The Overnight
Orchard, The | Release Date: June 19, 2015 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
65
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 32 Critic Reviews
Positive:
26
Mixed:
6
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperJun 25, 2015
This is one terrifically twisted parental play date. Read full review
83
The PlaylistKatie WalshFeb 1, 2015
Smart, playful, and hilarious, The Overnight is a delightful romp between the sheets. Read full review
83
HitfixGregory EllwoodFeb 1, 2015
Much of the success of the film is due to the four leads who seamlessly work the one or two outrageous moments into the story without resorting to over-the-top characterizations. Read full review
80
EmpireIan FreerJun 23, 2015
Excruciatingly hilarious and hilariously excruciating. The merkin scene will live with you forever. Read full review
75
Portland OregonianJeff BakerJul 14, 2015
Writer-director Patrick Brice is interested only in his male characters; Alex and Kurt work out their issues while their wives serve as support or comic foils. The laughs stop about halfway through, and the 79-minute running time feels about right. Read full review
75
Charlotte ObserverLawrence ToppmanJul 9, 2015
Brice stops his story just before it becomes redundant – most filmmakers these days can’t say that – and although I didn’t believe the outrageous next-to-last scene, he caps it with a laugh-out-loud joke. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comChristy LemireJun 19, 2015
See it with someone you love, and then just try to feel smug about the security of your own relationship afterward. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubA.A. Dowd Jun 17, 2015
The pleasure of the movie lies in the way it both rewards and subverts expectations, delivering on the risqué possibilities of its premise while also coming up with something smarter and a little deeper than a log line might suggest. Read full review
75
New York PostSara StewartJun 17, 2015
Schwartzman is perfect as Kurt, simultaneously compelling, ridiculous and creepy. Read full review
75
Rolling StonePeter TraversJun 17, 2015
Brice, who made an impressive thriller debut with 2014's "Creep," has a knack for getting the most out of four people talking. Read full review
75
IndieWireEric KohnFeb 1, 2015
Even though the story involves legitimate issues surrounding sexual identity and the boundaries of monogamy, its humor only goes surface deep. For the most part, the endearingly silly plot amounts to little more than sight gags and off-the-wall asides. Read full review
70
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzJul 2, 2015
It's a short film, weighing in at 79 minutes, but that feels about right. You probably wouldn't want to spend a lot more time with these folks, no matter how intriguing their company. You won't necessarily enjoy the visit, not all of it. But you won't be bored, and for grown-ups with kids looking for a night out, that's something. Read full review
70
New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinJun 22, 2015
The actors manage to show crack comic timing while looking as if they’re groping along blindly — a high compliment for psychodrama. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesGary GoldsteinJun 18, 2015
This engaging, funny and frank new film also proves something of a cop-out, especially given the bullet train of a narrative concocted by writer-director Patrick Brice. Read full review
70
SalonAndrew O'HehirJun 18, 2015
It takes discipline in this age of bloat to bring your movie in under 80 minutes, closing credits included, and still make the audience feel we’ve been taken on a genuine journey with these people, a few big laughs and jagged left turns included. Read full review
70
Village VoiceDanny KingJun 16, 2015
Though an accomplished farce, The Overnight is most interesting when confronting its genuine emotional stakes. Read full review
70
The DissolveMike D'AngeloJun 16, 2015
It’s an unusual but surprisingly effective mix of outrageousness and sincerity, in which the four anxious revelers somehow function both as broad caricatures and as real, complex human beings. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneyFeb 1, 2015
There’s a breezy spirit and an agreeable touch of tenderness to the movie that makes it hard not to like, even if it never accumulates much substance. Read full review
70
VarietyGeoff BerkshireFeb 1, 2015
The Overnight invites the audience to keep guessing exactly who is seducing whom, and exactly where the temptations will lead, right up to its final few beats. Barely hitting 70 minutes before the credit crawl, this comedy successfully achieves a climax of its own that is equal parts exciting and frustrating. Read full review
67
Tampa Bay TimesSteve PersallJul 2, 2015
Will they, won't they? A bolder movie wouldn't settle for maybe. Read full review
63
Movie NationRoger MooreOct 20, 2015
A farce that dabbles in darkness. True confessions here, sexual mores tested there. We see where this is going long before it gets there, and in a short movie, that can be fatal. Read full review
63
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliJun 25, 2015
The Overnight plays like the pilot of a sitcom developed for Netflix or premium cable. A hit-and-miss affair that deals in a sporadically amusing fashion with many of the mundane (and a few not-so-mundane) tribulations of long-term monogamy in marriage. Read full review
63
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsJun 25, 2015
I like it up to a point — not a specific story point, but to a certain degree throughout. It's engaging but thin, and I couldn't buy screenwriter Brice's idea of Charlotte's antidote for her 10-year itch. Read full review
63
Boston GlobeTy BurrJun 25, 2015
A bonbon of embarrassment comedy. Read full review
63
Washington PostAnn HornadayJun 25, 2015
In a way, The Overnight ends just as it’s beginning. But for a brief time, even in the midst of preposterous digressions and full (and not so full) Montys, it offers a compassionate glimpse of people at their most naked, honest and undefended. Read full review
63
Miami HeraldConnie OgleJun 25, 2015
In the end The Overnight promises more than it can deliver: Some of the supposedly provocative material ends up being juvenile, and the movie ends just as the situation gets truly, weirdly interesting. It’s too tame a resolution to a film that suggested the capacity for more. Read full review
60
The New York TimesManohla DargisJun 18, 2015
The Overnight ends just as it starts to get interestingly messy, tapping into something real and sweetly touching. Read full review
50
TheWrapInkoo KangJun 18, 2015
Brice’s script boasts a few surprises, but this is essentially a highly competent film about boring people’s boring problems. Read full review
50
Slant MagazineClayton DillardJun 13, 2015
The film's Buñuelian potential for harpooning the bourgeoisie is quickly dashed in favor of mumblecore antics. Read full review
40
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike ScottJul 3, 2015
Unfortunately, Brice appears more interested in ramping up the outrageousness and keeping his audiences guessing than in crafting a meaningful story. And so while his film is nothing if not unpredictable, that comes at the cost of the sort of emotional impact for which his film seems to be aiming. Read full review
40
Austin ChronicleSteve DavisJun 24, 2015
In the end, the preordained ménage à quatre that culminates the evening’s funny games titillates neither mentally nor erotically. Without any such catharsis, the whole thing feels like a big tease. No doubt what The Overnight could use at this point is another happy ending. Read full review
40
Time OutDavid EhrlichJun 19, 2015
The result is a throwaway trifle that plays like it came together over the course of a slaphappy weekend, and while size may not matter (the movie runs a short 79 minutes), it’s not even relevant to something this flaccid. Read full review
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