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
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
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