The Eyes of Tammy Faye
Searchlight Pictures | Release Date: September 17, 2021 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
55
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 48 Critic Reviews
Positive:
19
Mixed:
25
Negative:
4

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
88
USA TodayBrian TruittSep 12, 2021
Entertaining and surprisingly funny given the subject matter, the movie’s also an exquisitely acted affair paced by Chastain (who also produces), turning in a career-best effort as the complex Tammy Faye. Read full review
80
Screen RantSarah Bea MilnerSep 20, 2021
Ultimately, The Eyes of Tammy Faye has to compromise its story with real events, and at least it gives Tammy Faye a celebratory note to end on. Read full review
75
ObserverRex ReedSep 20, 2021
Still, in spite of its flaws, I liked The Eyes of Tammy Faye a lot—mainly because of its dedication to period accuracy in every visual detail, and Jessica Chastain’s baptism by fire in the complex leading role. Read full review
75
Washington PostAnn HornadaySep 15, 2021
The Eyes of Tammy Faye gives viewers an absorbing, amusing and provocative chance to rethink yet another train wreck who turned out to be, of all things, human. Read full review
75
LarsenOnFilmJosh LarsenSep 14, 2021
By its bombastic (and somewhat abrupt) final scene, you have to imagine that The Eyes of Tammy Faye accurately captures how Tammy Faye saw herself. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Johanna SchnellerSep 13, 2021
The director, Michael Showalter (The Big Sick), and the screenwriters Abe Sylvia, along with Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato who made the 2000 documentary of the same name, either can’t or don’t want to confine themselves to a consistent tone. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubKatie RifeSep 12, 2021
If Showalter resists a cartoon takedown of Tammy Faye Bakker, he also hasn’t made a very deep look at her life, either. Read full review
75
Entertainment WeeklyLeah GreenblattSep 12, 2021
Comes drawn in bold, broad strokes — a fond treatment of a flawed but fascinating American icon whose revelations feel mostly cosmetic in the end. Read full review
70
Little White LiesCharles BramescoFeb 4, 2022
No matter what we might think of her, it’s clear that Tammy Faye was one of a kind. Chastain’s mannered plague of tics does right by her in that respect, but she’s been inserted into a template now worn from overuse. Read full review
70
VoxAlissa WilkinsonOct 5, 2021
This exceptionally well-cast version of Tammy Faye’s story does manage to tap into a cultural moment with reverberations we continue to feel today. Read full review
70
ABC NewsPeter TraversSep 24, 2021
Firing up the Oscar race for Best Actress, a virtuoso Jessica Chastain raises up this formula biopic about televangelist Tammy Faye Bakker by redeeming her reputation as a cultural joke in clown makeup and finding the soul beneath the sparkle. Read full review
70
The New YorkerAnthony LaneSep 20, 2021
Jones is as formidable as ever, and Vincent D’Onofrio gives a sombre and riveting portrayal of Jerry Falwell, the Baptist Savonarola, who doesn’t hesitate to scythe down the Bakkers for their sins. But this is Chastain’s movie, through and through. Read full review
70
Vanity FairRichard LawsonSep 17, 2021
It would be easy to get lost in all that technical detail, to figure the impression—both physical and vocal—is enough. But Chastain digs deeper than the aesthetics, and locates something crucial in Tammy Faye. It’s a genuine, deep-seated, perhaps ruinously naive compassion, which Chastain illustrates with great care. Read full review
70
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzSep 13, 2021
Ultimately it’s a sympathetic portrayal. Yes, people called her a clown, but The Eyes of Tammy Faye shows her as someone more complicated and much more interesting. Read full review
70
VarietyOwen GleibermanSep 12, 2021
Chastain and Garfield give performances that are brashly entertaining but also canny and layered, as the characters get caught up in something far bigger than themselves. The Bakkers were hucksters of a grand order, and the film uses their spectacular greedhead soap opera to tell the larger American story of how Christianity got turned into showbiz. Read full review
