Savages
Universal Pictures | Release Date: July 6, 2012 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
59
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 41 Critic Reviews
Positive:
24
Mixed:
10
Negative:
7
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
88
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe WilliamsJul 5, 2012
At the confluence of altered states and state-sanctioned violence, this drug-fueled thriller is Stone's most successfully provocative picture since "JFK." Read full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertJul 4, 2012
A return to form for Stone's dark side, Savages generates ruthless energy and some, but not too much, humor. Read full review
83
Entertainment WeeklyOwen GleibermanJul 4, 2012
Savages is Oliver Stone doing what he should have done a long time ago: making a tricky, amoral, down-and-dirty crime thriller that's blessedly free of any social, topical, or political relevance. Read full review
80
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike ScottJul 6, 2012
Stone is generally given to deep thinking -- eternal fates are on the line. Not only does that lend the riveting and intense Savages a certain gravity, but it's also what separates his film from, say, your favorite Guy Ritchie movie. Here, we find an appealing depth amid the appalling violence. Read full review
80
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternJul 5, 2012
The violence is graphic, the dialogue can be awfully arch and the style is often mannered, but this long, dense adventure takes surprising side trips into thoughtfulness, ruefulness, whimsy and romance. It's high-grade entertainment sustained by a buoyant spirit. Read full review
80
New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierJul 5, 2012
Stone relies on his leads to guide us into this hyper-charged inferno, and they fit his juiced-up approach like James Woods and Woody Harrelson did in Stone's equally hopped-up "Salvador" and "Natural Born Killers." He gets us high on what they're selling before it goes south. Read full review
80
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzJul 4, 2012
This is, in fact, one of the more violent movies in recent memory. But Stone doesn't let anyone off easy. Violence has an effect here, has meaning, has relevance to the story. And that's a good thing; otherwise, it would be hard to stomach. Read full review
80
Boxoffice MagazinePete HammondJun 29, 2012
Savages is one of Stone's best movies with a ménage et trois love story giving some human dimension to its three young leads. Read full review
80
VarietyJustin ChangJun 28, 2012
Savages never quite captures the novel's diamond-hard sarcasm, it offers other satisfactions in its visceral immediacy, its overriding sense of danger and a clutch of performances that, whatever one's reservations about the characters, can't help but court the viewer's emotional investment. Read full review
75
New York PostKyle SmithJul 6, 2012
Despite its excesses, Savage" is never unintentionally funny, just gritty and mean. The run time is more than two hours, yet it's also tight: no drag, no waste, no message. Read full review
75
Portland OregonianShawn LevyJul 5, 2012
Stone seems to take a little vicarious pleasure in making these relative lightweights squirm in fear and confusion. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeTy BurrJul 5, 2012
Savages is Oliver Stone's strongest work in years - a stylish, violent, hallucinatory thriller with both a mean streak and a devilish sense of humor. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliJul 4, 2012
From an acting standpoint, Blake Lively makes a compelling case that she doesn't have what it takes to play this sort of a role; she lacks the chops to carry the elements of the movie in which she is expected to dominate. Read full review
70
New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinJul 7, 2012
The film is impressive. It has a bit of the cinematic whoop-de-doo of his noxious "Natural Born Killers," in which serial killers became existential heroes, celebrated for attaining absolute freedom. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesKenneth TuranJul 5, 2012
Stone is also a director who has often felt that anything worth doing is worth overdoing, and his weakness for bloody excesses of all sorts undermines much of his good work. You might not think that a motion picture called Savages could be too violent, too savage, but you would be wrong. Read full review
70
SalonAndrew O'HehirJul 5, 2012
Savages is enjoyable in a way that's almost but not quite intentional camp; it's like eating a dinner made by a 7-year-old, with cake for every course, interspersed with Jell-O, Pepperidge Farm goldfish and chocolate sprinkles. Read full review
70
The New York TimesA.O. ScottJul 5, 2012
Savages is a daylight noir, a western, a stoner buddy movie and a love story, which is to say that it is a bit of a mess. But also a lot of fun, especially as its pulp elements rub up against some gritty geopolitical and economic themes. Read full review
70
TimeRichard CorlissJul 5, 2012
Savages isn't great cinema, but it's a very alive movie about people who probably ought to be dead. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthyJun 28, 2012
Savages represents at least a partial resurrection of the director's more hallucinatory, violent, sexual and, in a word, savage side. Read full review
