Touch
Focus Features | Release Date: July 12, 2024 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
74
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 21 Critic Reviews
Positive:
20
Mixed:
1
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
91
IndieWireChristian ZilkoJul 15, 2024
Spanning 50 years and multiple continents without ever shifting its focus from the universal human urge to ponder what could have been, Touch is an ode to accepting your life story without losing sleep over the things you couldn’t change. Read full review
90
VarietyCourtney HowardJul 15, 2024
This gentle, unfussy romance contains a heart-clutching finale that’s as classically restrained as it is emotionally resounding. Read full review
88
RogerEbert.comNell MinowJul 12, 2024
The film’s embrace of compassion and forgiveness for everyone is heartwarmingly spacious. It shimmers with grace. Read full review
80
The GuardianCatherine BrayAug 28, 2024
If we’re nitpicking it’s fair to say that neither of the couple’s interior lives are as fully fleshed out as would be permitted in a novel, but maybe they don’t have to be: they function as avatars for romantic hopes and dreams as much as anything, delivering all the vicarious pleasure and pain that we’re looking for when we tuck into a good romance Read full review
80
TimeStephanie ZacharekJul 15, 2024
This is a movie of gentle but resonant pleasures; it slows the world down, a little, for the span of time you’re watching it. And couldn’t we all use a little of that these days? Read full review
80
SlashfilmBen PearsonJul 15, 2024
This is a stripped down story — the type of moving, romantic drama aimed at adults that's become an endangered species over the past couple of decades. If the director wants to take a sudden shift in his preferred mode of filmmaking at this stage in his career, I would greatly welcome seeing him make more movies in this mold. Read full review
80
Los Angeles TimesRobert AbeleJul 15, 2024
The result, anchored by enchanting performances and Kormákur’s reliably visceral storytelling, is an appealing pivot for a filmmaker who tends to gravitate toward adrenalized tales of survival. Read full review
80
ColliderJeff EwingJul 15, 2024
It's a film that subtly reminds the audience to slow down, be present, and enjoy what one has, because it can be gone in an instant, while also encouraging hope. It's a beautiful cinematic journey and one not to be missed. Read full review
80
Arizona RepublicKaely MonahanJul 11, 2024
Author Olaf Olafsson helped write the screenplay and you can feel his intentions throughout. There is a literary beauty woven throughout the film. He asks you to examine what it means to reach out and touch someone — or have someone touch you. Both the physical and the metaphysical are orchestrated wonderfully. Read full review
80
Screen DailyNikki BaughanJul 11, 2024
Director Baltasar Kormákur and his actors err on the side of restraint, delivering a balanced, absorbing human drama. Read full review
77
TheWrapWilliam BibbianiJun 14, 2024
What’s worth taking away from the film is its peacefulness. There are moments of friendship and family and workplace camaraderie that are real and charming. Read full review
75
The Film StageDan MeccaJul 15, 2024
Things are revealed, loose ends are tied, and Kormákur keeps it all moving at brisk pace given the evolving intrigue. The word “lovely” feels old-fashioned, but it’s appropriate here. This is a lovely film. Read full review
75
ObserverOliver JonesJul 12, 2024
It is a difficult and painful subject to consider, talk about, and confront both in life and in the movies. But Kormákur’s quiet little film reminds us that when we do—and however we do it—the process can remind us what it is like to be human. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleG. Allen JohnsonJul 10, 2024
Ultimately, the film does its job with skill and heart. Read full review
75
Original-CinJim SlotekJul 10, 2024
Touch is a film that moves at its own Icelandic pace to savour its own tragic, but ultimately hopeful story. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneyJul 15, 2024
The movie occasionally veers toward cliché, but its delicacy and restraint keep it dramatically compelling and its emotions are never unearned, right through to its lovely open-ended conclusion. Read full review
70
Wall Street JournalKyle SmithJul 11, 2024
Touch is a worthy consideration of the things that matter most when the clock is running out, but it could have been more focused. Read full review
70
The New York TimesBeatrice LoayzaJul 11, 2024
Touch rekindles a treacly genre that I didn’t realize I missed. Its tender performances and gut-punch reveals are classic tear-jerker ingredients. Add to this a natural, inordinately sensitive approach to intercultural love — mercifully, without a sense of righteousness or obligation. Read full review
63
Movie NationRoger MooreJul 12, 2024
Emotional shortcomings aside, Touch still pulls you in, an immersive story of alien worlds — the 1960s, Iceland and Japan — sympathetically and patiently told, a lovely two hour break from the world and the fresh waves of bad news that stain even the best of times. Read full review
63
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsJul 11, 2024
I admire this film’s craft. And I would’ve appreciated a messier, inner-life impulse to go with it. Read full review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Radheyan SimonpillaiJul 11, 2024
Touch, adapted from Olafur Johann Olafsson’s novel, is handsome, sentimental and restrained (admirably, in parts). But it also leaves a lot to be desired – yes, a movie about yearning left me yearning – chiefly when it comes to the central romance, which is presented as more ornamental than passionate. Read full review
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