70
TheWrapRobert AbeleSep 12, 2021
That blend of tones is not always smoothly handled, but there’s enough heart in its express train of ambition, flaws and fallout to allow its leading lady wide berth for a wonderfully committed, soulful, even sexual turn admirably devoid of caricature. Read full review
65
CNNBrian LowrySep 16, 2021
The stars outshine the movie in The Eyes of Tammy Faye, a dazzling showcase for Jessica Chastain and Andrew Garfield as Tammy Faye and Jim Bakker in a dutiful, somewhat disjointed chronicle of how the televangelists amassed great wealth before his disgraced fall. Read full review
63
The Associated PressLindsey BahrSep 14, 2021
Although “Tammy Faye” may be imperfect, it does succeed in at least one significant way: We’re not just looking at her makeup anymore. Read full review
63
Movie NationRoger MooreSep 14, 2021
Chastain is perfect. Forget the prosthetics and the “clown makeup” mimicry. She gets under the character’s skin, sings in her own voice and never lets an insincere moment flicker by on the screen. Read full review
60
NMENick LevineMar 11, 2022
Showalter’s film gives Bakker a sentimental but effective final act, but never fully explains why this flawed but enormously warm human being became an unlikely icon. Read full review
60
The Irish TimesTara BradyFeb 4, 2022
For all the impeccable production values – including Bakker’s outlandish 1980s costumes, all lovingly recreated by Mitchell Travers – the film’s generosity towards its controversial heroine feels like an unwarranted canonisation. Read full review
60
The IndependentClarisse LoughreyFeb 3, 2022
The Eyes of Tammy Faye has done right by its subject, but only at the cost of shrinking down her world. Read full review
60
EmpireHelen O'HaraJan 31, 2022
It's an impressive performance from Chastain and a fascinating subject, but the film doesn’t delve deep enough into Bakker’s inner life. Read full review
60
Los Angeles TimesJustin ChangSep 17, 2021
Unfortunately, [Showalter] is often stymied by a pedestrian script by Abe Sylvia ( TV series “Dead to Me” and “Nurse Jackie”) that lurches from one defining life moment to the next and leans heavily on Chastain’s performance to establish a sense of emotional and psychological continuity. Read full review
60
SlashfilmChris EvangelistaSep 13, 2021
Chastain gets some huge, showstopping moments – her final scene is genuinely terrific, and another scene that recreates Tammy Faye's on-air conversation with gay minister and AIDS activist Steve Pieters is effective and tender – but it would've been nicer if the movie itself was more worthy of her considerable talents. Read full review
60
The GuardianBenjamin LeeSep 12, 2021
The Eyes of Tammy Faye’s focus might be all over the place, but our eyes remain trained directly on Chastain. Read full review
58
The Film StageMichael FrankSep 17, 2021
Showalter made a bright, fun, pleasing film, colorful in both character, tone, and picture. I just wish it had a bit more criticism, a little more outrage, in its bones. Read full review
58
ConsequenceClint WorthingtonSep 13, 2021
It’s genuinely funny at times, but at two hours, it drags on for far too long, and Chastain suffers from having to hold up too much of the film’s weight on her thickly padded shoulders. It’s a killer performance looking for a movie to support it, and it’s just not here. Read full review
58
IndieWireKate ErblandSep 12, 2021
For better or worse, we’re on Tammy Faye’s side, but the film often embraces the worst bits of a complicated story in order to make Tammy Faye look better. Why not make her look more real, makeup and all? Chastain is always able to find that humanity, but The Eyes of Tammy Faye too often turns its attention to the wrong places. Read full review
54
Paste MagazineJacob OllerSep 20, 2021
The weary and plodding story putters along the redemption arc’s curve, losing faith even in itself along the way. Read full review
50
The New YorkerRichard BrodySep 27, 2021
In short, [Showalter] can’t see Tammy Faye as a person, rather than as a character in a media drama. As a result, The Eyes of Tammy Faye, far from getting behind the public image, merely creates another one. Read full review
50
TimeStephanie ZacharekSep 17, 2021
