The Golden Dream
| Release Date: August 28, 2015 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
74
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 16 Critic Reviews
Positive:
14
Mixed:
2
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
91
The PlaylistNikola GrozdanovicAug 27, 2015
It's a wonderful thing to experience a film unshackled from Hollywood conventionality and unburdened by the necessity for simplistic storytelling. Read full review
90
The New York TimesStephen HoldenSep 3, 2015
Buoyed by the wonderfully natural performances of its young leads, La Jaula de Oro is a compelling social-realist drama that owes much to the style of the British social-realist filmmaker Ken Loach. Read full review
90
Wall Street JournalJohn AndersonSep 3, 2015
The filmmaking is fluid and electric; the acting, precise; the archetypal storytelling, seamless and brutal. What happens in “La Jaula de Oro” might enrage audiences, and probably for a variety of reasons. But there’s no getting away without it leaving a mark. Read full review
80
New York Magazine (Vulture)Bilge EbiriSep 7, 2015
Don’t expect incendiary topicality from The Golden Dream; this is more poetry than politics. Read full review
80
The GuardianPeter BradshawAug 27, 2015
It's a tough, absorbing and suspenseful drama, excellently acted by its three non-professional leads. Read full review
80
CineVueEd FranklAug 27, 2015
Quemada-Díez filmed The Golden Dream chronologically using natural light and real locations, utilising Super 16 film to give his first feature a documentary shimmer. He also worked as a camera operator on Alejandro González Iñárritu's 21 Grams (2003), with whom he shares his penchant for opulent landscapes and narratives, and a sense of beauty amidst unforgiving reality. Read full review
80
EmpireGuy LodgeAug 27, 2015
A tough yet tender and beautifully crafted human drama that more than earns those Loach comparisons. Read full review
80
The TelegraphTim RobeyAug 27, 2015
Quemada-Díez thinks in images, and his film is too offhandedly credible in its details to feel like a thesis he’s trying to prove: it’s poetry, not prose. Read full review
80
Time Out LondonDave CalhounAug 27, 2015
Director and co-writer Diego Quemada-Díez condenses many acute observations about life as an emigrant into a sure-footed, credible story. Read full review
80
Total FilmKevin HarleyAug 27, 2015
You root for them as they bond, bicker and endure grim dangers – gangs, traffickers, police – but Quemada-Díez doesn’t play soft, and the stinging climax really sticks with you. Read full review
75
Washington PostStephanie MerrySep 10, 2015
The movie has an unhurried pace, lulling the teens — and by extension the audience — into occasional complacency with the regular rhythms of each chugging train. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesRobert AbeleAug 27, 2015
The movie exists in a space beyond arguments about immigration policy and border security, and while sometimes a little too willfully pokey, it speaks to something indelibly human about dreams and their costs. Read full review
70
VarietyPeter DebrugeAug 27, 2015
Though it takes some work to engage with the characters at first, the journey makes a powerful impact. Read full review
70
Village VoiceAlan ScherstuhlAug 27, 2015
For all its heart and strong performances, there's little new here. Still, the ending is perfect, triumphant and heartbreaking all at once, demonstrating that Quemada-Diez gets the reality of U.S. life. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleJan 28, 2016
It does not follow the usual pattern of a Hollywood film. It goes to places that are desperate and irrevocable. Read full review
40
The Hollywood ReporterNeil YoungAug 27, 2015
The Golden Cage (La Jaula de oro) is a lukewarm examination of a hot-potato political issue. Read full review
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