| Focus Features | Release Date: July 29, 2022 | CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION | ||
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Positive:
25
Mixed:
14
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews
Aug 2, 2022
Vengeance may have a sort of old-fashioned setup, but its takes are razor sharp, such that when the comedy starts to turn earnest, and the story begins to evolve from fish-out-of-water comedy into more straight-up potboiler (Jason Blum having produced it and whatnot), it doesn’t feel like an apology or a digression. It feels like a deepening of themes.
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IndieWireJun 15, 2022
Even when the jokes miss the mark or the central mystery seems too easily solved, Vengeance is sustained by the question of what its characters mean to each other; a question asked sweetly but shrouded by an ever-growing darkness that allows the film to wander into dangerous territory by the end.
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Jul 28, 2022
In Vengeance, Novak sets his sights on lampooning the big-city media types who go chasing stories in middle America and return with observations from the “flyover states” that are usually condescending, preachy, or inauthentic, and in doing so, he finds the humor, and something honest too.
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Jul 29, 2022
Jul 28, 2022
This Blumhouse production marries fish-out-of-water elements with some philosophical musings and offbeat characters that might remind viewers of (Robert) Altman lite. The ending feels a little forced, as if the filmmakers felt that not providing some kind of punch might disappoint viewers, but there are enough little pleasures along the way to more than compensate.
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Jul 27, 2022
Vengeance is a movie whose dry humour carries its message well and even has its sweet moments. The desolate desert location hangs over everything, sometimes suggesting another planet peopled by humans. But given the movie’s suggestion of the emptiness of city life, it may also suggest just another kind of desert.
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Jul 27, 2022
In writer-director-star Novak’s scathing social satire “Vengeance,” he plays a character who isn’t all that different from Ryan—only this guy might be even more cynical, more immersed in his smart phone, more of an opportunistic narcissist. It’s a smart and insightful performance in a film that has a lot to say about the personal disconnect we feel in today’s Wi-Fi world; the stereotypes held by Blue Staters about Red Staters and vice versa, and the manner in which millions of us consider every waking moment as potential material, to be memorialized in a selfie or a tweet or a Tik-Tok video or a podcast.
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Jul 26, 2022
Vengeance is unexpected and, in the best way, weird. In his first film as a writer-director, B.J. Novak takes familiar elements, but puts them together in ways that are original and unexpected. Even when the plot turns go off the deep end, it’s impossible not to appreciate Novak’s audacity.
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The PlaylistJun 12, 2022
Some of Novak’s camera sense, particularly early on, betrays his sitcom roots, and he commits the classic rookie mistake of going on three or so scenes too long, tying up inconsequential loose ends. But he crafts a good mystery, consistently engaging and entertaining, and the thoughtful turns of the last confrontation are sly, smart, and knowing.
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Aug 1, 2022
Jul 29, 2022
Mr. Novak comes up with so much funny dialogue and so many intriguing ideas that I mostly forgive the creakiness of his plotting. The basic mechanics of the whodunit seem to elude him, and he leaves important matters dangling at the end. But questioning the failings and prejudices of his tribe (Mr. Novak grew up in greater Boston, went to Harvard, worked in Hollywood, and has also written for the New Yorker) has provided him with a wealth of material.
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Jul 28, 2022
Among some of the movie’s heady notions the movie attempts to assay are the idea and consequences of people living in their own highly individualized spaces; the question of whether any truth can be embedded in pure intuition; and the empty distractions of collapsing civilization, in which culture is relegated to increasingly meaningless fragmentary morsels.
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RogerEbert.comJul 29, 2022
A jumbled, fitfully amusing, occasionally fascinating effort, but one that shows promise even when it's stumbling over its ambition and falling prey to some of the same stereotypes about "red" and "blue" (or reactionary and progressive) America that it keeps intimating that Americans need to get beyond.
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Screen RantJul 29, 2022
The movie asks a lot of questions and juggles a lot of ideas, most of them good, but key pieces don't stick their landing - undermining the overall impact of what Novak, clearly, intends to say. A missed opportunity, given that "finding your voice" is one idea that Vengeance spends a lot of time exploring.
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Jul 28, 2022
Vengeance, while earnest, thoughtful and quite funny in spots, demonstrates just how difficult it can be to turn political polarization and culture-war hostility into a credible narrative. Its efforts shouldn’t be dismissed, even though it’s ultimately too clever for its own good, and maybe not quite as smart as it thinks it is.
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PolygonJul 28, 2022
The movie isn’t easy to dismiss. Its awkward comedy is often funny, and its shadowy mystery is compelling, because Abilene’s death does become more of an enigma to Ben as he learns more about her. Performers as eclectic as Holbrook, J. Smith-Cameron, Isabella Amara, and Ashton Kutcher all do their best to bring these potentially elusive characters to life.
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Jul 29, 2022
Novak, who spent years refining the squirrelly ticks of his self-regarding salesman Ryan on nine seasons of The Office, isn't a demonstrably different dude here. His callow-millennial act — and the navel-gazing vagaries of modern content culture — make fertile ground for satire, and many of the jokes here do find their soft targets. But it can also feel hollow and exhausting in main-character movie form.
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Aug 1, 2022
Novak’s forever-skill as an actor is likability, and that approachable magnetism is on display here. What doesn’t work in this otherwise naturalistic movie are the punchlines he’s written for himself. Too planned and stilted, not terribly funny. The huge size of all the actors’ humor never matches the intimate way the film has been shot.
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Jul 28, 2022
While Vengeance doesn’t always rise to the level of its ambitions, it is admirable to see Novak spit acid towards the privilege systems that make careers like his possible...But by repeating the same reductive and representational mistakes of the media it so pointedly criticizes, Novak’s film unwittingly becomes yet another part of the problem.
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The GuardianJul 29, 2022
When a writer-director of some undeniable talent throws so much at the wall, it’s inevitable that elements will stick and in Vengeance, there’s just about enough to make us curious to see what happens when Novak learns to tighten his focus. Vengeance is less the film we need right now and more the one he thinks we do but hopefully next time, he’ll figure out how to make something we want instead.
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