The Peasants
Sony Pictures Classics | Release Date: December 8, 2023 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
61
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 17 Critic Reviews
Positive:
8
Mixed:
8
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Wall Street JournalKyle SmithFeb 1, 2024
With its feel for both beauty and ugliness, the film transports us to this unfamiliar milieu with a richness rarely attempted in the cinema anymore. Read full review
100
The Hollywood ReporterFrank ScheckSep 20, 2023
The Peasants is a ravishingly beautiful visual triumph. Read full review
100
IndieWireChristian BlauveltSep 18, 2023
Bringing this 1,000-page novel to animated life in this way isn’t just an adaptation, it’s an illumination. It makes real the heightened reality that exists in your mind when reading a particularly captivating book. Read full review
90
Screen DailyNikki BaughanSep 18, 2023
The Peasants again melds oil paintings (some 40,000 of them) over live-action footage of actors to become a dynamic, immersive drama that brings the pleasures and pains of the past to ravishing life. Read full review
83
ColliderRoss BonaimeSep 19, 2023
As a live-action film, The Peasants would’ve been a grand achievement, but by taking the time to animate these frames and add that extra texture to this story, the Welchmans have made one of the most impressive animated films of the year by far. Read full review
75
The PlaylistAnkit JhunjhunwalaSep 18, 2023
The narrative proceedings provide sufficient interest for the duration, making it easy to recommend this film. Read full review
67
Original-CinLiam LaceyFeb 14, 2024
These images are intriguing and intermittently beautiful, but the technique gets repetitive, and the gap between the visual lavishness and the so-so script is distracting. Read full review
63
Movie NationRoger MooreFeb 26, 2024
The Peasants is an engaging way of taking us back to a simpler time when the people are just as petty, inconsiderate and greedy as people have always been and always will be. Read full review
60
The Observer (UK)Wendy IdeDec 11, 2023
The film is a match for Lars von Trier’s Dogville in its grimly relentless approach to misogyny and sexual violence. A disconcertingly beautiful picture about the ugliness of humanity. Read full review
60
Time OutKambole CampbellDec 6, 2023
Where Loving Vincent imagined the great artist’s world in the style of his paintings, The Peasants lacks that same clear purpose. Instead, it’s an animation that feels like a live-action film in disguise. Read full review
50
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanMar 7, 2024
There’s the potential for some real emotion here, as well as a touch of real-world commentary about a woman with 21st-century sensibilities trapped in a 19th-century world that feels, at times, medieval. But we can only catch glimpses of it beneath all the flickering layers of paint. Read full review
50
RogerEbert.comTomris LafflyJan 26, 2024
The story overstays its welcome eventually, with the impending tragedy that would conclude the film fizzling as a result. Read full review
50
The New York TimesNatalia WinkelmanJan 25, 2024
As the story’s melodrama grows repetitive, so do the visuals. Read full review
42
The Film StageChristopher SchobertSep 18, 2023
The Peasants is a histrionic and often-ludicrous bummer, one that wastes the deeply committed performance of star-in-the-making Kamila Urzedowska. The Welchmans deserve credit for developing a unique style. Now it is time to write words that match these images. Read full review
40
The Irish TimesTara BradyDec 8, 2023
There is some fun to be derived from supposedly maggoty peasants muttering rosaries against inclement weather while looking as if they’ve been styled for the Emmanuelle reboot. But not enough to justify a feature film, let alone all those paintings. Read full review
40
The GuardianPeter BradshawDec 5, 2023
There is visual interest here, but for me the drama isn’t sustained. Read full review
25
San Francisco ChronicleG. Allen JohnsonFeb 7, 2024
The Peasants is filled with sniping, fistfights, brutal violence and sexual assaults and becomes unbearable through its nearly two-hour running time. Most of these characters you wouldn’t want to spend more than five minutes with, if that. Read full review
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