The New Boy
Vertical | Release Date: May 23, 2025 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
64
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 21 Critic Reviews
Positive:
12
Mixed:
9
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
83
IndieWireElla KempMay 23, 2023
It’s the kind of culturally specific filmmaking that somehow immediately gains universality in that ambition to connect, to understand the empathy and sensitivity to listen in to these conflicts and this bright spark of a boy who speaks to struggles of faith however you were raised. Read full review
82
Paste MagazineJim VorelMay 19, 2025
Gorgeously shot and intellectually/emotionally provoking, the film tantalizes with transcendent revelations but is simultaneously unbalanced in how it approaches its characters and minimalist storytelling. Read full review
80
Film ThreatKent HillMay 23, 2025
It’s not perfect, but it’s unforgettable. Call it a miracle, call it a parable, call it cinema that dares to believe. Read full review
80
Time OutStephen A. RussellJun 8, 2023
There’s a kinetic strength to star-in-the-making Aswan Reid’s screen presence as we first glimpse his unnamed ‘new boy’ attempting to throttle the life out of a policeman much bigger than himself. Read full review
80
Screen RantPatrice WitherspoonMay 30, 2023
Warwick Thornton’s feature tests faith and humanity in a way that will leave a lasting impression. It’s the kind of film that requires no stance from us, yet is fully capable of opening hearts and minds from a place of empathy and understanding. Read full review
80
Screen DailyFionnuala HalliganMay 23, 2023
What sets it apart is Thornton’s deep spirituality, examined here as the titular ‘The New Boy’ encounters – and explores – Christianity. But it is not a two-way street: Christianity will never accept who he is. Read full review
78
TheWrapSteve PondMay 23, 2023
There’s not a lot of clarity here, but there is a terrible, strange beauty in the film’s mixture of ritual, magic, faith and the dark side of colonialism. By the end New Boy has a name, but his identity remains elusive. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comJourdain SearlesMay 23, 2025
Bathed in darkness and warm tones, “The New Boy” feels like a classic melodrama with modern sensibilities. Read full review
70
ColliderElisa GuimarãesMay 23, 2025
The New Boy is a movie about how colonization can disguise itself as kindness, and how that kindness is still violent and destructive. Read full review
70
The New York TimesBeatrice LoayzaMay 22, 2025
Thornton, who briefly attended a Christian boarding school when he was a child, brings a textured perspective to this story of cultural violence and white guilt. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneyMay 23, 2023
Even when its storytelling occasionally falters, the visual power of Thornton’s gorgeous compositions — in the monastery’s chiaroscuro interiors as well as the sprawling landscapes in the northern part of South Australia, near the former mining town, Burra — remains transfixing. Read full review
70
VarietyGuy LodgeMay 23, 2023
In Warwick Thornton’s thoughtful magical-realist fable The New Boy, spiritual differences aren’t treated with violence, but echo bloody territorial conflict just the same. Read full review
60
The Observer (UK)Wendy IdeMar 17, 2024
The latest film from Warwick Thornton (Samson and Delilah) is strikingly beautiful, its widescreen vistas rendered in a scorched palette of dust and ochres. But the pacing is languid to a fault and it all gets rather bogged down in allegory. Read full review
60
EmpireJohn NugentMar 13, 2024
A gentle, odd little Australian fable. Warwick Thornton’s film has a lot of thoughts to process, and while they don’t always cohere, the performances from Blanchett and Reid keep it interesting. Read full review
60
Little White LiesCharles BramescoMar 12, 2024
With a mix of righteous anger and abiding serenity, Thornton terraforms the Wild West of his home nation into a spiritually parched landscape. Read full review
60
The GuardianLuke BuckmasterJul 6, 2023
There are many provocative images: a winking statue of Jesus crucified, for instance, and occasions in which the “new boy” experiences stigmata. But Thornton revels in ambiguity and has no desire to provide viewers a clear pathway to understanding. Read full review
60
The GuardianPeter BradshawMay 23, 2023
After some robust storytelling at the start; the film drifts into a series of images and moods which perhaps don’t deliver as much impact as intended. Read full review
58
ColliderTherese LacsonMay 23, 2023
Where Thornton's narrative falters, his camerawork and directorial eye are stronger than ever. Read full review
58
The Film StageLeonardo GoiMay 23, 2023
Blanchett gives a committed turn as the conflicted nun, but all her emphatic exertions cannot resurrect a story that forsakes its mysticism for a calculated parable, as well-intentioned as it is turgid. Read full review
50
The PlaylistAnna BogutskayaMay 24, 2023
The film never returns to the strength of its opening scene, and by the end, the spark is gone. Read full review
40
The TelegraphTim RobeyMay 23, 2023
This tale of epiphanies and religious schooling at a tiny monastery in the 1940s has a woozy, episodic lyricism all Thornton’s own. It’s also fuzzy and unfulfilled, groping for its images without ever precisely knowing what it needs them to say. Read full review
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