The Wife
Sony Pictures Classics | Release Date: August 17, 2018 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
77
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 36 Critic Reviews
Positive:
34
Mixed:
1
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
CineVueZoe MargolisSep 27, 2018
Close’s performance here surely must finally provide her with the Oscar she has deserved for so many years; the suppressed resentment which slowly builds up on her face steadily throughout the film is a masterclass in screen acting. Read full review
100
The GuardianPeter BradshawApr 13, 2018
It is a smart, supremely watchable and entertaining film, and Close gives a wonderful star turn. Read full review
88
The Seattle TimesMoira MacdonaldSep 6, 2018
Close owns this movie, from beginning to end; it’s a performance of such intelligence and subtlety that only when the movie is long over do you start wondering about whether the plot holds up. Read full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperAug 24, 2018
The Wife is visually arresting, but Runge wisely opts for a straightforward approach overall, giving center stage to the dialogue and the actors. Read full review
88
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsAug 24, 2018
An unusually good adaptation of an unusually good novel. Read full review
88
Washington PostAnn HornadayAug 22, 2018
A handsome production that delicately skewers literary-world pretensions and Great Man mythmaking. But primarily, The Wife offers viewers a chance to observe one of the finest — and most criminally underpraised — actresses of her generation working at the very top of her shrewd, subtle, superbly self-controlled game. Read full review
88
ObserverRex ReedAug 15, 2018
Soars above the ordinary with a timely narrative and a magnetic performance by Glenn Close that is nothing short of miraculous. Read full review
87
Film Journal InternationalSimi HorwitzAug 16, 2018
The Wife is an astute character study thanks in large part to Jane Anderson’s winning screenplay. Read full review
86
TheWrapTodd GilchristAug 4, 2018
What ultimately works most profoundly for the film is that its intimacy, its specificity, feels less like the culmination of Joan’s life experiences and more like an epiphany, or maybe an origin story, for what’s yet to come from her. Read full review
83
Entertainment WeeklyLeah GreenblattAug 15, 2018
Welsh actor Pryce (Game of Thrones) is fantastic — a fussy, adulterous egoist in the Great Man mold of Norman Mailer or Philip Roth, with his own touchingly real frailties. But the movie belongs to Close, whose face, as she is courted and patronized, sexually betrayed and damned with faint praise, is a marvel of emotional intelligence and control. Read full review
83
The Film StageJordan RuimyApr 13, 2018
As fraught with drama as this powder keg of heightened circumstances may be, make no mistake, The Wife is more than an actor’s showcase. The film itself is superb, a ticking time-bomb of simmering tension which benefits from the audience knowing as little as possible in advance. Read full review
80
The Observer (UK)Mark KermodeOct 2, 2018
Watching the film for a second time, with prior knowledge of the revelations of its final act, Close’s performance seemed even more nuanced, as if each look now meant something different. Read full review
80
EmpireDavid HughesSep 24, 2018
Close gives a performance that demands the Oscar voters consider her for a seventh time, and with Pryce matching her barb for barb, this is a heavyweight piece of theatre that grips whenever they’re on screen. Read full review
80
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzAug 24, 2018
A compelling film, and an excruciatingly entertaining one. Read full review
80
Film ThreatMatthew PassantinoAug 20, 2018
Björn Runge’s The Wife is an unmissable drama, largely in part to Glenn Close’s stunning performance in the title role. Read full review
80
Time OutAnna SmithAug 17, 2018
While Meg Wolitzer’s source novel is written in Joan’s voice, The Wife resists narration and allows Joan to internalize her feelings, ranging from affection, concern and duty to bitterness and rage. It’s a smart move. Read full review
80
New York Magazine (Vulture)Emily YoshidaAug 17, 2018
That’s what’s great about The Wife: Joe is no saint, and his philandering appears to be an open secret in the literary community, but it doesn’t mean Joan doesn’t love him. If she didn’t, none of this would be half as wrenching. Read full review
80
The New York TimesBen KenigsbergAug 16, 2018
The Wife pulls off the not inconsiderable feat of spinning a fundamentally literary premise into an intelligent screen drama that unfolds with real juice and suspense. Read full review
