Salinger
Weinstein Company, The | Release Date: September 6, 2013 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
40
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 28 Critic Reviews
Positive:
8
Mixed:
9
Negative:
11
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
83
The PlaylistChris WillmanSep 3, 2013
Given that this isn’t the extended TV mini-series that the subject deserves, Salinger does an effective job of making the writer seem alternately more mundane and more mysterious, almost at the same time. Read full review
83
IndieWireEric KohnSep 2, 2013
In its revelations of Salinger's flaws, the documentary capably strips away the fanaticism associated with his books to create the impression of a human being. Read full review
80
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike ScottSep 20, 2013
This much is sure: Salinger would have hated this movie. But he would have hated it for the very reason that others will like it: because it takes an honest-to-goodness crack at unlocking that mystery of a man and at answering key questions the publishing world and the reading public have been asking ever since he forsook them. Nothing phony about that. Read full review
75
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe WilliamsSep 19, 2013
This documentary reconstructing the life of the ultimate cult author is like a three-act thriller, and the character at the center of the story is a mute man of mystery. Salinger would have recognized the irony, even as he hated the film for invading his privacy. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperSep 19, 2013
Despite its considerable flaws, Salinger is a valuable and engrossing biography of the author. Read full review
75
Christian Science MonitorPeter RainerSep 6, 2013
By turns fascinating and infuriating. Read full review
75
USA TodayClaudia PuigSep 6, 2013
Insightful gems are unearthed throughout the flawed but engrossing Salinger,a much-anticipated documentary about the author of The Catcher in the Rye. Read full review
63
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaSep 19, 2013
It is by turns illuminating, exasperating, sloppy, redundant, a head-spinner, and a headache. Read full review
60
Los Angeles TimesKenneth TuranSep 5, 2013
Salerno, as if he's unsure of what he's got, goes to great lengths to heighten the drama with crisp editing, a strong score, frequent sound effects and snappy visuals. Read full review
60
The Hollywood ReporterStephen FarberSep 4, 2013
Although it is overlong, it manages to be fascinating for much of its running time. But it also disappoints on many counts, providing another example of hype outpacing actual achievement -- a syndrome that Salinger himself would probably have deplored. Read full review
60
Time OutDavid FearSep 3, 2013
Though there’s no shortage of biographies on the notoriously private writer, no one has had the stones to try making a comprehensive visual documentary on someone as camera-aversive as the Catcher in the Rye author. The effort itself should be applauded. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleMichael OrdonaSep 19, 2013
Salinger does what so many documentaries and biopics either fail to do or decline to attempt; it speculates convincingly on the connective tissue between the life and the work of the subject. Read full review
50
Entertainment WeeklyTina JordanAug 28, 2013
At two hours and nine minutes, Salinger is at least 40 minutes too long, suffering, just like the book, from its creators' obsessive zeal. Only here, you can't page ahead to the next chapter. Read full review
42
The A.V. ClubKyle RyanSep 5, 2013
When Salinger succeeds, it’s in spite of Salerno’s heavy hand and because of the implicit intrigue of J.D. Salinger’s life story. For a director who clearly reveres his subject’s work, he doesn’t grasp how the flashy, eardrum-busting pomp and circumstance of his film is exactly the kind of thing Salinger abhorred. Read full review
40
Austin ChronicleMarjorie BaumgartenSep 18, 2013
Salerno spends more time talking to photographers with telephoto lenses who, over the decades, laid in wait for Salinger in the hope of capturing a grainy picture, than he does talking to literary analysts and historians. Read full review
40
New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinSep 9, 2013
The fact that the movie’s focus is how and why he renounced the world, moved to Cornish, New Hampshire, and stopped publishing makes it worse, somehow. Salerno probably didn’t mean it this way, but he gives you the impression he came to mock his subject: We’ve got you now, you antisocial bastard. Read full review
40
VarietyAndrew BarkerSep 4, 2013
It’s difficult to get past the film’s restless, ill-fittingly bombastic style. Read full review
38
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsSep 22, 2013
Salerno blows little more than smoke in this one, especially near the end, when we get to the maybe-probably-sort-ofs regarding the maybe-probably-possibly full vault of unpublished work. Read full review
38
RogerEbert.comOdie HendersonSep 6, 2013
The ultimate invasion of its subject's privacy. Read full review
38
Slant MagazineSteve MacfarlaneSep 4, 2013
An outsized A&E Biography episode coursing with the strident urgency typical to anyone convinced they have something new to say on a long since played-out topic. Read full review
37
Washington PostStephanie MerrySep 19, 2013
While some of the stories are interesting, the film is much longer than it needs to be. For his part, Salerno tries to get creative with solutions for the lack of visual stimuli, but most attempts fail. Read full review
30
The New YorkerDavid DenbySep 16, 2013
The movie is like a monstrous balloon that keeps re-inflating. If Salinger were around, he would reach for a pin. Read full review
30
The New York TimesA.O. ScottSep 5, 2013
Salinger, directed by Mr. Salerno, is less a work of cinema than the byproduct of its own publicity campaign. Read full review
25
Boston GlobeTy BurrSep 19, 2013
Some documentaries are an embarrassment of riches. Salinger is merely an embarrassment. Read full review
25
Rolling StonePeter TraversSep 6, 2013
We also learn that five of his books, written in secret, will be published between 2015 and 2020. Can't wait to read them. Can't wait to forget this movie. Read full review
20
Village VoiceAlan ScherstuhlSep 4, 2013
What the movie gets hilariously, howlingly wrong is the idea that a life like Salinger's—so extraordinary, yet so willfully humdrum—could somehow be captured by the most shopworn of cinematic techniques. Read full review
10
The DissolveNathan RabinSep 5, 2013
Salinger thinks it’s big, important news, but it’s barely a footnote. Read full review
0
SlateDana StevensSep 5, 2013
That mystery is certainly hardy enough to withstand the voyeuristic onslaught of this self-aggrandizing, lurid documentary, which leaves the viewer feeling that we’ve been given a tour of Salinger’s septic tank in hip waders without ever getting to knock on his door and say hello. Read full review
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