The Book of Henry
Focus Features | Release Date: June 16, 2017 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
31
METASCORE
Generally unfavorable reviews based on 31 Critic Reviews
Positive:
2
Mixed:
15
Negative:
14
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
88
ObserverJoshua DudleyJun 20, 2017
The Book of Henry is a wildly imaginative film with a lot of shifting parts, and an absolutely huge heart. A film this original deserves to be seen and felt. Read full review
70
We Got This CoveredBernard BooJun 21, 2017
The Book of Henry is a hair away from being in league with the most ludicrous Lifetime original movies, but its cast, slick production and Trevorrow’s willingness to take risks make it an oddball chunk of entertainment you’ll be sure to tell your friends about, whether you liked, loved or loathed it. Read full review
60
EmpireIan FreerJun 19, 2017
After a gentle engaging start, The Book Of Henry makes an ill-judged move into thriller territory. But the performances, especially from Jaeden Lieberher, are strong and it delivers that rare cinematic treat: a real surprise. Read full review
50
RogerEbert.comSusan WloszczynaJun 16, 2017
Suddenly, The Book of Henry turns into a not very believable thriller, complete with a ticking clock and a talent show. Read full review
50
The Seattle TimesSoren AndersenJun 15, 2017
The Book of Henry launches itself into cloud cuckooland and never returns to Earth. Read full review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Kate TaylorJun 15, 2017
This story soon turns excessively maudlin. Read full review
50
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliJun 15, 2017
Suspension of disbelief is an oh-so-tricky hurdle for a movie like this to overcome and The Book of Henry fails to achieve it. Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyJun 15, 2017
Director Colin Trevorrow (Jurassic World, Safety Not Guaranteed) lacks any of the eccentricities that might make this quirky and contrived material work, even at face value. Read full review
50
Movie NationRoger MooreJun 15, 2017
The only way to appreciate The Book of Henry is by treating it as the movie equivalent of a summer read, a beach book that tries to pack in the full breadth of human experience into a few too many pages. Read full review
50
IndieWireEric KohnJun 14, 2017
It’s intermittently funny, mopey, and tense, sometimes totally off-base but certainly ambitious in its approach. Read full review
42
The PlaylistDrew TaylorJun 15, 2017
The entire thing feels forced and hollow, less an authentic expression of the human experience and more a gee-whiz exercise in cleverness, slathered in a healthy coat of multiplex-friendly weirdness. Read full review
42
The Film StageDaniel SchindelJun 14, 2017
Watching The Book of Henry feels like being gaslit. Read full review
40
Time Out LondonCath ClarkeJun 19, 2017
The whole thing is boring and phony, with just a couple of lines of dialogue that feel sharp. Read full review
40
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzJun 15, 2017
Some movies are kind of fake good — at first blush they seem to have all the ingredients in place to be successful. But on further inspection, it’s all a trick. That’s the kind of movie this is. Read full review
40
Screen DailyTim GriersonJun 15, 2017
The only thing saving the film from utter catastrophe is Watts. Read full review
40
TheWrapDan CallahanJun 14, 2017
The really sad thing is that this is a movie with some intriguing characters that has some real comic and dramatic potential, but all this gets lost in increasingly silly plot mechanics. Read full review
40
The Hollywood ReporterJohn DeForeJun 14, 2017
The preposterousness of Gregg Hurwitz's screenplay isn't enough to throw star Naomi Watts off her game, and the actor's sincere performance may suffice to keep a segment of the family-film demographic on board, barely. Read full review
38
Rolling StonePeter TraversJun 15, 2017
The Book of Henry starts well, begins flirting with absurdity in the middle – and ends in crashing disaster. But the feeling persists that director Colin Treverrow believes every word in the shambles of a 20-year-old screenplay by crime novelist Gregg Hurwitz. Read full review
38
Boston GlobeTy BurrJun 14, 2017
The plot proceeds from the charming to the manipulative to the shameless to the demented in gentle steps that may lull some audiences the way a frog can be boiled to death by degrees. Read full review
37
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanJun 15, 2017
It’s the filmmaking equivalent of a monkey with the head of a goat, the tail of a fish, wings and teeny-tiny rat claws. Read full review
33
ConsequenceDominick Suzanne-MayerJun 16, 2017
It aims for the kind of sprawl that could contain a film with so many big ideas about death and grief and cruelty and salvation, but it’s somehow at once too modest for how bizarre it eventually gets and too excessive to meaningfully deliver on those emotions. Read full review
30
Village VoiceCraig D. LindseyJun 20, 2017
The Book of Henry is just a lunkheaded tearjerker that you’ll wish was even half as smart as its allegedly gifted protagonist. Read full review
30
VarietyOwen GleibermanJun 14, 2017
The film’s muted yet still rather flamboyant terribleness derives from the fact that it seems to be juggling three or four borderline schlock genres at once. Read full review
25
Entertainment WeeklyJoe McGovernJun 15, 2017
Lieberher delivered such a nuanced performance in Midnight Special (ditto Tremblay, in Room) that The Book of Henry can (we hope) just be chalked up to a case of early-career hiccups. Read full review
25
Slant MagazineKeith WatsonJun 14, 2017
Schmaltzy, manipulative, and tonally schizophrenic, The Book of Henry is such a monumentally misguided venture that it ends up being oddly, if unintentionally, compelling. Read full review
22
Paste MagazineAndrew CrumpJun 21, 2017
The Book of Henry means well, but it doesn’t do well. It does incoherent pastiche and self-congratulatory pap instead. Read full review
20
The New York TimesManohla DargisJun 15, 2017
A weepie, a thriller, a tragedy, a sub-Spielbergian pastiche, The Book of Henry is mostly a tedious mess. Read full review
20
Los Angeles TimesJustin ChangJun 15, 2017
At no point do the filmmakers seem to evince any real interest in the emotional misery they inflict on their characters; trauma here is just the quickest means to an uplifting end, or in this case, a montage’s worth of wretched epiphanies. Read full review
20
The GuardianPeter BradshawJun 15, 2017
In its pure misjudged ickiness, bad-acting ropiness, and its quirksy, smirksy passive-aggressive tweeness, this insidiously terrible film could hardly get any more skin-crawling. Read full review
0
New York Magazine (Vulture)Emily YoshidaJun 15, 2017
It does not suffice to call The Book of Henry bad; it’s nonfunctional, so poorly conceived from the ground up as to slip out of the grasp of the usual standards one applies to narrative film. It might be admirable if it wasn’t such torture to watch. Read full review
0
Austin ChronicleJosh KupeckiJun 14, 2017
The Book of Henry is the most misguided film since the 2003 Gary Oldman abomination "Tiptoes." Trevorrow is slated to helm an upcoming Star Wars film, so y’all have fun with that. Read full review
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