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A Time for Drunken Horses
Metascore
78 out of 100

Generally favorable reviews - based on 24 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 22 out of 24
  2. Mixed: 2 out of 24
  3. Negative: 0 out of 24
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  1. Christian Science Monitor
    Reviewed by: David Sterritt
    100
    The tale is simply told but stunningly photographed and superbly acted in the best tradition of modern Iranian cinema.
  2. San Francisco Chronicle
    Reviewed by: Mick LaSalle
    100
    Presents us with characters of such humanity and dignity that it begins to seem obscene that until now we haven't exactly given all that much thought to the Kurds.
  3. Boston Globe
    Reviewed by: Jay Carr
    100
    Deeper and richer in humanity than all but a handful of the American films released this year.
  4. Entertainment Weekly
    Reviewed by: Lisa Schwarzbaum
    91
    The nonprofessional cast of Bahman Ghobadi's remarkable, slow, rough edged feature reveals a simple, piercing grimness and determination framed by the gray, icy landscape of Iranian Kurdistan.
  5. Portland Oregonian
    Reviewed by: Kim Morgan
    91
    A profoundly anxious picture that from its first frame holds you, clenched, never able to let go, even after its unresolved coda.
  6. Dallas Observer
    Reviewed by: Bill Gallo
    90
    It's difficult to imagine a more eloquent tribute.
  7. Film.com
    Reviewed by: Peter Brunette
    90
    It simultaneously wows you with the stark beauty of its images, a beauty that leads to another, related kind of truth that is equally crucial. It's not to be missed.
  8. Chicago Tribune
    Reviewed by: Michael Wilmington
    88
    Showing us a world through a child's eyes, A Time for Drunken Horses speaks so truthfully and well that it breaks the heart and scars the conscience.
  9. L.A. Weekly
    Reviewed by: Manohla Dargis
    80
    A central work in the new, boldly politicized Iranian cinema.
  10. Los Angeles Times
    Reviewed by: Kevin Thomas
    80
    A film of simplicity and power, beautifully shot and effortlessly acted by nonprofessionals.
  11. Variety
    Reviewed by: Deborah Young
    80
    It is all the more heart-wrenching for being realistic. Its portrait of child labor brooks no sentimentality and no cliches.
  12. Chicago Reader
    Reviewed by: Alissa Simon
    80
    More grim and less sentimental than other Iranian films featuring plucky children, this strikingly photographed work stresses the harshness of daily life in Iranian Kurdistan.
  13. Chicago Sun-Times
    Reviewed by: Roger Ebert
    75
    Brief, spare and heartbreaking.
  14. Miami Herald
    Reviewed by: Curtis Morgan
    75
    A wrenching film.
  15. Philadelphia Inquirer
    Reviewed by: Carrie Rickey
    75
    A disturbing and forceful drama.
  16. Baltimore Sun
    Reviewed by: Chris Kaltenbach
    75
    The real hero here is Ghobadi, whose love and respect for the culture in which he was raised shines through every frame.
  17. Seattle Post-Intelligencer
    Reviewed by: Paula Nechak
    75
    In its austere visual understatement rests a ton of emotional power.
  18. TV Guide
    Reviewed by: Ken Fox
    70
    Truly in a class by itself.
  19. The New York Times
    Reviewed by: Dana Stevens
    70
    Because of its relentlessness, its crawling pace (the 77 minutes pass like 2 1/2 hours) and its sometimes confusing story, A Time for Drunken Horses may not be for every taste, but it's still an affecting, and in its way beautiful, movie.
  20. Austin Chronicle
    Reviewed by: Marrit Ingman
    67
    Ghobadi works squarely in the neorealist tradition of countrymen like former mentor Abbas Kiarostami, using nonprofessional actors and documentary technique to tell small, spare stories of the human condition through the eyes of children.
  21. New York Post
    Reviewed by: Jonathan Foreman
    63
    Ghobadi (himself an Iranian Kurd) takes some gorgeous shots against the snow, but his storytelling is uneven and often slow.
  22. San Francisco Examiner
    Reviewed by: Wesley Morris
    63
    The welcome hints at emotional excess are compromised by the blunt force of the movie's political point-making.
  23. Village Voice
    Reviewed by: J. Hoberman
    60
    Single-minded, sometimes harrowing.
  24. New York Daily News
    Reviewed by: Elizabeth Weitzman
    50
    In Bahman Ghobadi's heart-tugger about Kurdish orphans, those wide eyes are too often used as a manipulative device.
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