Tesla
IFC Films | Release Date (Streaming): August 21, 2020 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
67
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 30 Critic Reviews
Positive:
20
Mixed:
10
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
ConsequenceClint WorthingtonFeb 2, 2020
Both here and in the real world, Tesla is more legend than man, and we can only ever really comprehend him through that warped lens. Almereyda understands this fundamental hurdle in the biopic formula, and leans into it with refreshing candor. Read full review
90
PolygonKaren HanAug 27, 2020
The film’s experimental nature makes it tougher to swallow than a conventional biopic, but also more interesting and rewarding to engage with. Great performances help keep the whole enterprise anchored — Hawke and MacLachlan are wonderful as men caught in conflict with each other — and the anachronisms provide food for thought long after the film has ended. Read full review
90
Los Angeles TimesJustin ChangAug 20, 2020
What comes through most in Hawke’s brilliantly internalized performance is Tesla’s intense commitment to his work, as well as his weariness about having to continually explain and defend it to men of deeper pockets and lesser minds. The progress of human civilization can be infuriatingly banal, which doesn’t mean our biopics have to be. Read full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperAug 20, 2020
I found it to be a fantastically creative, fourth-wall-breaking, pop-art waking dream. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneyFeb 2, 2020
The degree to which the Tesla story syncs with Almereyda's abiding fascinations is clear in every frame of this contemplative, questioning, soulfully philosophical film. Read full review
78
Austin ChronicleRichard WhittakerAug 19, 2020
It's rebellious within an era of restraint, bathing Tesla in glowing pastel shades in a time of mahogany, leather, and steam. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliAug 23, 2020
It’s an arthouse production made with arthouse audiences in mind but I found it to be a more compelling experience than the equally “important” (but entirely too safe) "Radioactive," which played in the same general historical era with less zest. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineChuck BowenAug 14, 2020
A profound sense of restlessness and loneliness haunts Michael Almereyda’s film, which reinvigorates the biopic genre. Read full review
75
The Film StageDan MeccaFeb 2, 2020
The messy creativity on display is something to admire. Read full review
75
IndieWireDavid EhrlichFeb 2, 2020
If Almereyda fails to pierce the inventor’s skin and expose his circuity, his gauzy film nevertheless has fun exploring the idea that we’re all wired differently. Read full review
70
New York Magazine (Vulture)Bilge EbiriAug 21, 2020
Bizarre, bewitching film. Read full review
70
Film ThreatAlex SavelievAug 21, 2020
The filmmaker goes for broke, deliberately setting sequences against painted backgrounds or giant black-and-white photographs. There’s a moment when Tesla belts out Tears for Fears’ “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” into a mic. Such embellishments could’ve potentially led to a mess, but in Almereyda’s capable hands, they somehow coalesce into a dreamlike whole. Read full review
70
Rolling StonePeter TraversAug 20, 2020
A striking film that frustratingly never coheres but still holds you in thrall. Read full review
70
The New York TimesA.O. ScottAug 20, 2020
You might not learn everything there is to know about Tesla — that’s what the internet is for — but you will nonetheless feel illuminated by his presence. Read full review
70
Screen DailyTim GriersonFeb 2, 2020
It can be a challenge to get on this movie’s frequency, but the strange signals Tesla emits are nonetheless fascinating. Read full review
67
Entertainment WeeklyLeah GreenblattAug 21, 2020
Amidst all his meta tricks — the winky callouts to Wikipedia, the deliberately kitsch sets and incongruous soundtrack — Tesla’s own story ultimately fades; a small, bright light lost in the bigger spectacle. Read full review
67
The PlaylistJessica KiangFeb 2, 2020
The supporting cast, fine craft, and the appealingly idiosyncratic approach to history, legacy, and storytelling summon as much energy as they can and fling it Tesla’s way. Whatever he’s made of in Almereyda’s film, it’s a perfect insulator and generates no sparks. Read full review
65
The VergeAdi RobertsonFeb 25, 2020
Tesla has oddball panache and is probably more compelling than a conventional period piece would be. Read full review
63
Boston GlobeMark FeeneyAug 19, 2020
A subplot involving Sarah Bernhardt (Rebecca Dayan) seems to have wandered in from another, less watchable movie. It might have been for the best if Eve Hewson, as J.P. Morgan’s daughter and Tesla’s sort-of love interest, had wandered out. Read full review
63
LarsenOnFilmJosh LarsenAug 19, 2020
There’s a playfulness and a romanticism to the technique—a way of placing the characters both within and without history—that elevates Tesla from being a snarky art installation to something, presumably like Tesla himself, with a soul. Read full review
60
The GuardianEllen E JonesSep 28, 2020
To watch Tesla the film is to admire its ambition while regretting its follies. Much like Tesla the man, perhaps? Read full review
58
UproxxVince ManciniAug 27, 2020
Almereyda making a show of himself as storyteller takes away from his story, and seems to betray a lack of confidence in it. Read full review
58
The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyAug 19, 2020
Far from the flamboyant figure of fantasy and popular myth, this version of the inventor is totally interiorized. Read full review
50
Original-CinJim SlotekSep 21, 2020
Static… low energy… no spark to speak of. A weak biopic of Nicola Tesla, the man who defined our electric lives, practically begs for shameful puns. For that, I apologize. Read full review
50
RogerEbert.comMatt Zoller SeitzAug 21, 2020
It inadvertently puts Hawke in the position of having to carry a film that's more of a series of half-formed notions, some intriguing, others ill-advised, and a few verging perilously close to cute. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleG. Allen JohnsonAug 19, 2020
Hawke is effectively brooding, which recalls his first collaboration with Almereyda, a 2000 adaptation of “Hamlet” set in modern-day New York City. Read full review
50
The Associated PressJake CoyleAug 18, 2020
While its ideas are often intriguing, the movie feels like high-concept scaffolding that only thinly conceals it hollowness. It’s a Tesla without electricity. Read full review
50
Movie NationRoger MooreAug 13, 2020
Hawke? He mumble-whispers his way through the notoriously introverted Tesla, not taking even a stab at a Croatian accent. That he sings in this same voice is kind of rubbing our noses in it. Read full review
50
CNNBrian LowryJul 24, 2020
Tesla even more aggressively incorporates documentary-style techniques and weird anachronisms into the drama. His story is essentially narrated by Morgan's daughter, Anne (Eve Hewson), in a way that gives the movie a decidedly off-kilter spin. At one point, Hawke even sings a few bars of the 1980s song "Everybody Wants to Rule the World," recorded decades after Tesla's death. Read full review
50
VarietyAmy NicholsonFeb 2, 2020
Almereyda lays tracks to take Tesla in a dozen wild directions. . . . Yet, having ordered the audience onboard, Almereyda doesn’t go anywhere with the gambit. Read full review
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