The Workshop
Strand Releasing | Release Date: March 23, 2018 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
74
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 15 Critic Reviews
Positive:
11
Mixed:
4
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
The New York TimesJennifer SzalaiMar 22, 2018
It’s a measure of this film’s stealthy brilliance that it blurs the line between empathy and exploitation. Read full review
90
Screen DailyDan FainaruMar 19, 2018
The Workshop conveys a stunningly authentic portrait of French youth today; their class, racial and occupational concerns. Read full review
90
VarietyGuy LodgeMar 19, 2018
A sly, supple and repeatedly surprising collision of literary, moral and political lines of debate that marks an enthralling return to form for writer-director Laurent Cantet. Read full review
88
Washington PostAlan ZilbermanApr 11, 2018
It is not exactly a thriller, yet its plausibility will inspire very real anxiety. Read full review
80
The Observer (UK)Wendy IdeNov 29, 2018
A third act that stumbles into genre territory loses focus temporarily, but is redeemed by a scene that celebrates the power of words above all else. Read full review
80
Los Angeles TimesRobert AbeleApr 5, 2018
The trappings are thriller-ish, but the playing field is recognizably timely: a fast-changing economic/cultural world in which some youth are up for the challenge to reconcile a vanished past with a roiling present — France's terrorism woes are explicitly referenced — while others are dangerously indifferent to it. Read full review
80
The GuardianWendy IdeMar 19, 2018
It’s a film which demonstrates that debate, the exchange of ideas, can be as thrilling as any ramped up action flick. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterJordan MintzerMar 19, 2018
Featuring sharp performances from Marina Fois (Polisse) and promising newcomer Matthieu Lucci, the film shows Cantet returning to form...with a story that pursues the themes of his best work while underscoring some of the issues currently facing his homeland. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comGodfrey CheshireMar 23, 2018
For myself, I couldn’t avoid the irony that, in finding it ultimately rather superficial and self-satisfied in that particular Parisian way, I was echoing Antoine’s criticism of Olivia’s writing. Read full review
75
TheWrapBen CrollMar 19, 2018
Though the film occasionally assumes the airs of a slow-burning thriller, the overall product remains a firmly intellectual exercise. Read full review
63
Slant MagazineChristopher GrayMar 18, 2018
Matthieu Lucci deftly carries the weight of all the symptoms that The Workshop loads upon Antoine, a resonant character whose inscrutability is at once dangerous, sympathetic, and eerily apt. Read full review
60
CineVueJohn BleasdaleNov 28, 2018
It’s difficult given the premise of the film not to come out of The Workshop thinking of alternative directions the story could have gone in. Read full review
60
The TelegraphTim RobeyNov 21, 2018
While it's possible to fantasise a truly explosive, riskily disturbing version of The Workshop, that simply wouldn’t be what its own makers intended. Read full review
60
Village VoiceDevika GirishMar 22, 2018
These scenes of debate (reminiscent of Cantet’s The Class from 2008) thrum with energy, thanks to the spontaneous and full-bodied performances of the nonprofessional cast, whose improvised dialogue feels casual, yet cuttingly profound. Read full review
58
The A.V. ClubMike D'AngeloMar 20, 2018
Cantet remains a gifted filmmaker — The Workshop’s semi-improvisational aspects are no less impressive than those in "The Class," and he’s at least superficially engaged with the current state of the world — but this isn’t the return to form that his fans have awaited over the past decade. Read full review
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