67
Christian Science MonitorPeter RainerJul 6, 2012
Savages isn't about anything except flashily directed mayhem. In this nest of vipers, it's the slitheriest varieties that survive – at least for a time. Read full review
67
The A.V. ClubAlison WillmoreJul 4, 2012
Like "Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps" and "W.," Savages feels like Stone softballing something he should be skewering - in this case, SoCal entitlement and faux-progressive hypocrisy. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleMarjorie BaumgartenJul 4, 2012
There's so much that's so right in Oliver Stone's dizzying new crime thriller that its impediments stick out like speed bumps. You'll know you've hit one when your vertiginous sense of WTF screeches to a manageable – and much duller – pace. Read full review
67
IndieWireEric KohnJul 3, 2012
Stone's uneven direction veers from near-amateurish genre antics to an enjoyable awareness of those same standards. Read full review
63
Washington PostAnn HornadayJul 5, 2012
Savages is a B-movie striving for an A-plus, a decadently energetic summer escape with bloody action, bold visuals and bodacious attitude to burn. Read full review
60
Total FilmKen McIntyreSep 1, 2012
Savages is punishing in places, but there are enough colourful characters and careening twists to make it worth the effort. Read full review
55
MovielineStephanie ZacharekJul 5, 2012
Stone's moralism, coupled with discreet but bloody beatings, shootouts and all manner of tawdry goings on, rings hollow. The picture is neither entertaining nor preachy – it is simply very loudly meh. Read full review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Liam LaceyJul 5, 2012
So why does Savages feel so calculated, cutesy, free of suspense and trashy only in the uninteresting sense? No doubt, Stone is trying... but it all feels more like flexing atrophied muscles rather than creating a believable experience. Read full review
50
USA TodayClaudia PuigJul 5, 2012
Savages comes off as director Oliver Stone trying to rekindle his "Natural Born Killers" mojo from 1994. But when the bigger-name stars show up here in cartoonish roles, things feel more silly than gritty. Read full review
50
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaJul 5, 2012
Who knows if it was Del Toro's idea, or Stone's, but at a particularly crucial - and criminal - moment, as a very bad thing is about to occur, the actor twirls his mustache menacingly, like a Mexican Snidely Whiplash. Yes, Savages is that kind of story. Read full review
50
Chicago ReaderJ.R. JonesJul 5, 2012
The true schism here, however, is between the brainless fun of the action plot and Stone's cheap exploitation of the cartels' real-life sadism. Read full review
50
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsJul 5, 2012
It's not as if Stone is above this sort of pulp. But as rejiggered for the movies, Savages has trouble making us care what happens to the beautiful people - the untouchables - at the center of the sun-baked fairy tale. Read full review
50
Village VoiceKarina LongworthJul 3, 2012
Soul is something Savages has in short supply, not least because Kitsch and Johnson register as blanks on-screen. In contrast, Hayek and del Toro, both sporting apparently intentionally terrible wigs, give big, scenery-chewing performances and earn our interest and empathy even while committing heinous acts. Read full review
40
EmpireWilliam ThomasSep 17, 2012
What could have been an effective excoriation of US drug policy and a proper look at the violence inherent in the trade is wasted on a simplistic thriller that offers very little, especially given who is behind the camera. Sorry if that harshes anyone's buzz. Read full review
40
Time OutJoshua RothkopfJul 3, 2012
This time, Stone is just sloshing around in the shallow end. When John Travolta and Benicio Del Toro show up for extended, cartoonish dialogues, you'll wonder what year it is, and let out a sigh of relief that the moment is long gone. Read full review
38
Slant MagazineJesse CataldoJul 5, 2012
While his classic hyperbolic visual style is back in force, Stone can't bother to muster any of his usual righteous anger, instead mischanneling his discontent into a kind of zen acceptance of these perpetually tiresome main characters. Read full review
30
The New YorkerDavid DenbyJul 19, 2012
If the rest of the movie had been on Travolta's level of sly knowingness, it might have been a hip classic, rather than what it is -- a summertime debauch. [23 July 2012, p. 81]
25
ObserverRex ReedJul 11, 2012
These are neither good people nor interesting savages, and they're not worth caring about. Neither is the movie. Read full review
25
Tampa Bay TimesSteve PersallJul 4, 2012
An amoral mosaic of carnage and carnality. Read full review
25
Miami HeraldRene RodriguezJul 3, 2012
Aggressively, defiantly stupid. Read full review
20
The GuardianPeter BradshawSep 21, 2012
Sadly, Savages plays up to Stone's worst tendencies: machismo, bombast and self-indulgence, and the factor that could conceivably have made this movie tolerable – humour – is off the menu. Read full review
0
San Francisco ChronicleAmy BiancolliJul 5, 2012
So. What part of this is boring? All of it. Read full review
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