The Blackening
Lionsgate | Release Date: June 16, 2023 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
67
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 34 Critic Reviews
Positive:
24
Mixed:
8
Negative:
2

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
ConsequenceMarcus ShorterJun 14, 2023
The Blackening is tense, funny, and thoughtful. It’s a miracle when any movie expertly hits that hat trick but even more so when it does it with this much confidence. Read full review
90
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Sarah-Tai BlackJun 14, 2023
Even if its cultural and artistic stakes remain relatively low in the grand scheme of things, The Blackening – whose enjoyment absolutely lies in the fact that it both knows exactly the confines it’s working within and doesn’t take itself too seriously – is still a hell of a good time. Read full review
88
RogerEbert.comPeyton RobinsonJun 16, 2023
The Blackening is an unapologetically Black comedy through and through. It maintains its wit and bite to the very end, boastfully serving audiences a hilarious film we didn’t know we needed. Read full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperJun 14, 2023
With the ensemble cast doing superb work, The Blackening is a horror comedy that packs a serious punch. Read full review
84
PolygonTasha RobinsonSep 14, 2023
The Blackening is a strange movie, and often a very silly one. But the creators can at least boast that they’ve put something on screen that horror fans don’t see often, and won’t be expecting. Read full review
80
Total FilmKen McIntyreAug 11, 2023
Director Tim Story (Barbershop, Ride Along, 2005’s Fantastic Four) skewers Hollywood convention and urban stereotypes in a rapid-fire satire that manages to be both scathing and affectionate. If the plot ultimately feels a tad stretched - despite the 97-minute run time - you’ll likely be having too much fun to care. Read full review
80
Film ThreatBenjamin FranzJul 6, 2023
While it will not win many (if any) awards, The Blackening is hands down the best time that has been offered up in a movie theater since the Dungeons and Dragons movie last March. This horror comedy plays with genre conventions in a sparkling and vividly delightful way. Read full review
80
The New York TimesLisa KennedyJun 15, 2023
The Blackening comes with a horror movie’s requisite skittish and stalking camerawork, its creaks and breath-holding hushes, its gore and payback. But it is the friends’ flee, fight, freeze — or throw under the bus — banter that makes the film provocative fun. Read full review
80
VarietyOwen GleibermanJun 14, 2023
The Blackening is a slasher movie that’s also a slapdash enjoyable social satire. That the satire turns out to be sharper than the scares isn’t a problem — it’s all part of the film’s slovenly demonic party atmosphere. Read full review
80
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzJun 14, 2023
Not every bit lands and the social commentary is not always exactly incisive. Sometimes it is, though. When a character says they should call the police and everyone breaks out into simultaneous guffaws, the point is made — fittingly, with laughter. Read full review
80
The GuardianAndrew LawrenceJun 14, 2023
As a horror The Blackening isn’t the scariest. But that’s not the point of this film – a Fubu satire smack in the sweet spot between Get Out and Scary Movie. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliJun 20, 2023
The Blackening is a flat-out satire from frame #1, and there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s a breath of fresh air in what has become a very stale multiplex atmosphere. Read full review
75
CNNBrian LowryJun 16, 2023
Like other self-referential horror/comedies (the “Scream” franchise come to mind), the film ably delivers on its premise, mining enough life from its satirical concept to deliver plenty of crowd-pleasing moments. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleZaki HasanJun 15, 2023
This is a horror movie the way the original “Ghostbusters” is a horror movie –– that is to say, not really — and like that film, there’s a “hanging out with friends” energy that gives The Blackening its charm. Read full review
75
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsJun 14, 2023
It’s a comedy with a lot of very big laughs. Read full review
75
Paste MagazineMatt DonatoJun 14, 2023
It’s better as a comedy than as a wickedly sharpened thriller, making The Blackening one of those surefire “see it with a crowd” pleasers. Read full review
75
IndieWireRafael MotamayorJun 14, 2023
