Risk
Showtime Networks | Release Date: May 5, 2017 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
72
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 27 Critic Reviews
Positive:
22
Mixed:
4
Negative:
1
Watch Now
Buy on
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Expand

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
88
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)John SemleyMay 11, 2017
There’s no doubt that the world needs more iconoclasts, whistle-blowers and anti-authoritarian rabble-rousers. But it deserves better than Julian Assange. Read full review
88
RogerEbert.comGodfrey CheshireMay 5, 2017
The film is not one for any viewer who’s never heard of Assange. Indeed, it’s best suited to audiences who are familiar with the basic Wikileaks saga and thus prepared for Poitras’ much more intimate and nuanced view of events and personalities that the mainstream media tend to present in more reductive terms. Read full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperMay 4, 2017
Risk is filled with dramatic scenes straight out of a spy thriller. Read full review
83
IndieWireEric KohnMay 21, 2016
Unlike "Citizenfour," there's not a whole lot here that hasn't already been revealed through the scrutiny of Assange's iconoclastic legacy, but the filmmaker's skillful treatment of the material yields another look at major historical events on an intimate level. Read full review
80
Time Out LondonTom HuddlestonJun 28, 2017
As a portrait of power gained and lost, of unchecked self-absorption and what drives people like Assange to do what they do, it’s absolutely fascinating. Watching it feels like history unfolding in close-up. Read full review
80
Los Angeles TimesJustin ChangMay 4, 2017
Risk is first and foremost an impressive cinematic coup, a triumph of access to an elusive and sometimes combative subject. It is also an unsettling and fascinatingly unresolved piece of work, with little of the moment-to-moment suspense and dramatic focus that made “Citizenfour” so riveting. Read full review
80
Village VoiceSteve EricksonMay 3, 2017
Though it could benefit from less hopping around in time and space, and it bears the scars of Poitras’ multiple edits — she showed one cut to Assange, who hated it — if you care about what’s happening to the internet and to global politics, it’s essential viewing. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterDeborah YoungMay 21, 2016
There is much to appreciate in Poitras’ low-key, down-to-business approach which employs instinctive editing choices, and not her own persona (she never appears onscreen), to build the most revealing portrait of Assange and his WikiLeaks staff in the public domain. Read full review
80
Screen DailyLee MarshallMay 21, 2016
Sometimes all a documentary needs to do is to get us in the room with somebody we’re curious about. Laura Poitras did this, and a lot more, in Citizenfour, by taking us to meet US whistleblower Edward Snowden; she pulls off the same trick in Risk. Read full review
80
The TelegraphRobbie CollinMay 21, 2016
Risk doesn’t burnish the Assange myth – it injects you into the bloodstream of the Assange story. Read full review
80
CineVueJohn BleasdaleMay 21, 2016
A superb character study of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Read full review
80
The GuardianCatherine ShoardMay 21, 2016
What we have here is an embedded report that sacrifices impartiality for access. But what access. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleDavid LewisMay 10, 2017
Risk is far from a narrative masterpiece — it hopscotches all over the place, with even Lady Gaga making an appearance — and it peels only a layer or two from a man with many masks. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeTy BurrMay 10, 2017
Debuting at last year’s Cannes Film Festival and updated in light of recent events, it’s a failed film whose failure makes it interesting; it’s less a portrait of Assange than an account of how the scales fell from one admirer’s eyes as she looked at him. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineKenji FujishimaMay 1, 2017
Laura Poitras doesn't indulge in score-settling cheap shots, but seriously grapples with her contradictory subject. Read full review
75
The PlaylistNikola GrozdanovicMay 21, 2016
Laura Poitras has done it again. Much like the celebrated Edward Snowden documentary Citizenfour, “Risk” is instilled with a sense of immediate urgency as an apprehensive cloud hovers over every action, every word, every wayward glance. Read full review
75
The Film StageGiovanni Marchini CamiaMay 21, 2016
Poitras takes very little advantage of her direct access to Assange to offer up any other information that isn’t already common knowledge. Read full review
70
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternMay 4, 2017
Timing being everything in life, Risk could hardly be more of the moment. Read full review
70
The New York TimesA.O. ScottMay 4, 2017
To some degree in spite of Ms. Poitras’s journalistic intentions — though very much as a consequence of her rigorous honesty — the picture that emerges is complicated, unsettling and intriguingly ambivalent. Read full review
70
VarietyPeter DebrugeMay 21, 2016
Running a short 84 minutes, Risk offers considerable insights into Assange, but seems to omit as much as it reveals. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleMarjorie BaumgartenMay 3, 2017
In the end, however, Poitras’ portrait of Assange in exile exudes a less acute sense of history unfolding before our eyes than does "Citizenfour." Read full review
63
Washington PostAnn HornadayMay 4, 2017
Risk raises deep misgivings about its subject and its maker. But it’s still queasily, compulsively watchable — and probably necessary, if only as a cautionary example of how ethics, objectivity and agendas come into play in nonfiction filmmaking. Read full review
60
Total FilmTom DawsonAug 11, 2017
Director Laura Poitras (Citizenfour) charts her own feelings towards her subject, yet unanswered questions abound surrounding WikiLeaks’ alleged connections to Donald Trump’s campaign. Read full review
60
Arizona RepublicKerry LengelMay 4, 2017
Artfully shot and mooded-up with a jittery ambient soundtrack, Risk is compelling because the enigma of Assange is compelling. Read full review
58
The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyMay 3, 2017
It’s a patchy and seemingly unfinished film. Read full review
55
TheWrapRobert AbeleMay 4, 2017
In the fraught relationship between controlling subject and probing filmmaker who start out as comrades in activism, the tension should be explored, not glided over. It leaves “Risk” feeling like the outline for a dozen different documentaries, instead of a complete one itself. Read full review
20
SlateFred KaplanMay 4, 2017
This isn’t the churning of ambiguities; it’s a muddle, a mess. Read full review
More From This Movie

72 Critic Reviews

7.2 User Reviews

Details & Credits|Trailers

Current Movie Releases
By MetascoreBy User Score
1 81 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple
2 77 Project Hail Mary
3 75 Send Help
4 73 Hoppers
5 72 The Sheep Detectives
SEE ALL
Essential Links
New on Amazon Prime Video
New on Netflix
Coming Soon to DVD/Blu-ray
SEE ALL