You, the Living
Palisades Tartan | Release Date: July 29, 2009 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
81
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 15 Critic Reviews
Positive:
14
Mixed:
1
Negative:
0

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
There’s joy in watching a movie like You, the Living. It is flawless in what it does, and we have no idea what that is. It’s in sympathy with its characters. It shares their sorrow, and yet is amused that each thinks his suffering is unique. Read full review
100
The New York TimesA.O. Scott
The film is slow, rigorously morose and often painful in its blunt reckoning of disappointment and failure. It is also extremely funny. Read full review
88
New York PostV.A. Musetto
Andersson has a one-of-a-kind style that not all viewers will appreciate. His humor is not at all like Hollywood’s. His is leisurely and cerebral — two words never heard in La La Land. Read full review
88
Slant MagazineNick Schager
Humor and sorrow are equally immediate emotions throughout, whether in the writer-director's traditionally structured setup-punchline scenes or his strange non sequiturs Read full review
88
LarsenOnFilmJosh Larsen
Perhaps my preference is best explained this way: I’d rather live in the world of You, the Living. Songs from the Second Floor is the one I’d rather watch. Read full review
80
Village VoiceNick Pinkerton
You, the Living flips through 50-some single-panel vignettes, many very funny. Read full review
80
EmpireDavid Parkinson
Recalling the work of Jacques Tati, this is a grim but amusing and ultimately successful effort. Read full review
80
The GuardianPeter Bradshaw
You, the Living is a very funny film - though in the darkest possible way. It is a silent comedy, but with words. Read full review
80
Time Out LondonDave Calhoun
You won’t know whether to laugh or cry. Read full review
80
Total FilmStaff [Not Credited]
Andersson’s movie reveals poetic ironies, surreal slapstick and melancholy truths, often all wrapped up together. Read full review
80
VarietyJustin Chang
Results are painfully amusing, frequently random and occasionally laugh-out-loud hilarious. Read full review
70
L.A. WeeklyNick Pinkerton
Andersson particularly delights in left-outs: the guy who can’t squeeze into the bus stop during a downpour; the natty little suitor getting his bouquet smashed in a slamming door. The sum total is the reflection of a worldview -- sad sack, bordering on “Everybody Hurts” black-velvet sad-clown bathos -- rather than any narrative. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesKevin Thomas
You, the Living suggests that we would do well to discover the joy we find in each other that so often goes along with the pain. Read full review
67
The A.V. ClubScott Tobias
You, The Living, if only by virtue of a more intimate scale than Songs, benefits from a lightness of touch and even a thin sliver of optimism in some sequences. Read full review
60
Time OutKeith Uhlich
The ideologies underlying Andersson’s oft-astonishing succession of extreme wide-angle, vanishing-point tableaux are a decidedly acquired taste. Read full review
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