The Best of Enemies
STXfilms | Release Date: April 5, 2019 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
49
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 25 Critic Reviews
Positive:
11
Mixed:
9
Negative:
5
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
88
Movie NationRoger MooreApr 4, 2019
Bissell has made a film where the casting isn’t the only thing that’s “on-the-nose.” The message, where the film’s sympathies lie and its emphasis on the character with the bigger journey to make could earn it some “Green Book” styled blowback. Read full review
75
Film ThreatAlan NgApr 8, 2019
Tells a fascinating story backed up by solid, compelling performances by Rockwell and Henson. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliApr 5, 2019
My sense is that, while The Best of Enemies may be met by stinging criticism from the far left and far right (for different reasons), those with centrist leanings will appreciate it for what it is (as opposed to for what it isn’t). Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleApr 4, 2019
The movie also benefits from the presence of Anne Heche as Ellis’ wife. Heche doesn’t say much, but she conveys a lot. Read full review
75
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsApr 4, 2019
It’s a surprise and a small wonder, then, when The Best of Enemies starts getting good and pretty much stays that way to the end. This may be an apples/oranges comparison, but: For a true-ish story of racial animus, bone-deep prejudice and the American South in the civil rights era, it’s a better, more nuanced and more interesting feel-good movie than a certain, recent, less interesting Best Picture Academy Award winner we could mention. Read full review
70
VarietyOwen GleibermanApr 4, 2019
The Best of Enemies while not nearly as good as “Green Book,” is a rock-solid movie: squarely deliberate, a little long and predictable, but honest and thoughtful enough, precise in its period and locale, with very strong performances. Read full review
67
IndieWireDavid EhrlichApr 4, 2019
Robin Bissell’s The Best of Enemies may not be some kind of game-changing corrective to all the retrograde films about race in America (we’re talking about an uplifting historical biopic directed by the executive producer of “Seabiscuit”), but this sturdy drama has the good sense to recognize that allyship is only valuable when it’s hard. When it’s a sacrifice. When it forces white people to put some of their own skin in the game. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleMarc SavlovApr 3, 2019
Leads Henson (barely recognizable under a mountain of Tyler Perry-esque practical makeup) and Rockwell turn in top-notch, emotion-laden performances, buoyed by a supporting cast of equally fine character actors. Read full review
63
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperApr 5, 2019
Despite the strong performances and more than a few audience-pleasing moments where peace and love triumph over stupidity and bigotry, the film travels such an obvious path and falls into such a predictable rhythm, it doesn’t quite carry the emotional resonance such a powerful true-life story should convey. Read full review
63
The Associated PressJocelyn NoveckApr 4, 2019
While much of Bissell’s film is poignantly rendered, especially the spirited lead performances by Taraji P. Henson and Sam Rockwell, it has its flaws and its omissions. Read full review
63
Washington PostMark JenkinsApr 4, 2019
The Best of Enemies is perhaps the first account of the United States’s traumatic racial history that could be adapted into a sitcom. Read full review
60
The Hollywood ReporterCaryn JamesApr 4, 2019
While it lacks the ambition to turn its obvious plot into a film that feels new, it also avoids the pitfalls of moral smugness and stereotyping. It flows along easily, bolstered by Taraji P. Henson’s and Sam Rockwell’s vibrant performances. Read full review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Barry HertzApr 12, 2019
Luckily, Henson finds just enough in this thin movie to chew on, and every moment that the actress is on screen feels like we’re glimpsing the promise of a better, different movie to come. Read full review
50
Original-CinJim SlotekApr 10, 2019
The “beats” in the story where hearts are supposed to swell are so telegraphed as to render The Best of Enemies emotionally flat. There are no surprises, no change-ups, no setbacks in this collision of sensibilities. Read full review
50
New York PostSara StewartApr 5, 2019
As actor pairings go, you couldn’t hope for better than Oscar winner Sam Rockwell and nominee Taraji P. Henson. So why is The Best of Enemies such a slog? Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyApr 4, 2019
Bissell’s fudging of the facts (which includes completely making up the reasons behind the charrette) doesn’t create a story that’s more insightful or dramatically cohesive than the real thing; the only thing it reveals, if indirectly, is liberalism’s longstanding discomfort with the relationship between civil rights and labor movements. Read full review
50
TheWrapCandice FrederickApr 4, 2019
The Best of Enemies tries to remind us that simple solutions might exist if we could open our minds, but it undercuts itself by shortchanging its black female lead and ending on a very maudlin note that lacks punch. Read full review
50
The New York TimesA.O. ScottApr 3, 2019
Rather than illuminating the politics of the present by examining the struggles of the past, Bissell lurches from folksy comedy to clattering melodrama, producing the opposite of enlightenment. To quote an old protest song: When will we ever learn? Read full review
42
The PlaylistCory WoodruffApr 8, 2019
The Best of Enemies has good intentions, and some potent things to say, but its novice direction and limited perspective fail it from becoming anything other than this season’s Green Book. Read full review
40
Los Angeles TimesKatie WalshApr 4, 2019
Bissell has needlessly manipulated the real story, completely missing what makes it significant. Read full review
38
The Seattle TimesKatie WalshApr 4, 2019
The changes Bissell makes to the story are overly contrived, and the writing and editing are shaky. Most egregiously, Ann’s perspective is completely underwritten, without any personal history and the single humanizing factor of one daughter, who appears only briefly. Read full review
30
Screen DailyTim GriersonApr 5, 2019
No doubt the world needs more paeans to tolerance, but movies as ineffectual as The Best Of Enemies feel profoundly inadequate to the task. Read full review
25
Slant MagazineDerek SmithApr 4, 2019
The Best of Enemies may be based on a true story, but in so stubbornly turning the spotlight away from Atwater and the radical, grind-it-out community activism that took on the racism that Ellis helped to foster as a segregationist, it more accurately resembles an all-too-familiar Hollywood tall tale. Read full review
20
SlateInkoo KangApr 6, 2019
The key, according to the film, is dialogue and altruism — namely, black overtures to white hate. The onus is as misplaced as the movie’s sympathies. Read full review
12
RogerEbert.comOdie HendersonApr 5, 2019
This movie isn’t just tone-deaf, it’s ass backwards. Read full review
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