More importantly, the film specifically examines Blackness through the lens of whiteness, making a white man the enemy and showing how an outside force wreaks havoc among the closed group. The film jokes about Black suffering, but this is far from trauma porn. It’s a truly Black horror comedy. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubTimothy CogshellJun 14, 2023
The movie is highly entertaining, while being oddly validating and very funny. It cleverly weaves the horror tropes that it rebukes right into the narrative. And it’s done without slipping into parody like the Scary Movie series, where similar notions are skewered more broadly and, with The Blackening now on the table, way less successfully. Read full review
70
Screen DailyTim GriersonJun 14, 2023
Even when the jokes occasionally fall flat, the ideas are killer. Read full review
67
Original-CinThom ErnstJun 16, 2023
The film works, mostly as a comedy, never as a horror, but would work better if Story didn’t squander the film’s potential with an uneven script that fluctuates between extremes. Read full review
67
ColliderChase HutchinsonJun 15, 2023
Even as not all the jokes land, the rare experience of getting to take in a spoof comedy like this makes it worthwhile all the same. Read full review
67
The Film StageJared MobarakJun 14, 2023
When the entire cast embraces the self-deprecating nature needed to lean into the stereotypes while also calling them out, it’s impossible not to climb onboard via comedy alone. If the twists and turns are hardly shocking, that bluntness is the point. Read full review
63
Washington PostOlivia McCormackJun 14, 2023
The framing may use the tropes of horror, but the film’s light tone — with jump scares more often used for comedic effect — defuses the tension required to make viewers feel on the verge of snapping. Read full review
63
Movie NationRoger MooreJun 14, 2023
Veteran director Tim Story (“Barbershop,”Shaft”) knows to keep the camera where the joke is –in everybody’s face — and the pace quick enough for The Blackening to skip along its well-worn path, making merry and making scary the way of many a Wayans Brother did before them. Read full review
60
The TelegraphRobbie CollinAug 25, 2023
The film’s tendency to go broad wherever possible renders it fairly un-scary, while in place of Get Out’s deep and needling cultural allegory we instead get pointed jabs at American film and television trends. It’s all good fun as far as it goes, but Story and his cast could have afforded to sharpen their own blades a bit. Read full review
60
The Irish TimesDonald ClarkeAug 23, 2023
Are we supposed to be scared or are we supposed to be laughing at the absurdity of it all? Happily, the actors throw enough energy at the screen to deflect any incoming frustration. An odd beast. Read full review
60
Little White LiesCheyenne BunsieAug 22, 2023
Bolstered by an entertaining cast, including Insecure’s Yvonne Orji, SNL’s Jay Pharoh, and Perkins himself as the standout, The Blackening turns one of horror’s most problematic tropes on its head and gets justice for all those black characters we never got to know. Read full review
60
EmpireKim NewmanAug 18, 2023
The Blackening is shuddery entertainment with more laughs than the entire Scary Movie franchise. Read full review
60
Los Angeles TimesKatie WalshJun 15, 2023
It succeeds as a comedy but not quite as a horror film, the genre merely a setting and style for sending up insidious character stereotypes. Read full review
50
New York Magazine (Vulture)Alison WillmoreJun 26, 2023
The Blackening gets halfway there, and has the benefit of some gifted performers and some very good ideas. It just never really figures out how to be a movie. Read full review
40
NMEKyann-Sian WilliamsAug 25, 2023
At its best, The Blackening is a fun, laugh-out-loud blockbuster that sends up the many genre clichés surrounding Black people in horror (mostly the notion that they always die first in horror films). At its worst, though, it’s a reductive slasher-comedy where most jokes earn a measly huff. Read full review
40
The Daily BeastNick SchagerJun 15, 2023
Would have no reason to exist if it didn’t constantly foreground the issue of race, and yet affords no pointed or amusing commentary on the subject. Read full review
35
SlashfilmMike ShuttJun 14, 2023
The Blackening is content to make a couple of easy observations and move on from the idea. It cuts itself off from actually maximizing what a great idea it is. If a meta-horror comedy can't nail its commentary, horror, or comedy, then it sadly isn't doing much. Read full review
30
Austin ChronicleJenny NulfJun 14, 2023
The Blackening feels like a cash grab, a film so blatantly made because “horror is so hot right now.” There’s no love for the genre, and if you don’t admire something to some degree, it’s hard to properly satirize it. Read full review
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