Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring
Sony Pictures Classics | Release Date: April 2, 2004 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
85
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 29 Critic Reviews
Positive:
28
Mixed:
1
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Christian Science MonitorDavid Sterritt
Kim's movie conjures a sense of spiritual discipline as suspenseful as it is stunning to watch and exhilarating to contemplate. Read full review
100
San Francisco ChronicleCarla Meyer
A masterful portrait of the seasons of a life. Read full review
100
Charlotte ObserverLawrence Toppman
This meditation on spirituality, loneliness and accountability could touch your heart's core. Read full review
91
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
The triumph of ''Spring, Summer'' is that even those of us who don't happen to be Buddhists can catch a glimpse of ourselves in the spinning wheel of hope, destruction, suffering, and bliss. Read full review
90
The New York TimesDana Stevens
An exquisitely simple movie. Mr. Kim manages to isolate something essential about human nature and at the same time, even more astonishingly, to comprehend the scope of human experience. Read full review
90
L.A. WeeklyScott Foundas
The film unfolds at a deliberate pace, with a soundtrack occupied less by dialogue than by the sounds of water flowing and crickets chirping. And if you listen carefully enough, you might just hear the sound of one hand clapping. Read full review
90
Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan
As meditative and beautiful as its title would indicate. What is a surprise is the extent to which it manages to be involving if you can put yourself on its wavelength. Read full review
90
New York Magazine (Vulture)Peter Rainer
Kim exalts nature--life’s passage--without stooping to sentimentality. He sees the tooth and claw, and he sees the transcendence. Whether this is a Buddhist attribute, I cannot say, but the impression this movie leaves is profound: Here is an artist who sees things whole. Read full review
90
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
This beautiful -- and beautifully controlled -- film is also an object lesson in how to hypnotize an audience.
90
Washington PostDesson Thomson
Truly a movie for world audiences with a message that's devastatingly subtle. Read full review
89
Austin ChronicleMarrit Ingman
Proof that movies don’t always have to be busy to entertain and enrich, this tale of life at a bucolic Korean monastery is at once profound and simple. Read full review
88
Boston GlobeTy Burr
The film is as spare and unvarnished as a wooden temple floating on a lake, but its reflections run deep, and it can ripple your thoughts for months. Read full review
88
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
Using perfectly composed shots to amplify an emotionally resonant story, the film successfully argues that "artistic" films do not have to be boring. Read full review
88
PremiereGlenn Kenny
Beautiful, lyrical, but not in the least bit wimpy. [May 2004, p. 18]
88
Chicago TribuneMichael Wilmington
An exquisitely realized film; a little gem, it keeps its conflicting or varying themes of tranquility and violence, sacred and profane love, recklessness and wisdom, in almost perfect balance. Read full review
88
Philadelphia InquirerCarrie Rickey
Proves that the most local story is sometimes the most universal, the simplest tale sometimes the most complex. Read full review
88
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
This delicate, transporting movie, which keeps dialogue to a minimum to tell its story primarily through images, is also a triumph of sheer cinematic craft that mirrors its characters' contemplative natures while extolling the virtues of lives simply led. Read full review
88
Baltimore SunChris Kaltenbach
Spring, Summer values life, beauty and even human fallibility, ascribing to humanity a nobility we neglect at our own peril. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterKirk Honeycutt
Kim Ki-duk keeps dialogue to a minimum and actions simple in what is virtually a two-character piece. Humor arrives organically, often resulting in hearty laughs. Read full review
80
VarietyDerek Elley
A sublime, witty, gritty and transcendental movie reflecting one man's life journey. Read full review
80
Village VoiceMichael Atkinson
Far from a maxim-expounding sermon, the film is a fresh spring of irrational visual pleasure. Read full review
80
Dallas ObserverStaff (Not credited)
This subtly entrancing paean to seasons earthly and emotional is to the developing male psyche what "Whale Rider" is to the female, and deserves equal acclaim. Read full review
80
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
Wise, gentle, and simply constructed. Read full review
75
New York Daily NewsElizabeth Weitzman
Where Kim's best-known movie, "The Isle," was a stomach-churner, this beautifully composed canvas is the sort of film one falls into, resurfacing at the end with great reluctance. Read full review
75
New York PostV.A. Musetto
In the end, inner peace is found by all - on screen and in the audience. Read full review
70
The A.V. ClubNoel Murray
It IS a little obvious, but that's the way it goes with spiritual enlightenment. The film's lessons are plain--spoken aloud, even--and deal with the close relationship between what can be shed in this life and what binds people to the world in spite of their best efforts to purify. Read full review
70
TV Guide MagazineKen Fox
Exquisitely crafted drama. Read full review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Liam Lacey
Looking like some gorgeous fan painting come to life, Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter . . . and Spring is pictorially spellbinding. Read full review
60
Washington PostPhillip Kennicott
Though lacking in any particular narrative surprise, the film nevertheless takes the viewer completely by surprise several times. Read full review
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