88
Metascore
18 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 100Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertChicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertThe film was written and directed by Louis Malle, who based it on a childhood memory. Judging by the tears I saw streaming down his face on the night the film was shown at the Telluride Film Festival, the memory has caused him pain for many years.
- 100The GuardianPeter BradshawThe GuardianPeter BradshawIt remains breathtakingly good. There is a miraculous, unforced ease and naturalness in the acting and direction; it is classic movie storytelling in the service of important themes.
- 100CineVueMartyn ConterioCineVueMartyn ConterioWilliam Faulkner once made the sage point that “the past is never dead. It’s not even past.” Louis Malle’s Golden Lion winner Au Revoir Les Enfants (1987) is a Second World War-set film very much guided in spirit by the US novelist’s musing on the febrile relationship between memory, time and individual and collective histories.
- 100TV Guide MagazineTV Guide MagazineA delicately rendered and exceptionally moving reminiscence of a boyhood friendship cut short by war.
- 100The New York TimesVincent CanbyThe New York TimesVincent CanbyIt's a work that has the kind of simplicity, ease and density of detail that only a film maker in total command of his craft can bring off, and then only rarely.
- 90Washington PostRita KempleyWashington PostRita KempleyLouis Malle's Au Revoir Les Enfants is more than his wartime memoir; it is an epitaph to innocence.
- 80Time OutTime OutCrisply photographed and directed with understated grace, the film can feel a little standoffish given the emotive subject matter. But with strong performances from the young leads and a vice-like air of mounting tension, it’s well worth revisiting.
- 75Slant MagazineGlenn Heath Jr.Slant MagazineGlenn Heath Jr.Part dream, part nightmare, the film vividly remembers a traumatic moment in time that cannot be forgotten.
- 75Slant MagazineGlenn Heath Jr.Slant MagazineGlenn Heath Jr.Part dream, part nightmare, the film vividly remembers a traumatic moment in time that cannot be forgotten.
- 60Washington PostDesson ThomsonWashington PostDesson ThomsonBy many other directors' standards, Au Revoir would be a major achievement. But Malle has reached higher. If he'd made his childhood movie earlier in his career -- when he didn't have the sense to be so dispassionate -- it might have packed a meatier punch. Now it's just a deftly aimed poke.