The Lords of Salem
Anchor Bay Films | Release Date: April 19, 2013 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
57
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 21 Critic Reviews
Positive:
10
Mixed:
9
Negative:
2
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Slant MagazineNick SchagerApr 14, 2013
Rob Zombie understands horror as an aural-visual experience that should gnaw at the nerves, seep into the subconscious, and beget unshakeable nightmares. Read full review
90
Los Angeles TimesMark OlsenApr 18, 2013
The Lords of Salem is like some queasy-making machine, a chamber piece of possession and madness that exerts a strange, disturbing power. Read full review
83
The PlaylistSimon AbramsApr 14, 2013
The Lords of Salem is a product of Zombie’s better creative impulses, so it’s ok that it also features several of his worse indulgences, too. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comSimon AbramsJun 11, 2013
A genuinely nasty and disturbing piece of work, but its cumulative nerve-shredding effect is not just the product of effective direction. Sheri Moon Zombie delivers her best serious dramatic performance yet (before marrying Zombie, she used to be a porn star). Read full review
75
New York PostV.A. MusettoApr 18, 2013
Movies by Rob Zombie, the goth rocker turned cult filmmaker, aren’t for everybody. But he couldn’t care less. He makes movies exactly the way he wants to, with no thought of pleasing mainstream audiences. They can like it or lump it. His latest effort, The Lords of Salem, is true to form. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubNoel MurrayApr 17, 2013
For a rock star and old-movie buff like Rob Zombie, The Lords Of Salem offers a chance to riff on the notion of rock ’n’ roll as the devil’s music, while recreating scenes from old Hammer witch pictures. Zombie does both of these things—just not always as expected. Read full review
75
IndieWireEric KohnApr 14, 2013
Zombie's witches aren't as scary as the credible psychopaths he has portrayed before, but The Lords of Salem contains enough frenzied imagery in its climactic moments to make the spell linger. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterFrank ScheckApr 18, 2013
The Lords of Salem is more creepily atmospheric than truly scary and eventually lapses into silliness. But it does provide some evocatively spooky moments along the way. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleMarc SavlovApr 17, 2013
I could go on and on about Zombie’s style-over-substance direction, but why bother? The Lords of Salem is so clearly a project that Zombie has had stewing in his blood-and-black-lace heart for, I assume, ever, that the fact that it’s not a masterpiece seems almost moot. It’s a head trip, to be sure, but it’s Zombie’s electric, haunted head, so my advice is just sit back and goggle. Read full review
63
Film.comWilliam GossApr 22, 2013
The film’s final shot ranks among its least graphic and yet most puzzling, a slap-in-the-face piece of punctuation that reminds the most accommodating viewers that, even on his good days, Mr. Zombie is really only making movies for an audience of one. Read full review
60
The New York TimesNeil GenzlingerApr 18, 2013
Considerable care goes into establishing the premise, but the film eventually abandons psychological subtlety for hallucinatory garishness, which is too bad. Read full review
60
New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierApr 18, 2013
Atmosphere is three-fourths of the game in a horror film, and The Lords of Salem has it in spades. It’s not too much to say that until this culty-witchy throwback chiller turns too bloody, it shows how far a little style can go. Read full review
60
Time OutJoshua RothkopfApr 16, 2013
This may be terrifying news to Rob Zombie fans, but after years mining the 1970s for gunky shock moments, the musician-turned-filmmaker has emerged as an unusually sensitive director of actors. Read full review
50
Boston GlobeTom RussoApr 18, 2013
There are echoes of Roman Polanski’s “Rosemary’s Baby” in all of this that are impossible to miss. Read full review
50
VarietyRob NelsonApr 14, 2013
The helmer’s narrative dead end here registers not as a lack of nerve so much as a lack of imagination. Read full review
42
Entertainment WeeklyChris NashawatyApr 17, 2013
Unfortunately, it’s just a witchy mess. Read full review
40
New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinApr 22, 2013
The Lords of Salem is gloomy, lacks variety, and is not without its flat patches. Heidi is an increasingly dullish heroine, and in the first 15 minutes you’ll know what’s going to happen in the next 80. Read full review
40
Total FilmJamie GrahamApr 19, 2013
Occasionally potent but mostly risible, this tale of the occult sees Rob Zombie cast a weak spell. Disappointing. Read full review
40
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzApr 17, 2013
Some of the imagery is memorable, in a twisted-horror kind of way. Zombie has no trouble scaring up atmosphere. But other scenes are ridiculous, unintentionally funny, particularly one he builds up to ominously, only to give us a silly payoff. Read full review
30
Village VoiceChuck WilsonApr 16, 2013
The movie is eerily photographed (by Brandon Trost), but never suspenseful or scary, and eventually, events descend into goat-sacrificing silliness. Read full review
25
ObserverRex ReedApr 16, 2013
This one is so bad it’s hilarious. Sheri Moon Zombie is no Mia Farrow, Rob Zombie is no Roman Polanski, and The Lords of Salem seems to have been made by people on the rubber bus headed for a rubber room with bars on the windows. Read full review
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