Small Axe: Alex Wheatle
Amazon Prime Video | Release Date (Streaming): December 11, 2020 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
77
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 19 Critic Reviews
Positive:
17
Mixed:
2
Negative:
0

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
CineVueLucy PopescuDec 6, 2020
Remarkably, this is Cole's first time in front of the camera. He approaches Alex’s emotional journey as a teenager with a sure touch, switching effortlessly between innocence and a gradual hardening. Read full review
90
The New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisDec 10, 2020
A film in which violence and stillness alternate with queasy regularity. Read full review
90
TheWrapAlonso DuraldeNov 29, 2020
Even as its lead character endures physical and psychological torment at the hands of authorities, the film is very much of a piece with the ebullience of “Small Axe,” as the ongoing themes of community, music and defiance play a huge role in the story. Read full review
88
LarsenOnFilmJosh LarsenDec 10, 2020
Reggae music is a through line in almost all five installments of Steve McQueen’s Small Axe anthology, but in Alex Wheatle, it’s a lifeline. Read full review
88
Movie NationRoger MooreNov 29, 2020
McQueen makes the viewer work towards understanding the themes and subtexts of these films. He gloriously recreates the jaw-dropping delight the bullied, racially-taunted kid experiences the first time he sees the shops and colorfully-attired street life of “his” people on moving day. Read full review
80
Time OutKaleem AftabAug 29, 2024
It's first and foremost a teenage coming-of-age tale​, 65 electric minutes​ ​packed with financial hardship, racial demonisation and reggae. Read full review
80
EmpireKambole CampbellDec 17, 2020
While it’s more sprawling than the other entries, Alex Wheatle is Small Axe’s strongest character piece, Wheatle’s coming-of-age and process of ‘unlearning’ the dogma of England’s white upper classes told with powerful emotivity and clarity. Read full review
80
VarietyOwen GleibermanDec 11, 2020
“Alex Wheatle” is like a sketch for the biopic it might have been, but by the end you feel you’ve glimpsed the key fragment of a life. Read full review
80
Screen DailyFionnuala HalliganDec 7, 2020
It would take a hard heart not to break at the sight of Alex Wheatle (now a much-loved children’s author in the UK), sitting frozen on the sofa as his friend’s mother prepares his first-ever Christmas meal. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneyNov 29, 2020
At just a fraction over an hour, the film doesn't match the narrative scope of Mangrove or Red, White and Blue. Nor does it have the enveloping intimacy of Lovers Rock, the only Small Axe entry not based on a true story. But its understated celebration of resilience and hope makes the compelling snapshot very much in keeping with the deeply personal nature of this project for McQueen. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comOdie HendersonDec 14, 2020
Even as a standalone feature, this installment falters by keeping its main character at arm’s length. We never get close enough to Alex Wheatle to feel as if we know him. Despite my mild dissatisfaction, I believe that distancing is on purpose, a part of the film’s design. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubAramide TinubuDec 9, 2020
A short coming-of-age film that works well within the Small Axe saga, Alex Wheatle has a a richness comparable to any long, drawn-out biopic that’s come from Hollywood of late, thanks to the the nuances McQueen layers into the story. Read full review
75
IndieWireEric KohnNov 29, 2020
It’s not episodic, but feels more like the first act of a larger story begging for further exploration. Nevertheless, with a complex, ever-evolving turn by newcomer Sheyi Cole at its center, the story it does offer up turns on McQueen’s usual sophisticated narrative techniques and the same striking penchant to render Black British culture in complex lyrical terms. Read full review
70
Little White LiesRogan GrahamFeb 14, 2022
While the beautiful directorial flourishes are still there – the fluid cinematography, striking performances and airtight soundtrack – Alex Wheatle is the first Small Axe film where the blend between the informative and the pointedly artistic feels a little unsettled. Read full review
70
Rolling StoneK. Austin CollinsDec 16, 2020
If Alex Wheatle proves less powerful than the other films in this series, that’s in large part because of the strengths of the series. Every entry in Small Axe is a study in expansive miniatures. None of these films flexes its muscle by way of length. They burrow. Alex Wheatle’s primary imperfection is that it almost doesn’t burrow enough. The intricacies of Wheatle’s inner life feel almost rushed through or limited in their illustration. I wanted to know more about this young man — which is also a sign that the film is doing something right. Read full review
70
VoxAlissa WilkinsonDec 9, 2020
Alex Wheatle plays like a conventional coming-of-age story, of sorts, but the film is a fitting addition to Small Axe, rounding out a picture of young manhood and serving up powerful images of isolation and courage. Read full review
67
ConsequenceClint WorthingtonDec 9, 2020
You may not come away feeling like you know much about Wheatle himself, but you get to spend an hour in his shoes. Read full review
60
The TelegraphAnita Singh Dec 9, 2020
McQueen’s work seldom features memorable lines; the moments that stay with you are the ones where nothing is said, and his camera stays fixed on an actor’s face. Read full review
58
The PlaylistRobert DanielsNov 30, 2020
Alex Wheatle combines the relevant themes that guide the prior “Small Axe” installments: music as an escape from one’s environment, police brutality, and a character adrift from his community — yet the writing struggles to connect the major plot points for big picture interpretations of Alex’s cultural self-education. Read full review
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