80
Village VoiceApril WolfeAug 16, 2018
It is the depth Close lends to Joan that kept me riveted — and angry. Read full review
80
Rolling StonePeter TraversAug 14, 2018
Close plays this ignored, pushed-aside woman like a gathering storm, drawing us into the mind and heart of a heroine who’s not going to take it any more. The actress has received six acting nominations without ever winning an Oscar. The Wife, a funny and fierce showcase for her prodigious talents, might just end the drought. You can’t take your eyes off her. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterJon FroschApr 13, 2018
Like a bomb ticking away toward detonation, Glenn Close commands the center of The Wife: still, formidable and impossible to look away from. Read full review
78
Austin ChronicleKimberley JonesSep 6, 2018
What is lost in translation from Wolitzer’s novel is her particular vision of Joe – short, Brooklyn-born, Jewish – and her sidelong portrait of midcentury men of letters like Bellow and Roth. The Welsh-born Pryce makes a halfhearted swipe at mimicking an Outer Boroughs accent; he’s better at capturing Joe’s gluttony and overgrown-child sulks. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Johanna SchnellerSep 20, 2018
There is a different kind of pleasure in watching ultracivilized people struggle to contain their clammy self-loathing (in Joe’s case) and fury (in Joan’s). And if you think the themes of this story are nestled comfortably in the past, think again. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliSep 3, 2018
There’s nothing momentous about The Wife but it functions equally effectively as a character-based drama and an allegorical statement about the power dynamic between men and women in pre-21st century marriages. Read full review
75
Philadelphia Daily NewsGary ThompsonAug 30, 2018
It's Close who nearly rescues The Wife, grabbing control of it in the crucial final moments, managing to transcend the script to suggest a more complex portrait of Joan, whose life choices form their own narrative, with their own reward. Read full review
75
Movie NationRoger MooreAug 27, 2018
It’s a movie decorated with glittering performances, and not just by its leading lady and leading man. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comChristy LemireAug 17, 2018
Swedish director Björn Runge’s approach is no-nonsense and workmanlike, perhaps to give these esteemed actors room to swagger and shine, but a bit more imagination and artistry wouldn’t have hurt. Read full review
70
Vanity FairRichard LawsonAug 21, 2018
I wouldn’t call The Wife middling, exactly—but for all its soapy seriousness, it can’t match the genuine heft of Close’s craftwork. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesKenneth TuranAug 15, 2018
When Close and her costars command the screen, we can forgive problems and simply enjoy the proceedings. Read full review
70
Screen DailyWendy IdeApr 13, 2018
Despite high quality performances from Close and Pryce, the film leaves us with question marks over the credibility of the central scenario. Read full review
70
VarietyAndrew BarkerApr 13, 2018
The Wife is Close’s film from start to finish, and several of the supporting performances fail to rise to her level, with Pryce and Slater the only ones who manage to impress in her orbit. Read full review
67
The A.V. ClubKatie RifeAug 15, 2018
It’s Close’s wonderfully subtle characterization of Joan that lifts The Wife above its cliché setups and neat role reversals, which is really rather ironic. Once again, it’s the wife doing all the hard work. At least this time, she gets top billing. Read full review
67
IndieWireBen CrollApr 13, 2018
It has a couple of nice reversals, two or three good laugh lines, and a caustic but not too acid skewering of cultural institutions. It goes down easy, it’s relatively unmemorable and it’s fine. Close, on the other hand, is exquisite. Read full review
63
Boston GlobeTy BurrAug 29, 2018
What unites the film’s two halves — what makes it worth watching, period — is the road Close’s Joan travels as she decides whether to reclaim authorship of her own life. It’s a diamond forged under pressure — a performance of great fury that only finds its voice at the end. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleWalter AddiegoAug 23, 2018
It would be wrong to say Close’s performance in The Wife is wasted, but it certainly deserves a better movie. Read full review
38
Slant MagazineDiego SemereneAug 13, 2018
Glenn Close's perennial look of astonishment and resilience commands the action to the point of turning every other screen element into a gratuitous prop. Read full review
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