72
Metascore
40 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 100TimeRichard CorlissTimeRichard CorlissIn his most painterly film, Spielberg has appropriated the lavish visual palette of John Ford movies: "The Quiet Man" for the rural settings, "The Horse Soldiers" for the war scenes. Boldly emotional, nakedly heartfelt, War Horse will leave only the stoniest hearts untouched.
- 91Entertainment WeeklyLisa SchwarzbaumEntertainment WeeklyLisa SchwarzbaumThis is a beautifully built, classically framed movie, shot with the unshowy natural expressiveness of a John Ford Western by Spielberg's great cinematographer, Janusz Kaminski.
- 80Time OutJoshua RothkopfTime OutJoshua RothkopfWhat's missing, then? There's no fiery central performance in the mix (the horse doesn't count), and once Emily Watson's hardscrabble mom is rotated out of the action, you yearn for an anchor.
- 75Charlotte ObserverLawrence ToppmanCharlotte ObserverLawrence ToppmanFor certain movies, the adjectives "formulaic" and "predictable" are complimentary. War Horse is one of them.
- 70The Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthyThe Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthyWhatever its missteps, this is a film that kids, middle-aged adults and grandparents can all see -- together or separately -- and get something out of in their own ways. There are precious few films that fit this description today and hats off to Spielberg for making one.
- 60VarietyJustin ChangVarietyJustin ChangThis beautifully composed picture brings a robust physicality to tried-and-true source material, but falls short of the sustained narrative involvement and emotional drive its resolutely old-fashioned storytelling demands.
- 50Slant MagazineJaime N. ChristleySlant MagazineJaime N. ChristleyWhat ultimately hobbles War Horse is a two-pronged attack, with Spielberg's soft-sell producing an unfortunately dramatic flatness in almost every scene, while an 11th-hour scramble for picture-book catharsis doesn't seem to work either.
- 40Boxoffice MagazineAmy NicholsonBoxoffice MagazineAmy NicholsonDirector Steven Spielberg doesn't have a steady grip on War Horse's careening tone, but he'll be damned if there's not 15 minutes in there for everyone.
- 40Village VoiceJ. HobermanVillage VoiceJ. HobermanSince he's (Spielberg) a director largely incapable of understatement, War Horse is served up with a self-aggrandizing, distracting surplus of Norman Rockwell backlighting, aerial landscape shots designed to out-swoop David Lean's, and an aggravated sense of doggone wonderment amplified by the director's dependence on John Williams's bombastic score.