Critic Reviews
58
Metascore
Mixed or Average
positive
3(30%)
mixed
7(70%)
negative
0(0%)
Showing 10 Critic Reviews
80
A big, brave, stouthearted, sometimes romantic, sometimes silly melodrama with the kind of visual sweep you don't often find in movies anymore.
80
Papillon was produced with consummate technical skill and offers brilliant acting by McQueen and Hoffman.
70
Shaffner has really made an exhilarating movie out of the most dangerously depressing material. [10 Jan 1974, p.56]
60
One of the greatest behind-bars movies ever, the result finds director Franklin J. Schaffner making the most of both his sun-drenched locations and his leading man, who squintily acts even co-star Dustin Hoffman well off the screen.
60
Audiences whose expectations do not exceed their grasp will find it a much more comfortable vehicle for escape than any that McQueen & Co. discover on location.
50
No sense of complicity between filmmaker and spectator, no depth, no ambiguity, no production value spared, plenty of running time and pomposity, and a desperate sense of trying to do everything and please everybody.
50
An expensive, exhaustive, 150-mintue odyssey that doesn’t so much conclude as cross the finish line and collapse. It has been outfitted with expensive stars and a glossy production, but it doesn’t really make us care.
50
For 150 uninterrupted minutes, the mood is one of despair, brutality, and little hope. The script is very good within its limitations, but there is insufficient identification with the main characters.
50
With Schaffner unable to find the necessary perspective to prevent the film from becoming unevenly episodic, it ends up looking as if it were tacked together by at least three different directors.
50
A methodical, pointlessly grueling movie.
