Woman in Gold
Weinstein Company, The | Release Date: April 1, 2015 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
51
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 31 Critic Reviews
Positive:
11
Mixed:
18
Negative:
2
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
88
ObserverRex ReedApr 1, 2015
It’s a touching film that entertains with warmth and humor while teaching us something about history, law and justice with enormous heart, subtlety and compassion, brilliantly acted and skillfully written. Is there anything Helen Mirren cannot do? Read full review
80
EmpireAnna SmithApr 6, 2015
Even with a starry cast, the stirring true story is this drama’s standout feature. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaApr 3, 2015
The transformation of Reynold's lawyer from a bumbler and stumbler to a victorious litigator, sticking it to an entire nation, is the stuff of a Frank Capra/Jimmy Stewart pic. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliApr 2, 2015
Woman in Gold is arguably of more interest for its historical perspective than for its drama. Although there is some suspense in the courtroom proceedings, no one would mistake this for the next "To Kill a Mockingbird" or "The Verdict." Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperMar 31, 2015
Simon Curtis’ Woman in Gold is a shamelessly sentimental fictionalization of this true story, but it’s a fascinating story nonetheless, beautifully photographed and greatly elevated by a brilliant performance from the invaluable Helen Mirren. Read full review
70
Screen DailyMark AdamsMar 30, 2015
Though perhaps lacking in a real sense of dramatic tension; veering towards the schmaltzy at times and needing a far tighter ending, Woman In Gold is still a thoroughly enjoyable story, engagingly told and with a nice line in gentle humour to balance the legal battle structure which can veer to dryness at times. Read full review
67
Entertainment WeeklyLeah GreenblattApr 2, 2015
Even Helen Mirren, the Queen Midas of class acting, can’t fix this well-intentioned miss. Read full review
63
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe WilliamsApr 9, 2015
The Woman in Gold works, largely because of the odd-couple chemistry between Mirren and Reynolds. It just goes to show that broad strokes are appealing when they’re in the right frame. Read full review
63
RogerEbert.comSusan WloszczynaApr 3, 2015
While Mirren unquestioningly rules this roost, one cast member’s late arrival onscreen did get the audience murmuring in recognition. Namely, Lady Grantham herself — Elizabeth McGovern — who appears as a judge during one of the key moments in the legal case. One can assume that the “Downton Abbey” star took the slim part as a favor for her husband, who happens to be the director. Read full review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Simon HouptApr 2, 2015
Director Simon Curtis milks the predictable drama, thrills and heartache of the Holocaust-era story, but it’s a paint-by-numbers triumph, a copy of something we’ve seen many times before. Read full review
63
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanApr 1, 2015
Stirring at times, soggy and overly sentimental at others, the film moves surprisingly slow, even though its action, which takes place over many years of legal maneuvering, has been condensed for narrative expediency. Read full review
60
Time Out LondonTrevor JohnstonApr 7, 2015
Mirren’s performance movingly evokes the travails and rewards of seeking an accommodation with a nightmare past. Yet the clunky, often superficial movie around her tames the anger and anguish of memory in favour of a well-meaning but pat, feelgood ‘prestige’ product. Read full review
60
Total FilmPhilip KempApr 6, 2015
A plodding, predictable script hampers this tale of a real-life legal battle. But it’s redeemed by a vital central performance – and some vivid flashbacks. Read full review
60
Village VoiceSerena DonadoniMar 31, 2015
What Woman in Gold has over nonfiction portrayals is emotion, and director Simon Curtis (My Week With Marilyn) milks every scene for its heart-tugging potential. Read full review
58
Portland OregonianMarc MohanApr 2, 2015
It's a shame that a movie centered on such a powerful and unique work of art is itself so obviously a corporate product. Read full review
58
The A.V. ClubA.A. Dowd Apr 1, 2015
An early contender for the most Weinstein movie of the year, Woman In Gold bends a complicated legal quagmire—heavy on questions of ownership and national responsibility—into a crowd-pleasing David and Goliath story. The title, too generic for Klimt’s masterpiece, suits the movie just fine. Read full review
50
Boston GlobeTy BurrApr 2, 2015
The production design is swank, the score impassioned. We should be riveted. Instead, you may feel you’ve seen this movie before, and, in a sense, you have: Woman in Gold plays remarkably like 2013’s “Philomena” with a change of cast and a different historical outrage. Read full review
50
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsApr 2, 2015
There's really no other word for what Helen Mirren is doing in certain reaction shots, out of subtle interpretive desperation: mugging. She's mugging. She is a sublimely talented performer, and this is material with fascinating implications, and I doubt there's a moviegoer in the world who doesn't like Helen Mirren. But even the best actors need a director to tell them to tone it down. Read full review
50
Movie NationRoger MooreApr 2, 2015
It’s a labored film thanks to trite dialogue, to interesting characters like a “good Austrian” journalist (Daniel Bruhl) who wants his country held accountable who are given short shrift, and to the many court scenes have a hint of humor, but no spark. Read full review
50
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzApr 1, 2015
Reynolds is a good actor but he's miscast. Mirren is great, and she makes Woman in Gold better than it otherwise would have been. Still, it's just kind of boring and straightforward, even if its inspiration is not. Read full review
50
New York PostLou LumenickApr 1, 2015
Even the great Helen Mirren can do only so much to elevate this relentlessly mediocre, fact-inspired drama. Read full review
50
Los Angeles TimesKenneth TuranApr 1, 2015
It's regrettable that Woman in Gold is no more than adequate, more old-fashioned Hollywoodization than incisive modern dramatization. Read full review
50
Slant MagazineMatt BrennanMar 31, 2015
The film evades all but the most careful commonplaces about the relationship between the viewer and the work of art at its center. Read full review
40
CineVueBen NicholsonApr 9, 2015
Woman in Gold is ultimately a worthy endeavour even when it is not entirely successful. Read full review
40
Austin ChronicleMarjorie BaumgartenApr 8, 2015
Gustav Klimt’s spectacular painting Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I far outshines this pedestrian movie about the legal battle waged by Maria Altmann (Mirren), the niece of the portrait’s subject, to regain possession of the work which was seized from her family by the Nazis during their takeover of Austria. Read full review
40
The New York TimesStephen HoldenMar 31, 2015
Apart from Ms. Mirren’s performance, Woman in Gold smugly and shamelessly pushes familiar buttons. Read full review
40
The DissolveTasha RobinsonMar 31, 2015
Director Simon Curtis and first-time screenwriter Alexi Kaye Campbell constantly push too hard and too forcefully, laying on schmaltz where none is needed. Read full review
40
The Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneyFeb 10, 2015
While Helen Mirren elevates the material with her usual aplomb and the events being depicted inevitably are stirring, this is a stodgy crusade-for-justice drama, directed and written with minimal flair. Read full review
40
The TelegraphTim RobeyFeb 10, 2015
The film seems to think the mere presence of Mirren as a wisecracking widow will be enough for us to forgive it a multitude of sins. Read full review
30
VarietyPeter DebrugeFeb 10, 2015
This is manufactured sentiment, less interested in provoking thought than in manipulating emotion, constructed of human obstacles overcome, stirring speeches delivered and heart-rending flashbacks unveiled, all suspended like so much Spam in the jelly of its own score. Read full review
25
The PlaylistJessica KiangFeb 19, 2015
Is it fair to make Woman in Gold representative of the failings of the whole historical-true-story-designed-to-remind-an-older-skewing-middle-class-white-audience-that-people-have-triumphed-over-adversity genre? Perhaps not, but as one of its most egregious and fallacious examples, it's as good a line to draw in the sand as any. Read full review
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