Flowers in the Attic
Lifetime | Release Date: January 18, 2014
CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
49
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 22 Critic Reviews
Positive:
8
Mixed:
10
Negative:
4

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
75
People WeeklyTom GliattoJan 21, 2014
Season 1 Review: Flowers, both the book and the new movie, is completely absurd--if you want to gauge the absurdity, just know that one of the darkest secrets in the narrative involves a doughnut--but somehow also psychologically coherent. It has a grip. Read full review
70
Philadelphia InquirerDavid HiltbrandJan 21, 2014
Season 1 Review: A sharper creepy TV movie. Read full review
67
Boston HeraldMark A. PerigardJan 21, 2014
Season 1 Review: If you dwell too much on the plot, you’ll fall into a chasm of disbelief.... Flowers doesn’t look like a Lifetime film, and that’s a compliment. The production moves at a brisk pace, and unlike the children’s predicament, never feels claustrophobic. Read full review
67
Uncle BarkyEd BarkJan 16, 2014
Season 1 Review: The whole enterprise is alternately laughable and affecting without committing the eighth deadly sin of being boring. Read full review
67
The A.V. ClubGenevieve ValentineJan 16, 2014
Season 1 Review: Perhaps, because it was unwilling to risk becoming camp, this Flowers can’t achieve the necessary passion, either--Corinne’s viciousness is lost in the shuffle, and volatile Cathy and confused Christopher remain sketches of real characters, whose love never becomes the lifelong connection that takes them by surprise and desperately rushes them toward freedom. Read full review
63
New York PostSara StewartJan 17, 2014
Season 1 Review: Despite the seemingly substantial production budget, there are moments of howlingly bad special effects.... But the real problem is the movie’s lack of lust. Read full review
63
St. Louis Post-DispatchGail PenningtonJan 16, 2014
Season 1 Review: It does what it sets out to do: that is, adapt the book faithfully and still make an entertaining film. Read full review
63
Chicago Sun-TimesLori RacklJan 13, 2014
Season 1 Review: This tale of a twisted family’s misguided quest for love and money is still creepy and atmospheric enough to make for pulpy television fun. Read full review
50
New York Magazine (Vulture)Matt Zoller SeitzJan 17, 2014
Season 1 Review: All the actors are spot-on, even ones who have just a few scenes. It's a pity Kayla Alpert's script and Deborah Chow's direction don't do their collaborators justice. Read full review
50
VarietyGeoff BerkshireJan 17, 2014
Season 1 Review: Chow’s flat direction does little to elevate the action beyond the level of staged reading. It’s hard to fault the actors, although Graham seems unfortunately miscast in a role that requires a degree of coldblooded cunning she’s simply too sweet to pull off. Shipka radiates natural intelligence and poise. Read full review
50
The Daily BeastAndrew RomanoJan 16, 2014
Season 1 Review: The performances are fine.... As a Lifetime Television Event--a sanctioned airing, projected into the living room, of some grown-up's version of Flowers in the Attic--that context [of the book itself being contraband] is gone. Completely. And so is most of Flowers’ strange, strange magic. Read full review
50
Pittsburgh Post-GazetteRob OwenJan 16, 2014
Season 1 Review: Flowers in the Attic plays it safe and a bit boring. This is material that screams for a campy touch, but director Deborah Chow and teleplay writer Kayla Alpert tell the tale with mostly straight faces. Read full review
42
Entertainment WeeklyLeah GreenblattJan 10, 2014
Season 1 Review: Flower's isn't a guilty pleasure, it's purgatory. [17 Jan 2014, p.63]
40
New York Daily NewsDavid HinckleyJan 21, 2014
Season 1 Review: V.C. Andrews’ popular and creepy 1979 novel “Flowers in the Attic” gets no favors from the scriptwriters in this latest adaptation. The reason to watch, even when you’re saying “Yeah, right” to what’s happening on the screen, is actors Ellen Burstyn, Mason Dye and Kiernan Shipka. Read full review
40
Kansas City StarSara SmithJan 17, 2014
Season 1 Review: Lifetime goes there, then backs away from the issue immediately, making for some scenes that add nothing to the story but brief bouts of nausea. Read full review
40
SlateWilla PaskinJan 17, 2014
Season 1 Review: Teen sexuality is tricky subject material. Teen sexuality manifested in incest is trickier still. And the new Lifetime movie is not up to the job. Read full review
40
Boston GlobeMeredith GoldsteinJan 17, 2014
Season 1 Review: Graham is so weirdly robotic as Corrine Dollanganger that it’s almost as if she’s doing an impression of an actress in a Lifetime movie.... Burstyn's scenes are compelling, even though she doesn’t have much to work with. The movie gets hard to watch when we’re stuck in the attic with siblings Cathy, Chris, Cory, and Cary. Read full review
40
The New York TimesMike HaleJan 16, 2014
Season 1 Review: The film, adapted by Kayla Alpert and directed by Deborah Chow, captures only the faintest shadow of the book’s tone and ambience, so it’s left with the story, and that’s not a good situation. Read full review
30
TV Guide MagazineMatt RoushJan 17, 2014
Season 1 Review: I'm not quite sure why this needed to be remade, but Lifetime's curiously inert adaptation of V.C. Andrews' twisted Gothic Flowers in the Attic at least gives Ellen Burstyn the opportunity to display her florid take on a classic Nurse Ratched/Baby Jane psycho character Read full review
25
HitfixLiane Bonin Starr Jan 17, 2014
Season 1 Review: Without the sex, we're left with a story that's all kinds of stupid and worse, dull. Read full review
20
Los Angeles TimesMary McNamaraJan 21, 2014
Season 1 Review: The problem is not that it's just terrible, but that it's also no fun. At all. Read full review
20
Washington PostHank StueverJan 17, 2014
Season 1 Review: Even allowing for the lowbrow standards that can paradoxically turn a Lifetime movie into a delectable piece of trash, this Flowers in the Attic is a remarkably weak effort. Read full review
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