The Killing of a Sacred Deer
A24 | Release Date: October 20, 2017 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
73
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 45 Critic Reviews
Positive:
36
Mixed:
7
Negative:
2
Watch Now
Buy on
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Expand

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
EmpireAndrew LowryNov 3, 2017
Working as a profound meditation on karma, predestination and guilt and a proper scary movie, this is near career-best work from all involved. Be warned: this is tough stuff. Read full review
100
The Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneyMay 24, 2017
The rich vein of unsettling darkness and psychological unease that ripples like a treacherous underground stream beneath the absurdist humor of Yorgos Lanthimos' work becomes a brooding requiem of domestic horror in his masterfully realized fifth feature. Read full review
100
VarietyPeter DebrugeMay 24, 2017
Farrell and Kidman are astonishingly gifted at playing the subtext of every scene. Read full review
100
The PlaylistJessica KiangMay 24, 2017
The Killing of a Sacred Deer is Lanthimos with the gloves off, and it makes the absurd, amazing “The Lobster” seem like a warm and cuddly experience by comparison. Read full review
100
The TelegraphRobbie CollinMay 24, 2017
When absurdism feels this wrong, you know it’s being done right. Read full review
95
IGNWilliam BibbianiOct 19, 2017
Director Yorgos Lanthimos lures us into his dream and shackles us there, for his own fascinating reasons. The experience is exquisite agony, both revelatory and painful. This is one of the best and most disturbing movies of the year. Read full review
90
ScreenCrushBritt HayesSep 23, 2017
You can see very clearly where The Killing of a Sacred Deer is headed, but it takes a protracted path to get there, prolonging our discomfort until the very act of watching the film feels like its own bleakly comedic exercise. Read full review
90
We Got This Covered Darren RueckerSep 6, 2017
The Killing of a Sacred Deer envelops you in its strange, disturbing world with the manipulative skill of a true surrealist master. Read full review
90
Screen DailyJonathan RomneyMay 24, 2017
This is a ruthlessly controlled drama that achieves its powerful effect by holding back when its dramatic content is most intense. Read full review
88
Rolling StonePeter TraversOct 19, 2017
Even the opaque hints can drive you cuckoo with frustration. Lanthimos does not coddle his audience. His M.O. is to shock, provoke and leave you talking to the voices inside your own head. The choice is yours. Read full review
88
RogerEbert.comBrian TallericoSep 13, 2017
The result is a mesmerizing thriller, a movie that asks questions with no good answers and traps us within its terrifying and bizarre situation with little hope for a happy ending. With uniformly great performances throughout the cast and Lanthimos’ stunning eye for detail and composition, this is one of the most unforgettable films of the year. Read full review
85
The AtlanticDavid SimsNov 20, 2017
With his latest movie, Lanthimos has made a tense, heart-wrenching tale with an admirably askance view of humanity that’s a worthy successor to his prior works. Read full review
83
IndieWireDavid EhrlichMay 24, 2017
Fortunately, the filmmaker’s rare gift for brutal absurdity remains intact, and The Killing of a Sacred Deer only gets funnier as it grows darker. Read full review
80
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike ScottNov 3, 2017
Killing of a Sacred Deer -- which most assuredly couldn't have sprung from the mind of any other filmmaker -- will deliver a moviegoing experience that is impossible to forget. Read full review
80
Total FilmPhilip KempOct 30, 2017
Disturbing and often distressing, but compulsively watchable. Read full review
80
Village VoiceBilge EbiriJun 21, 2017
As things spun out of control, getting ever stranger, I started to wonder if the director had merely written himself into a corner and was doubling down on weirdness to get himself out. And yet the film never quite loses its mythic drive. You walk out feeling like you’ve truly had an experience. Read full review
80
New York Magazine (Vulture)Emily YoshidaMay 24, 2017
To see an unfettered nightmare like this from such an idiosyncratic director feels like a cruel treat, and a welcome stylistic stretch. Read full review
80
The GuardianPeter BradshawMay 24, 2017
It’s an intriguing, disturbing, amusing twist on something which in many ways could be a conventional horror-thriller from the 1970s or 1980s, or even a bunny-boiler nightmare from the 90s. Read full review
80
CineVueJohn BleasdaleMay 24, 2017
In Farrell and Kidman, he has found two performers who are utterly willing to go the whole hog and their performances are brilliant deadpans. Read full review
78
Austin ChronicleMarjorie BaumgartenOct 25, 2017
Along the way, you’ll wonder if you’re watching a classic tragedy or a comedy. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Kate TaylorNov 3, 2017
The dialogue is often mundane...and the actors' lurching delivery of these lines, often flattened, sometimes speechifying, sometimes rushed, but never naturalistic, forces the viewer to question the point of the action as Lanthimos crafts a dark satire about responsibility, justice and retribution. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleOct 27, 2017
The tone of The Killing of a Sacred Deer is the best thing about it and the hardest to describe. You might call it skewed, except that what often is called skewed is extreme and outlandish, while this movie is quiet and precise. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperOct 26, 2017
The Killing of a Sacred Deer never hedges its bets, never takes its foot off the gas. The same can be said of the actors, from skilled veterans Farrell and Kidman to young Barry Keoghan. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliOct 26, 2017
