74
Metascore
40 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 80The GuardianJordan HoffmanThe GuardianJordan HoffmanWash Westmoreland’s Colette is exhilarating, funny, inspiring and (remember: corsets!) gorgeous, too.
- 80Screen DailyTim GriersonScreen DailyTim GriersonAlthough director Wash Westmoreland tackles several serious subjects — sexual liberation, the repression of women’s voices, the power of art to change society — the movie has such a playful spirit that the talking points go down smoothly.
- 80VarietyPeter DebrugeVarietyPeter DebrugeLess stuffy literary biopic than ever-relevant female-empowerment saga, Colette ranks as one of the great roles for which Keira Knightley will be remembered.
- 75IndieWireDavid EhrlichIndieWireDavid EhrlichColette is a costume drama for people who have yet to figure out that they love costume dramas. It’s fleet enough after that first act, and the squeezed plotting of its second half ensures the story never gets too long in the tooth.
- 75The PlaylistJordan RuimyThe PlaylistJordan RuimyIf only more period pieces these days were as finely tuned and accessibly pleasurable as Westmoreland’s film.
- 75Vanity FairRichard LawsonVanity FairRichard LawsonI love how open and casual this film is about Colette’s budding queerness, how it eschews any awkward coming out or pains-of-the-closet stuff. Instead it simply revels in Colette’s sexual and romantic freedom, suggesting that it was just that looseness, that liberation that gave her writing such verve.
- 75Slant MagazinePeter GoldbergSlant MagazinePeter GoldbergIt's the film's concerted emphasis on Colette's ambivalent nature and desires that reveals her to be an artist just ahead of her time, fighting against, yet seduced by, her present.
- 75The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Kate TaylorThe Globe and Mail (Toronto)Kate TaylorColette is a satisfyingly conventional biopic about a highly unconventional woman.
- 70The Hollywood ReporterJohn DeForeThe Hollywood ReporterJohn DeForeIt is an engaging literary coming-of-age story, and one embodied ably by its star.
- 70New York Magazine (Vulture)Emily YoshidaNew York Magazine (Vulture)Emily YoshidaPoliteness may be the film’s weakest point, whether with its characters or bedroom scenes. But it’s hardly something to complain about, especially when the company is this lively.