83
Metascore
14 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 100The PlaylistCarlos AguilarThe PlaylistCarlos Aguilar"Prayers” stands as a continuation of [Huezo’s] brilliance and expands it to a storytelling format with distinct tools for engagement, yet the impact is just as searing. Huezo’s ardor for humanistic examination loses no fire in this metamorphosis.
- 90The Hollywood ReporterSheri LindenThe Hollywood ReporterSheri LindenAs a portrait of a besieged community carrying on as best it can, the film is keenly observed, its character observations lucid and engrossing.
- 90VarietyJessica KiangVarietyJessica KiangThe film may be called “Prayers for the Stolen,” but it is much more a heartbroken lament for the circuits that are broken when the stealing happens, and for the spaces the stolen leave behind.
- 75Slant MagazineKeith WatsonSlant MagazineKeith WatsonThere’s a haunting beauty to Tatiana Huezo’s depiction of the gradual cross-contamination of childhood innocence and criminal aggression.
- 75IndieWireSusannah GruderIndieWireSusannah GruderTold through the lens of three girls as they grow up in a rural town in the Guerrero mountains, Huezo’s film is a murky, mesmerizing look at what it feels like to come of age in a place where young women have a target on their backs, and where the adults are as powerless as the children.
- 75RogerEbert.comSheila O'MalleyRogerEbert.comSheila O'MalleyOf all of the things Tatiana Huezo captures in Prayers for the Stolen, her first narrative feature, the terror of the night is most unnerving.
- 70Los Angeles TimesRobert AbeleLos Angeles TimesRobert AbeleThe result is a film made of loosely connected scenes, the best ones floating between observation and storytelling, not unlike a dream.
- 70The New York TimesBeatrice LoayzaThe New York TimesBeatrice LoayzaThe film swings back and forth from scenes of pastoral bliss to brutality, generating a narrative that, while unfocused, is nevertheless anchored by the tender and wounded performances by its adolescent cast.
- 63Movie NationRoger MooreMovie NationRoger MooreA movie that progresses at this rate gives you a lot of time to pick over what it’s really getting at.