This is made for art-house viewers who prefer films that go in strange and unexpected directions, where a failure at least offers thought-provoking elements that can function as conversation-starters. Read full review
75
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsOct 26, 2017
There’s nothing vague about the narrative of The Killing of a Sacred Deer. Its strangeness is crystal clear. It plays out in ways both sardonically funny and extremely cruel. Read full review
75
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanOct 24, 2017
In his most bracing and maddening morality tale yet, Lanthimos doesn’t so much paint himself into a corner as he runs into it, headlong, dragging us with him all the way. Read full review
75
Movie NationRoger MooreOct 20, 2017
Killing of a Sacred Deer is grim-going, too long for the thin parable it is built upon. But Lanthimos orchestrates these performances into a perfectly-matched pitch, before lighting a match against this chill for an emotional climax that, like the picture before it, moves you even as it leaves you cold. Read full review
75
Paste MagazineTim GriersonOct 19, 2017
The Killing of a Sacred Deer is endlessly watchable but only intermittently arresting—you’re held captive by its craftsmanship, even if you find yourself not particularly invested in how it all plays out. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubA.A. Dowd Oct 19, 2017
The Killing Of A Sacred Deer doesn’t have as sharp an allegorical edge as his best work — it’s no Dogtooth in that respect — but it does find the director honing his command of unnerving atmosphere to a razor point, enhanced by a camera that glides menacingly down hospital corridors and gazes from above with the severity of a merciless god. Read full review
70
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzOct 26, 2017
It's a gorgeously sterile film, fascinating to look at, sometimes painful to watch. The performances are outstanding; yet the actors, including Colin Farrell and Nicole Kidman, are toned down almost comically, often giving robotic line readings to empty bromides. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesJustin ChangOct 19, 2017
As it marches its characters ever so slowly toward a suitably despairing climax, the movie feels increasingly like a self-satisfied but unsustained provocation, a rich display of craft in service of secondhand shocks and ideas. Read full review
70
VoxAlissa WilkinsonJun 1, 2017
The result isn’t uplifting in the least. But it’s deliciously frightening, a cautionary tale for the careless and a horror film that posits a world devoid of any real goodness. Read full review
67
Entertainment WeeklyChris NashawatyNov 2, 2017
Farrell delivers his lines with the same replicant monotone he used in The Lobster. And Kidman, the only cast member who expresses recognizably human emotions, extends her recent hot streak. But even she’s not enough to give this head-scratcher any real life. Read full review
67
ConsequenceSarah KurchakSep 8, 2017
While the quality of the film’s craft is up for little debate, though, it’s overall appeal and impact are far more polarizing. Read full review
63
The Seattle TimesMoira MacdonaldOct 26, 2017
It’s the kind of movie that you watch with two simultaneous emotions: fascination, and the desire to leave immediately. I’m glad, mostly, that I didn’t give in to the second, but I’m still pondering exactly how Lanthimos pulled off the first. Read full review
63
Slant MagazineGreg CwikOct 16, 2017
The characters' emotional vacancy feels like another auteurist tic to which Yorgos Lanthimos is dauntlessly committed. Read full review
60
SlateSam AdamsOct 20, 2017
The whole movie starts to feel like a dare or elaborate game, the characters shuffling obediently about the board with no rules to guide them. Myths grow out of a need to understand the world, and to pass on an understanding of how to make our way through it, but Lanthimos just teaches you to be more cautious about his next film. Read full review
60
The New York TimesA.O. ScottOct 19, 2017
“Sacred Deer” feels like a dark, opaque bit of folklore transplanted into an off-kilter modern setting. Read full review
60
Time Out LondonDave CalhounMay 24, 2017
As storytelling, it’s pristine: it moves like a reptile playing the long game. But its cruelty is tough to bear. Read full review
58
Tampa Bay TimesSteve PersallNov 9, 2017
The third act sustains a fevered level of absurdity and everything prior is stylish, well-acted yet off-putting.Art without any noticeable heart. Read full review
50
Philadelphia Daily NewsGary ThompsonNov 2, 2017
Lanthimos is not Euripides, and not capable of — or interested in — staging a tragedy. And his aim to make something horrifying or at least excruciating out of this scenario gets lost in the iciness of the presentation. Read full review
50
The New YorkerAnthony LaneOct 23, 2017
If “The Lobster” remains Lanthimos’s most vital work, that’s because it tempers the gloom with a mischievous play of wit. The Killing of a Sacred Deer, by contrast, is stubbornly hard to enjoy; there are jokes, but they make few dents in the programmatic rigor of the plot. Read full review
42
The Film StageGiovanni Marchini CamiaMay 24, 2017
Even the most generous of viewers couldn’t come up with a legitimate reason for the vileness on show here, other than pure and simple sadism. Read full review
38
Boston GlobeTy BurrOct 25, 2017
The cast is earnest and they almost convince us they’re doing important rather than self-important work. Read full review
25
St. Louis Post-DispatchCalvin WilsonNov 9, 2017
This is the feel-bad film of the year. Recommend it to someone you hate. Read full review
More From This Movie

73 Critic Reviews

6.9 User Reviews

Details & Credits|Trailers

Current Movie Releases
By MetascoreBy User Score
1 77 Project Hail Mary
2 75 Send Help
3 73 Hoppers
4 72 The Sheep Detectives
5 68 Crime 101
SEE ALL
Essential Links
New on Amazon Prime Video
New on Netflix
Coming Soon to DVD/Blu-ray
SEE ALL