The Yellow Birds
Saban Films | Release Date: June 15, 2018 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
56
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 16 Critic Reviews
Positive:
4
Mixed:
12
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
The New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisJun 14, 2018
Capped by a truly lovely final shot, The Yellow Birds (the title comes from a particularly cruel Army cadence) is about unseen wounds and wasted lives. The closer we get to these young men, the closer we are to wondering how many more of these stories we can bear to hear. Read full review
80
Screen DailyTim GriersonJan 25, 2017
The Yellow Birds is a war movie whose outlines may be familiar — but its emotional clarity gives this drama an almost crushing sense of intimacy. Read full review
75
ObserverRex ReedJun 15, 2018
The film is extraordinarily well directed by Alexandre Moors, realistically written, and uniformly well played by an excellent supporting cast that includes Jennifer Aniston, Toni Collette, Jason Patric, and Jack Huston. As “war is hell” movies go, this one is better than usual. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesMichael RechtshaffenJun 14, 2018
Making a late appearance in the Iraq War movie cycle, the impressively acted “The Yellow Birds” manages to leave an affecting mark even as it constantly struggles to find a distinctive voice of its own. Read full review
60
IGNKenneth Seward Jr.Jun 21, 2018
While there's a lot to love in The Yellow Birds, this war film is ultimately a missed opportunity. Read full review
60
The GuardianJordan HoffmanJan 25, 2017
Yellow Birds goes heavy on the brooding, and even though a lot of it looks gorgeous and carries the whiff of great importance it is ultimately stunted by a central event that isn’t worth the mystery that surrounds it. Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubA.A. Dowd Jun 15, 2018
Directed by Alexandre Moors, who made the D.C. sniper movie Blue Caprice, The Yellow Birds might have used its nonlinear structure to confront us with how war reshapes these young men, putting who they were and who they become into conversation. But the performances don’t capture that psychological change. Read full review
50
RogerEbert.comGodfrey CheshireJun 15, 2018
Alexandre Moors’ film is also so lacking in anything new or compelling to say — either emotional or political — about its subject that it ends up a rather dispiriting slog of a movie. Read full review
50
Village VoiceApril WolfeJun 14, 2018
What Moors offers that’s new is a kind of unfolding mystery, as we come to find what really happened to Murphy in the war zone. Too bad that the pacing is botched and that the whole narrative becomes one long dirge of “and then, and then, and then.” Read full review
50
Slant MagazineJosh WiseJun 11, 2018
You may want for something to hold on to, but Tye Sheridan and Alden Ehrenreich slip through the fingers, both seeming uninterested and restless to move on to other projects. Read full review
50
Movie NationRoger MooreMay 29, 2018
For all the vivid combat sequences, the gritty adjustment-back-home touches and a couple of genuinely emotional scenes, it feels incomplete, choppy and something of a cheat. Read full review
50
The Film StageDan MeccaJan 25, 2017
Moors is a filmmaker with immense talent, as demonstrated in his Sundance film Blue Caprice from a few years back, but the beats don’t quite align this time around. Read full review
50
The Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthyJan 25, 2017
An excellent novel about the Iraq War and its homefront fallout has been turned into a rather flat and disappointing film in The Yellow Birds. Read full review
50
The PlaylistGregory EllwoodJan 25, 2017
There are elements of “The Yellow Birds” that should equate to a unique cinematic experience. Unfortunately, like Bartle’s return home, you leave the theater somewhat dazed, confused and thinking of what went wrong. Read full review
40
VarietyOwen GleibermanJan 25, 2017
The film keeps acting like it has something big to tell us; it plods and broods with self-importance. Yet in almost every crucial way, The Yellow Birds is a flat and listless piece of moviemaking, a monotonous indie dirge. Read full review
40
We Got This CoveredJordan RuimyJan 25, 2017
For a film that has such an intriguing premise at its core, The Yellow Birds seems to drag due to Moor’s abrupt tempo changes and flat visual style. Read full review
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