Paterno
  • Network: HBO
  • Series Premiere Date: Apr 7, 2018
User Score
4.6

Mixed or average reviews- based on 24 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 9 out of 24
  2. Mixed: 5 out of 24
  3. Negative: 10 out of 24

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User Reviews

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  1. mikemacdad
    Apr 10, 2018
    10
    This is an absolutely horrible story, but a story that has to be told. Joe Paterno was a great man, a great coach, a great husband...........but at the end of the day he had the ability to stop a child rapist and he chose to protect his kingdom over the moral and ethical easy choice. PSU cult members will always blindly defend him and that is disgusting.
  2. cmwy10a
    Apr 14, 2018
    0
    Waste of time with no digging into this terrible attempt to be a Paterno bio. Much has been shown to be wrong and evidence of major failures by Pennsylvania gov agency’s failings given almost no coverage. No conclusion leaves viewer hollow.
  3. amheretojudge
    Apr 11, 2018
    5
    why are they talking about him..

    Paterno There isn't much to look up to in this plot, no matter how much impact it creates on screen the characters are left off far away disconnected from the audience which is never acceptable especially on such character driven feature. Barry Levinson; the director, tries too hard on executing the anticipated vision but fails to deliver it. And if    why are they talking about him..

    Paterno

    There isn't much to look up to in this plot, no matter how much impact it creates on screen the characters are left off far away disconnected from the audience which is never acceptable especially on such character driven feature. Barry Levinson; the director, tries too hard on executing the anticipated vision but fails to deliver it. And if anything that helps one survive this feature, it is Al Pacino and his brilliant portrayal that is supported with a good cast. Paterno is plausible on some aspects but is piled up by this raw script whose attempt to go in detail on facts leads to an informative art rather than being entertaining one.    … Expand
  4. imthenoob
    Jan 16, 2019
    4
    Pacino does a great job but the film does little to offer any new insights into the man as he is dealing with the falling out of the scandal that brought down the college he built up. Instead, He comes off as a man who cares little about how things affected everyone else until he has to deal with his own mortality. And I wasn't a fan of how Paterno tried to put Joe in a better light thanPacino does a great job but the film does little to offer any new insights into the man as he is dealing with the falling out of the scandal that brought down the college he built up. Instead, He comes off as a man who cares little about how things affected everyone else until he has to deal with his own mortality. And I wasn't a fan of how Paterno tried to put Joe in a better light than what he really was: He wasn't some ill-informed man that possibly knew more than he did, Which is what they tried to portrait in the film. He was a man that repeatedly covered up a scandal in order to save his own skin and the legacy he built.… Expand
  5. calhounite
    May 16, 2018
    10
    Powerful, exonerative portrayal of Paterno. Transformative. Depicts the heroic Paterno, not the excoriated Freeh Report one. The key is the redress of Paterno's lawyer son when asks if he didn't hear about rumors. Supernal rebuke warning of the devastating damage that can be incurred by judging people in that manner. Pure anguish in realizing that this forbearance resulted in its ownPowerful, exonerative portrayal of Paterno. Transformative. Depicts the heroic Paterno, not the excoriated Freeh Report one. The key is the redress of Paterno's lawyer son when asks if he didn't hear about rumors. Supernal rebuke warning of the devastating damage that can be incurred by judging people in that manner. Pure anguish in realizing that this forbearance resulted in its own devastation. And makes clear that Paterno believed Sandusky had concocted his own image orbit through the Second Mile and wasn't a product of Paterno's. His remark that Sandusky had duped him along with scores of others, powerful figures, child professionals, exploiting that orbit resonates as ruefully sincere.

    Curley's email stated that Paterno wanted Sandusky to be confronted with the charge. What's wrong with that? That's basic to give a man a chance to explain. That would be a thought arising from the heroic Paterno.

    The question has never been whether or not Paterno believed McQueary. It is this. Did Paterno believe he did enough to set the judicial/police/social services investigative process in motion in order to arrive at the appropriate determination regarding Sandusky. It would be perfectly ok for Paterno to take a stance of utter detachment as long as HE BELIEVED HE DID THIS.

    Don't know. Won't never be known. The movie's inherent premise is that the answer is yes. Pacino's artistic portrayal weighs ever so slightly toward a self-recriminating guilt rather than a guilt arising from conscious knowledge of deliberate subterfuge. However, the outrage of society against Paterno is understandable as the answer appears on the surface to be no. Never asked again about the status of the presumably ongoing/completed investigation. Did in 1998. Didn't in 2001. Is the fact that Sandusky was a direct subordinate in 1998 but not in 2001 a sufficient reason?

    The movie's closing scene balances out its driving viewpoint. But this movie gives Paterno's life a chance to be defined by Paterno, not Sandusky. It uplifts Paterno, his family, Penn State, and the admirers of Paterno. Pacino's acting makes it possible. It is a masterpiece in the portrayal of different perspectives.    … Expand

Awards & Rankings

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#80 Best TV Season of 2018
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#71 Most Shared TV Season of 2018

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
69

Generally favorable reviews - based on 19 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 12 out of 19
  2. Mixed: 7 out of 19
  3. Negative: 0 out of 19
  1. Chicago Sun-Times
    Reviewed by: Richard Roeper
    Dec 14, 2018
    88
    Unsettling and riveting and scathing.
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  2. Los Angeles Times
    Reviewed by: Robert Lloyd
    Apr 9, 2018
    50
    The film is watchable, certainly, but also wayward. Its effects feel scattered, its points lost as the story looks here, looks there; Paterno has many things to show you, but less to say.
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  3. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
    Reviewed by: Rob Owen
    Apr 9, 2018
    78
    It’s an engaging (and, perhaps to some defenders of Joe Paterno, it will be an enraging) film that explores character, the politics of college athletics and the value of local journalism in a style that’s more process piece thriller than it is anything like a biopic given how “Paterno” concentrates on a short period in the coach’s life.
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