Summering
Bleecker Street Media | Release Date: August 12, 2022 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
50
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 17 Critic Reviews
Positive:
5
Mixed:
8
Negative:
4
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
83
ColliderErick MassotoAug 12, 2022
Summering provides the perfect territory for whoever wants to feel nostalgic about childhood, or just wants to enjoy spending time with kids trading clever banter. But the journey gets a little less sweet once you realize that the movie lets go of basic logic just so its main characters can have a bit of fun and bring their journey full circle. Read full review
80
TheWrapWilliam BibbianiAug 11, 2022
James Ponsoldt (“The Spectacular Now”) keeps his film permanently trapped in a liminal space between childhood and adolescence, where magic is real but intangible and largely metaphoric. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesChris HewittAug 14, 2022
There’s a sense that nature is speaking to the girls, perhaps because they’re still clinging to an age when imagination trumps reality, whatever that is. They’re also capable of seeing magical things that the adults in their lives no longer notice. Read full review
70
Screen DailyWendy IdeJan 29, 2022
Key to the film’s appeal is the way that the friendship between the four girls, Dina, Lola, Daisy (Lisa Barnett), and Mari (Eden Grace Redfield), is persuasively brought to life. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleMatthew MonagleAug 11, 2022
While James Ponsoldt (The Spectacular Now, The End of the Tour) authors a slightly uneven depiction of childhood, Summering still captures the gentle doom of being aware that your life is about change forever. Read full review
60
Rolling StoneDavid FearAug 9, 2022
Summering works better as a mood than it does a movie, succeeding in channeling a certain feeling of transition despite ambling, or occasionally stumbling though more traditional kids-flicks narrative beats. Read full review
50
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliAug 15, 2022
Older viewers may lose patience with the thinness of the narrative. Nostalgia might keep them watching but there’s only so far that can go and 90 minutes is too much to ask without the correspondingly intriguing story that Summering lacks. Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubLeigh MonsonAug 10, 2022
Summering may be a breezy little trip through the nostalgia of youth, but its stabs at deeper meaning are woefully immature. Read full review
50
The PlaylistJason BaileyJan 29, 2022
All in all, Summering is a very nice movie – sweet, affectionate, nostalgic, harmless – so it’s tempting to give it a pass. But “nice” and “compelling,” sadly, are not the same thing. Read full review
50
VarietyGuy LodgeJan 29, 2022
Nostalgia may be the strongest emotion engendered by this breeze-blown dandelion seed of a film, which nods to the bittersweet complexities of growing up and confronting adulthood, but never gets as far as fully dramatizing them. Read full review
42
The Film StageChristopher SchobertJan 29, 2022
Had [Ponsoldt] truly trusted his young performers and crafted the script accordingly, Summering could have been something special. Instead he’s made a film as unfocused and forgettable as a rainy late-summer afternoon. These characters deserve better. Read full review
42
IndieWireNatalia WinkelmanJan 29, 2022
A misfire that’s as stilted as it is inert. Read full review
40
The Hollywood ReporterAngie HanJan 29, 2022
Its potential for magic is dulled by uneven performances, unconvincing chemistry and an uninspiring script. Summering ends up a movie that’s easier to appreciate for what it’s trying to do than love for what it’s actually doing. Read full review
38
RogerEbert.comMarya E. GatesAug 12, 2022
The nostalgia of Ponsoldt's film is curdled and rotten underneath its summery sheen. Read full review
38
Movie NationRoger MooreAug 10, 2022
So yes, there’s the whiff of Stephen King’s story “The Body” to this, with emotional BFF bonding and the like. But barely a note of this contrived, Nutrasweetened melodrama engages, even on those rare instances in which something rings true. Read full review
36
Paste MagazineAndrew CrumpAug 12, 2022
Everyone has off days, or in his case off years. But Summering extends those off years into Ponsoldt’s most puzzling effort so far, a genre jumble roping together a kid-detective novel, a ghost story, a hokey “do you know where your children are” PSA and a coming-of-age dramedy. Read full review
20
Screen RantNadir SamaraAug 12, 2022
Summering is a slow and ultimately boring mystery that does little to portray youth in a meaningful way. Read full review
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