Sound of My Voice
Fox Searchlight Pictures | Release Date: April 27, 2012 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
67
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 30 Critic Reviews
Positive:
22
Mixed:
8
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
Boxoffice MagazineTodd GilchristApr 21, 2012
Sound of My Voice offers promise and pay off at the same time. Star and writer Brit Marling is having a rare double-whammy of a debut. Read full review
88
USA TodayClaudia PuigMay 3, 2012
This clever, low-budget film kicks the concept up a few notches to mesmerizing. Read full review
83
The A.V. ClubAlison WillmoreApr 25, 2012
Like "Martha Marcy May Marlene," Sound Of My Voice plausibly demonstrates how someone's sense of self and certainty can be eroded, and like "Another Earth," it was co-written by actress Brit Marling, a melancholy, luminous presence as the group's leader. Read full review
83
Entertainment WeeklyOwen GleibermanApr 25, 2012
Sound of My Voice doesn't follow through on everything it sets up, yet it has a hushed and revealing psycho-intensity. It also has an oh-wow Twilight Zone ending that truly made me go, ''Oh, wow.'' Read full review
80
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike ScottAug 24, 2012
Open-ended and decidedly un-Hollywood, it is faintly dissatisfying, especially coming on the heels of such as engaging and crisply presented story. But it offers movie-goers a wonderful opportunity to roll it all around in their heads and discuss it, even debate it, as they drive back to that cozy little cult compound they call home. Read full review
80
Total FilmRob JamesJul 28, 2012
Like "Martha Marcy May Marlene," this lo-fi psychodrama reaps the benefits of a mesmerising female lead, only this time as cult leader not disciple. Marling continues to impress. Read full review
80
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzMay 16, 2012
Creepy, confounding and more than a little curious. It's also quietly compelling. Read full review
80
SalonAndrew O'HehirApr 30, 2012
Sound of My Voice has such creepy-crawly, brain-tickling energy that I wanted a much bigger payoff out of the final collision of all these people and episodes. Maybe they're saving that for the sequel. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterKirk HoneycuttApr 21, 2012
Now Batmanglij and Marling deliver another terrific and engrossing venture into speculative fiction, Sound of My Voice. Read full review
80
VarietyJustin ChangApr 21, 2012
Two documentary filmmakers infiltrate a mysterious cult, only to find themselves drawn into the leader's insidious grip, in the taut, compelling low-budget feature Sound of My Voice. Read full review
75
St. Louis Post-DispatchCalvin WilsonJun 1, 2012
Denham impressively captures Peter's flintiness, rendering him sympathetic yet not quite likable, and Vicius is just right as the wary Lorna. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeWesley MorrisMay 10, 2012
It's as much a satire as a mystery, a film as much about art as it is about faith. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertMay 9, 2012
The Sound of My Voice never precisely declares whether her story is true. Without going into detail, I can say that the film never precisely declares anything to be true. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaMay 3, 2012
An economical thriller, both narratively and budgetarily, Sound of My Voice serves up moments of extreme dread and discomfort, but works a winning undercurrent of playful absurdity into the material as well. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Stephen ColeApr 26, 2012
The star of Sound of My Voice is co-screenwriter, female lead Brit Marling, who plays Maggie with melancholy, amusement and scorn. Compulsively watchable, she can change who we think she is by simply turning her face. In profile, she's Vanessa Redgrave. Laughing, she becomes Debbie Reynolds. Marling might become a great character actress. Let's hope the movies use her well. Read full review
70
The New York TimesManohla DargisApr 27, 2012
A smart, effectively unsettling movie about the need to believe and the hard, cruel arts of persuasion. Read full review
70
TimeMary PolsApr 27, 2012
The movie explores the basic debate over faith, the idea that we can feel a sense of relief in cynicism realized and turn around and face the horror of our lack of faith in the next moment. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesRobert AbeleApr 26, 2012
With storytelling economy and dramatic precision often missing from today's independent films, Batmanglij augments the building blocks for a nifty paranoid thriller with sharp commentary on our faction-centered society and the pitfalls of reinvention. Read full review
70
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternApr 26, 2012
The film is thin and mannered, even though many of the mannerisms are intrinsic to its shrewd vision of cult behavior. There's no arguing, though - and who would want to? - Ms. Marling's extraordinary gift for taking the camera and weaving a spell. Read full review
70
New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinApr 23, 2012
Batmanglij keeps the movie even-keeled, full of medium close-ups, underscored by ambient plinks and shimmers, with nothing to break the trance until a last scene that upends everything we thought we knew. Read full review
67
Portland OregonianM. E. RussellMay 10, 2012
The movie is directed with real confidence by Batmanglij. He lets his actors breathe, builds suspense in one group-purge brainwashing scene, and lets the mystery unfold in an immersive way that's probably a bit more compelling than its actual scripted payoff deserves. Read full review
63
Charlotte ObserverLawrence ToppmanMay 24, 2012
This visually engaging, well-acted story held me for an hour as tightly as anything I've seen this year. But as we neared the climax, I realized only a miracle could resolve the contradictions of the tale – and we didn't get one. Read full review
60
MovielineStephanie ZacharekApr 30, 2012
It's hard to say whether Sound of My Voice is a wholly bogus and pretentious indie enterprise or a weirdly compelling bit of low-budget storytelling. Read full review
60
New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierApr 26, 2012
Despite some tough-to-take moments, this challenging, smart movie is worth the trip. Read full review
60
Time OutDavid FearApr 24, 2012
Ambiguities trump answers, and possibly even logic. For those who aren't burdened by such things, the loopy, off-kilter pace and frontal-lobe frying provide their own unconventional pleasures. It's a cult film, in more ways than one. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleAmy BiancolliMay 3, 2012
Given the number of real-world cults that have ended in major bloodshed, there's some irony - and no small narrative coquetry - in any drama on the subject that ducks out so pointedly at the finish. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleMarjorie BaumgartenMay 2, 2012
In the end, the film doesn't add up to much of anything, but its individual parts are sometimes greater than its whole. Read full review
50
New York PostLou LumenickApr 27, 2012
Holds your attention for a while, but fails to build much suspense as it races toward a predictable climax. It probably would have worked better as a series of Webisodes, which reportedly was the original plan. Read full review
50
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanApr 26, 2012
Does it matter that Maggie might be a charlatan if she's truly capable of helping people? That's the film's most intriguing, and open-ended, question - not the more gimmicky one that will leave you hanging, and probably disappointed, at the end. Read full review
40
Village VoiceKarina LongworthApr 24, 2012
The bland, jittery visual "realism" can't counteract overheated performances of tin-eared dialogue, which strain for pulp but often land at soap. Read full review
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