenn KennyJul 1, 2016
While White’s direction is atmospheric, the sense of tension never gets crucial; the movie’s got more of a mood of resignation than of conflict. For all its respectful and respectable qualities, it also suffers from a certain inertia. Read full review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Brad WheelerJun 30, 2016
Scratch off Lewis as a contender for the new Bond actor. As for McGregor, he may have failed his audition as well. Our Kind of Traitor is tense enough, but lacks lustre and pizzazz. Perhaps a better-utilized Harris could have popped things up. Read full review
63
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsJun 30, 2016
I don't the think the "look" is quite right for the story. Nor is the dreamy, wandering score by Marcelo Zarvos, which adds the blandest sort of ambient "tension music" to whatever's going on. McGregor struggles to make Perry credible in his credulousness; Harris, far better, doesn't have enough to do; Skarsgard is fun. Read full review
63
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanJun 30, 2016
There’s little of the poetry that Perry teaches in the script, but the story’s mechanics are solid. Read full review
63
Slant MagazineOleg IvanovJun 29, 2016
It works as both a modern morality play for our globalized world and as an indictment of Europe's ethical bankruptcy. Read full review
60
Los Angeles TimesGary GoldsteinJun 30, 2016
It’s competently made, well-acted and largely intelligent, so why isn’t the spy thriller Our Kind of Traitor more rewarding? Perhaps it’s the feeling that we’ve trod this kind of twisty treachery on screen ad infinitum since before the Cold War-era stylings of Alfred Hitchcock — and far more vividly. Read full review
60
The New YorkerAnthony LaneJun 27, 2016
Indeed, the whole film is oddly poised between the pensive and the peevish, with a topdressing of high jinks. Read full review
60
EmpireDan JolinJun 20, 2016
A lesser entry in the LeCarré Cinematic Universe, though Damian Lewis and Stellan Skarsgård rescue it from complete blandness. Read full review
60
The GuardianMike McCahillJun 20, 2016
Director Susanna White favours a generic spy-movie look: those chilly blue filters surely need resting now. Yet she works smartly with her actors: while Skarsgård wolfs down great handfuls of scenery, McGregor effectuates a thoughtful transformation from ineffectual tourist to man in the field. Read full review
60
The Hollywood ReporterLeslie FelperinJun 20, 2016
Although engaging enough to hold interest, the just slightly off casting of Ewan McGregor and Stellan Skarsgard...dampens plausibility. Read full review
60
CineVueJamie NeishMay 17, 2016
It's a finely made thriller that's a little bit more contemporary than other le Carré adaptations before it, and allows the central trio a chance to shine and Lewis to do some weird things with his accent and mouth as a weirdly laid back and unconcerned British agent. Read full review
60
VarietyPeter DebrugeMay 5, 2016
The shattering of one’s noble ideals is a delicate thing to capture on film, and White plays the moment of rupture with a banality that threatens to undermine our faith in her as storyteller more than in the system itself. Read full review
60
Screen DailyFionnuala HalliganMay 3, 2016
While McGregor and Harris convincingly portray a couple in trouble, and Lewis’s odball spook is an uneasy fit, it is Skarsgard’s dynamic performance which saves the day. Read full review
58
The Film StageDan MeccaJun 29, 2016
The only bond built is the one between Perry and Dima, two characters who are little more than pawns in the game. It’s exciting enough watching them try to negotiate their situation, but it’d be more intriguing if we knew more about the people making the decisions. Read full review
50
Boston GlobePeter KeoughJun 29, 2016
Whatever the turning point, his transformation from feckless academic to stalwart knight occurs too easily. It should be the heart of the story, but instead is just a troublesome detail in a hollow movie. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleKimberley JonesJun 29, 2016
What it does have in its favor are two sit-up-and-clap supporting turns from Skarsgård, all barking bear in tacky gold chains, and Lewis, who wears the sour mouth of someone who just underwent a prostate exam. Collectively, they’re the film’s fail-safe: Whenever Our Kind of Traitor threatens to go completely inert, they show up and give it a good goosing. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleJun 29, 2016
For almost an hour, it keeps us off balance. But once we find that balance, the movie seems to coast. Read full review
50
New York Daily NewsEdward DouglasJun 29, 2016
Generally, one expects political thrillers to offer a little more suspense or excitement, so when this is such a deathly dull affair, you wonder what you might be missing. Read full review
50
ObserverRex ReedJun 28, 2016
Overexposed and barely awake in the most dramatic scenes, Ewan McGregor is the star, but it’s not one of his most energetic performances. Read full review
40
The New York TimesManohla DargisJun 30, 2016
The director Susanna White makes a lot of strange choices, including the dark, fussy visuals best described as stained-glass noir. As an Expressionist choice, it doesn’t make much sense. Then again, neither does much of Our Kind of Traitor, which has loads of twists and all the ritualistic pessimism you expect, but none of the political and moral outrage that might have elevated this genre story into a le Carré one. Read full review
40
The TelegraphTim RobeyJun 20, 2016
It’s a film whose final shape feels dwindled by compromise – not unappealing, but stymied, like a luxury jet which spends two hours taxiing on the runway. Read full review
38
New York PostKyle SmithJun 30, 2016
A dismal, low-energy affair. Read full review
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