This is potentially moving dramatic stuff—or at least bracing melodramatic stuff—but Showalter’s dramatization has a glazed, glassy-eyed surface, like a Pee-wee Herman movie without any of Paul Rubens’ surreptitiously sophisticated kindergarten wit. Read full review
50
Rolling StoneDavid FearSep 17, 2021
Jessica Chastain isn’t just the reason to seek out The Eyes of Tammy Faye — she’s the only reason to see this curiously tepid biopic at all. Read full review
50
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternSep 17, 2021
Jessica Chastain is the only reason, though a good one, to see The Eyes of Tammy Faye, a shrill biopic of the televangelist Tammy Faye Bakker. Read full review
50
SlateDana StevensSep 16, 2021
The movie seems to love its main character without bothering to understand her. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleJenny NulfSep 16, 2021
Showalter’s film never finds the right tone, leaving its audience with pleasantness in favor of sharp wit. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleG. Allen JohnsonSep 15, 2021
Showalter’s The Eyes of Tammy Faye, which credits the documentary as its inspiration, recreates some of the doc’s scenes almost verbatim. But while imitation might be the sincerest form of flattery, Abe Sylvia’s ambitious but shallow script has something spiritually missing — namely, a point to it all. Read full review
50
Screen DailyTim GriersonSep 15, 2021
The film ultimately feels like a superficial examination of rich subject matter. Read full review
50
IGNKristy PuchkoSep 13, 2021
Though Jessica Chastain delivers a heartfelt performance as Tammy Faye, her faith in the filmmakers can’t save this drama from falling flat. Read full review
50
RogerEbert.comBrian TallericoSep 12, 2021
As a performance piece, The Eyes of Tammy Faye connects. But is that enough? Read full review
50
The PlaylistRodrigo PerezSep 12, 2021
Despite the oh gee golly wiz Midwestern yokel-isms and the aforementioned cartoonish makeup she wears—historically accurate, yes, but still bordering on the ludicrous in reality— Chastain manages to bring such dignity to the character, really plumbing the depths of her soul for the moments of pathos, heartbreak, and despair. Much of this comes to an incredible crescendo in the third act, when Tammy Faye is tragic, washed-up, but never willing to give up or radiate compassion, even when she’s being mocked. Read full review
42
Original-CinLiam LaceySep 20, 2021
There’s not even a useful exploration about the gap between ideologues’ shoddy personal ethics and big picture rationalizations. What’s left is pantomime, a Halloween costume movie about characters who are far too simple-minded to explain the Bakker’s extraordinary, dubious success. Read full review
40
The TelegraphRobbie CollinFeb 3, 2022
A Wolf of Wall Street-like treatment of this story could have been a scream – and the details are more than bizarre, crass and damning enough to have supported it. But cheeks aside, this is flat, colourless stuff. Read full review
40
New York Magazine (Vulture)Alison WillmoreSep 17, 2021
The Eyes of Tammy Faye, which was written by Abe Sylvia, is unable to decide if it wants to understand its subject or make fun of her, and ends up never really committing to either. Read full review
38
Slant MagazineDerek SmithSep 16, 2021
The Eyes of Tammy Faye mostly plays out as a showcase for Jessica Chastain to bring as much emotional sturm und drang to the woman as she lurches between various states of turmoil. Read full review
38
Boston GlobeMark FeeneySep 15, 2021
It treats the Bakkers as something between grotesques and simpletons, which does rather limit the biopic angle. Satirizing televangelism is such low-hanging fruit it’s windfall. As for camp, it’s hard to avoid in a movie with Tammy Faye as its title character. Read full review
30
The New York TimesA.O. ScottSep 16, 2021
The Bakkers were many things to many people: appalling, inspiring, laughable, sad. This movie succeeds in making them dull. Read full review
30
The Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneySep 12, 2021
The movie, with its numbing overload of pastels and prayer, is too tonally uncertain to yield any fun. It’s a depressing window into the worst excesses of faith racketeering that has little to offer in the way of commentary. Read full review
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