The White Crow
Sony Pictures Classics | Release Date: April 26, 2019 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
61
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 29 Critic Reviews
Positive:
16
Mixed:
13
Negative:
0
Watch Now
Buy on
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Expand

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
80
The New YorkerAnthony LaneApr 26, 2019
Structurally, the film is all chop and change, with Hare and Fiennes tacking back and forth across Nureyev’s early years. Some viewers will find the result too fussy by half; I liked its restlessness, and the sense of a chafed and driven spirit that refuses to be boxed in. Read full review
80
Rolling StonePeter TraversApr 26, 2019
Part thriller, part meditation on life and art, part portrait of a man on a tightrope, The White Crow may be juggling more themes than it can handle. But Fiennes makes the result a thing of bruising beauty and an exhilarating gift. Read full review
80
Los Angeles TimesKenneth TuranApr 25, 2019
Subject and style could not be more different than in The White Crow, but that fusion of opposites has resulted in an involving biographical drama that rarely puts a foot wrong. Read full review
80
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternApr 25, 2019
While Mr. Fiennes plays passivity with subtlety, Adèle Exarchopoulos deploys subtlety in the service of quick wit and suppressed passion. She plays, quite beautifully, Clara Saint, the young Parisian who, in real life, befriended Nureyev during his six weeks in the French capital, and then, in the heat of that moment at Le Bourget, helped guide the intricate, perilous steps of his defection. Read full review
80
CineVueLucy PopescuMar 21, 2019
An evocative portrait ... Fiennes utilises a good balance of biography and ballet; emphasising how much Nureyev loved to dance and why, when forced, he chose artistic freedom over love of country. Read full review
80
VarietyPeter DebrugeMar 21, 2019
Lovely, elegant, and curiously opaque ... The film’s many ballet scenes are stunning, to say the least. Read full review
75
Movie NationRoger MooreMay 13, 2019
The actor/director and his co-stars more than do justice to this fascinating moment in Cold War history and one of ballet’s transformative figures. Read full review
75
The Seattle TimesMoira MacdonaldMay 9, 2019
It’s a movie full of small pleasures. Read full review
75
The Associated PressLindsey BahrMay 1, 2019
The dance sequences, in training and performance, are magnificent. Fiennes is fascinated by the athleticism of ballet, and the granular details of the flexing muscles in feet and forearms. Read full review
75
Christian Science MonitorPeter RainerApr 27, 2019
The White Crow fitfully does justice to Nureyev’s overwhelming desire to be an artist, and that’s not a negligible achievement. Read full review
70
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzMay 1, 2019
It’s a good movie, so smartly directed by Ralph Fiennes, who also appears as Nureyev’s dance instructor, that at times it feels like an IQ test. But the story is intriguing and, ultimately, gripping enough to overcome all that. Read full review
70
Film ThreatAlex SavelievApr 24, 2019
The White Crow demonstrates that, if perhaps not having yet mastered all of the nuances of directing an artful biopic, Fiennes possesses a keen eye for detail – and the man just can’t help but exude sophistication. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleRichard WhittakerMay 22, 2019
What holds the film together before that nerve-jangling sequence is Ivenko as the young genius. Read full review
67
Original-CinLiam LaceyMay 9, 2019
The White Crow is really “Nureyev before Nureyev,” and it’s a struggle to sort out its purpose. Read full review
67
Entertainment WeeklyChris NashawatyApr 26, 2019
There’s something about the movie that makes it all feel as though it’s being presented under glass. Nureyev is more of an idea than an actual flesh and blood character. The only time The White Crow truly shoots off sparks is during its dance sequences. For those brief, beautiful moments, you can almost feel what it must have been like to witness a one-of-a-kind artist at the spellbinding height of his powers taking flight. But then the spell is broken, and the crow falls back to earth. Read full review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Martha SchabasMay 9, 2019
As a stoic and weathered middle-aged ballet teacher, who lives in a cramped apartment and maintains a tender and dignified devotion to his craft, Fiennes gives the film’s best performance. Read full review
60
The Observer (UK)Wendy IdeMar 26, 2019
Equally impressive is the quality of the dance on screen. Read full review
60
The TelegraphMark MonohanMar 20, 2019
A serious-minded, often beautiful, utterly heartfelt character study that nevertheless lacks its astonishing protagonist’s fleet-footedness and only partly captures what made him tick. Read full review
60
The GuardianPeter BradshawMar 20, 2019
Hare cleverly suggests Nureyev’s mixture of courage, hauteur, emotional damage and cool self-appraisal; the Soviet authorities cannot threaten him through his family because he long ago left them behind. An athletic, confident, undemanding film. Read full review
60
EmpireIan FreerMar 18, 2019
An interesting, challenging mess. The White Crow offers lots that’s impressive — Ivenko as Nureyev, the dance sequences, a knuckle-whitening last 20 minutes — but can’t render it in a dramatically engaging way. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleMay 7, 2019
Aside from the defection scene, the only tension in The White Crow concerns whether Nureyev will achieve the renown he deserves or whether his career will be killed in the crib. That’s not nothing, but it’s small stuff to peg a two-hour movie on, especially one with an unsympathetic protagonist. Read full review
50
Washington PostAlan ZilbermanApr 30, 2019
While the details of Nureyev’s 1961 defection in Paris are thrilling, the film falls into the trap of many historical dramas, rendering the story as surprisingly clunky, especially considering the nimbleness of its subjects. Read full review
50
RogerEbert.comChristy LemireApr 26, 2019
It’s structurally awkward, jumping around in time needlessly and sometimes confusingly, rendering Nureyev’s story weirdly inert until the final 20-30 minutes. Read full review
50
The New York TimesManohla DargisApr 25, 2019
The problem is that while there are dance performances scattered throughout The White Crow, as well as interludes with a sweaty Rudy practicing and striving, the offstage scenes tend to feel like filler, the bits stuck between the barre and the theater. Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyApr 24, 2019
Unlike its subject, The White Crow is ultimately forgettable. Read full review
50
Slant MagazinePat BrownApr 24, 2019
Ralph Fiennes’s film too conspicuously avoids an overt political perspective. Read full review
40
TheWrapCandice FrederickApr 23, 2019
The film’s constant waltz between moods is aggravating at best. It becomes unclear whether we are even supposed to root for Rudolf, or if it matters that we do. Read full review
40
The Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthyMar 21, 2019
Writer David Hare and director Ralph Fiennes have a good feel for the artistic world the story inhabits and professional dancer Oleg Ivenko does a more than creditable job in personifying one of the 20th century’s most celebrated artistic figures, but the narrative bounces all over the place trying to cover too much ground when concentrating on the core drama would have far better served the desired end. Read full review
40
Screen DailyWendy IdeMar 21, 2019
The cluttered structure, littered with brusque little flashbacks, repeatedly interrupts the momentum and tension of the story of Nureyev’s most daring leap. Read full review
More From This Movie

61 Critic Reviews

6.4 User Reviews

Details & Credits|Trailers

Current Movie Releases
By MetascoreBy User Score
1 81 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple
2 77 Project Hail Mary
3 75 Send Help
4 73 Hoppers
5 72 The Sheep Detectives
SEE ALL
Essential Links
New on Amazon Prime Video
New on Netflix
Coming Soon to DVD/Blu-ray
SEE ALL