59
Metascore
42 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 80The Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthyThe Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthyThis surprising collaboration between director Clint Eastwood and "Milk" screenwriter Dustin Lance Black tackles its trickiest challenges with plausibility and good sense, while serving up a simmeringly caustic view of its controversial subject's behavior, public and private.
- 80The New York TimesManohla DargisThe New York TimesManohla DargisMr. Eastwood doesn't just shift between Hoover's past and present, his intimate life and popular persona, he also puts them into dialectic play, showing repeatedly how each informed the other.
- 75USA TodayClaudia PuigUSA TodayClaudia PuigJ. Edgar shines a probing beam of light on a man who was widely feared, often disliked, but rarely understood.
- 70The New YorkerDavid DenbyThe New YorkerDavid DenbyNo stranger man - not even Nixon - has ever been at the center of an American epic.
- 60New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierNew York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierAt least Leonardo DiCaprio, grounded and sure, has commitment to spare. His portrayal of Hoover is undeniably terrific.
- 40New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinNew York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinIt's too bad J. Edgar is so shapeless and turgid and ham-handed, so rich in bad lines and worse readings. Not DiCaprio, though.
- 40Time OutJoshua RothkopfTime OutJoshua RothkopfJ. Edgar is infuriatingly coy and noncritical about its subject, an undeniable patriot but also an alarmist and a ruiner of lives.
- Between Eastwood's direction and Dustin Lance Black's screenplay, what you feel leaking off the screen in every scene is missed opportunity.