81
Metascore
17 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 100Slant MagazineSlant MagazineLeviathan is a titanic achievement, a visceral overload whose impact registers immediately and with great force.
- A highly original film of uncompromising, other-worldly beauty. Leviathan demands to be seen, even if it means you never eat seafood again.
- 100Village VoiceMelissa AndersonVillage VoiceMelissa AndersonPlunging viewers into the thick of chaos, Leviathan explodes the antiquated paradigm of the documentary or ethnographic film, whose mission has traditionally been to educate or elucidate, to create something that seizes us, never letting us forget just how disordered the world is. This may be the greatest lesson any nonfiction film can teach us.
- 91The A.V. ClubNoel MurrayThe A.V. ClubNoel MurrayAnyone who enjoys overpowering cinematic sensation and watching people do a job will be predisposed to like Leviathan, Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Véréna Paravel’s avant-garde documentary about life aboard a commercial fishing vessel. Leviathan is an immersive experience, plunging viewers into darkness and chaos, amid a rush of vivid color and rapid movement.
- 80Time OutJoshua RothkopfTime OutJoshua RothkopfThe first and only piece of advice needed on one’s way to the fishing pond is this: Bring your patience. Not surprisingly, the same could be said to a viewer of this slow-building but riveting experimental collage.
- 80The New York TimesA.O. ScottThe New York TimesA.O. ScottLeviathan, a product of the Sensory Ethnography Lab at Harvard, offers not information but immersion: 90 minutes of wind, water, grinding machinery and piscine agony.
- 75New York PostFarran Smith NehmeNew York PostFarran Smith NehmeThe adventurous souls who stick with it, however, will find head-spinning images and a cumulative impact that does, in fact, amount to a story.