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Brick
Metascore
72 out of 100

Generally favorable reviews - based on 34 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 30 out of 34
  2. Mixed: 4 out of 34
  3. Negative: 0 out of 34
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  1. Baltimore Sun
    Reviewed by: Michael Sragow
    91
    A Big Sleep with underage bozos, a Maltese Falcon where the stuff that dreams are made of rests in the lockers of a well-worn high school, Brick is a remarkable oddity, audacious and engaging.
  2. The A.V. Club
    Reviewed by: Scott Tobias
    91
    Manages to be visually arresting, packed with geeky allusions to everything from Raymond Chandler to "Blue Velvet."
  3. Film Threat
    Reviewed by: Jeremy Mathews
    90
    With brilliant dialogue out of the 1940s and graceful visuals that add depth to the dark comedy, Johnson debuts with a smart, self-assured feature that portrays adolescence like no other film has.
  4. Boston Globe
    Reviewed by: Ty Burr
    88
    Brick is Bogart goes to high school, in other words, but that thumbnail description doesn't begin to convey the lasting pleasures of Rian Johnson's directorial debut.
  5. Entertainment Weekly
    Reviewed by: Lisa Schwarzbaum
    83
    Johnson also grabs hold of a fundamental truth and seduces us with it: The schoolyard can be the noirest burg of all.
  6. Christian Science Monitor
    Reviewed by: Peter Rainer
    83
    It's reminiscent of David Lynch, who is a master at mixing the ghastly and the risible. Brick would be better with a bit more Lynch in its soul, but Johnson is his own man, and I look forward to what he comes up with next.
  7. The Hollywood Reporter
    Reviewed by: Duane Byrge
    80
    The mean streets don't get any nastier than the high school parking lots in this cool-crafted mystery.
  8. Empire
    Reviewed by: Damon Wise
    80
    With a superb lead turn by rising star Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Rian Johnson's debut is a smart, original neo-noir that works as an ingenious mindgame as well as a slick Hollywood calling card.
  9. Salon.com
    Reviewed by: Andrew O'Hehir
    80
    Brick doesn't work 100 percent of the time, but it's a striking achievement, beautifully shot, often hilarious and occasionally moving.
  10. Los Angeles Times
    Reviewed by: Carina Chocano
    80
    Johnson has taken a well-worn, much-revised genre, adapted to what's become a clichéd setting and transcended both in the process.
  11. The New Yorker
    Reviewed by: David Denby
    80
    All in all, this twerpy little movie is one of the most entertaining pictures to be released so far this year.
  12. Rolling Stone
    Reviewed by: Peter Travers
    75
    "Sensational" is the word for Joseph Gordon-Levitt (equally striking in Mysterious Skin), who stars as Brendan, the teen outsider who becomes a budding Bogart.
  13. Chicago Sun-Times
    Reviewed by: Roger Ebert
    75
    This movie leaves me looking forward to the director's next film; we can say of Rian Johnson, as somebody once said about a dame named Brigid O'Shaughnessy, "You're good. You're very good."
  14. New York Post
    Reviewed by: Lou Lumenick
    75
    It's Gordon-Levitt's pitch-perfect work that makes Brick a hardboiled treat.
  15. San Francisco Chronicle
    Reviewed by: Neva Chonin
    75
    A weird and near-perfect polyglot of indie art film and noir mystery.
  16. TV Guide
    Reviewed by: Maitland McDonagh
    75
    First-time writer-director Rian Johnson's gimmick is that his SoCal teens talk like film-noir yeggs and dames, slinging hard-boiled shade and spitting out terse, rat-a-tat dialogue peppered with slang that was yesterday's news 40 years before they were born. But the result is, against all odds, marvelously entertaining.
  17. Premiere
    Reviewed by: Ethan Alter
    75
    It takes a good fifteen minutes to fully adjust to the screenplay's rhythms, but once you do, the dialogue is a lot of fun to listen to.
  18. The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
    Reviewed by: Rick Groen
    75
    Mainly, it's a clever gimmick, cleverly wrought, offering further evidence that you can dress up the student body in all manner of garb for all types of genres.
  19. Portland Oregonian
    Reviewed by: Shawn Levy
    75
    Brick is kinda brilliant and kinda demented, and you love it for the former far more than you hold the latter against it.
  20. Seattle Post-Intelligencer
    Reviewed by: Sean Axmaker
    75
    The concept is clever and Johnson's brisk editing, dynamic camerawork and snazzy transitions has fun with it all. It makes for an inspired time-warped teenage film noir.
  21. New York Magazine (Vulture)
    Reviewed by: David Edelstein
    70
    Writer-director Rian Johnson gives the usual teen angst an entertaining kick. But the joke wears off, and what's left is as convoluted and monotonous as any conventional hard-boiled mystery.
  22. L.A. Weekly
    Reviewed by: Scott Foundas
    70
    Johnson pulls us into his world and keeps things oddly plausible, despite the intense stylization
  23. Village Voice
    Reviewed by: Michael Atkinson
    70
    The hair may thin considerably under Brick's hat after a while, and Hammett redone remains Hammett half done, but while the plates are in the air, it's a spectacle of nerve.
  24. Slate
    Reviewed by: Troy Patterson
    70
    Like the best noirs, Brick is a triumph of attitude, and there's no arguing that its brand of deadpan cool is precisely unique.
  25. Variety
    Reviewed by: Todd McCarthy
    70
    The story, while derivative, isn't half bad, and the picture gains in finesse and confidence to the point where Johnson more or less pulls off his peril-fraught exercise.
  26. Washington Post
    Reviewed by: Desson Thomson
    70
    Like a good campfire storyteller, writer-director Rian Johnson knows how to fuse the amusing and the edgy. And, in Brendan, he has created an endearing character.
  27. Chicago Reader
    Reviewed by: J.R. Jones
    70
    It's worth seeing for the tightly coiled plot, well-realized characters, and novel take on rapacious teen culture.
  28. Austin Chronicle
    Reviewed by: Marjorie Baumgarten
    67
    Gordon-Levitt already proved in last year's "Mysterious Skin" his captivating command as a dramatic actor; with Brick he further demonstrates his remarkable dexterity and range.
  29. Miami Herald
    Reviewed by: Peter Debruge
    63
    This is neither the noir world of old '40s movies, of which he's clearly fond, nor something new and original enough to fit the concept. Instead, it feels like a blueprint for someone else to figure out.
  30. New York Daily News
    Reviewed by: Jack Mathews
    63
    Johnson combines the elements of classic 1940s film noir and "Rebel Without a Cause"-style teen angst in a movie that is as phony as it is ambitious. It's an A+ film school exercise with zero emotional or social impact.
  31. Wall Street Journal
    Reviewed by: Joe Morgenstern
    60
    Has the inherent limits of all movies that feed on movies, rather than life -- it's original, yet it's not.
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  32. Chicago Tribune
    Reviewed by: Allison Benedikt
    50
    Challenging to follow, at best.
  33. Philadelphia Inquirer
    Reviewed by: Steven Rea
    50
    Alas, Brick, from writer-director Rian Johnson, isn't as clever as its conceit.
  34. The New York Times
    Reviewed by: Stephen Holden
    50
    It's all so seamy, sordid, lurid and shocking! And dull, despite a noirish gloss of wide-angle cinematography and a jaundiced, smoggy color scheme.
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User Reviews

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User Score
7.5 out of 10

Generally favorable reviews- based on 94 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 43 out of 57
  2. Mixed: 2 out of 57
  3. Negative: 12 out of 57
  1. AndyM.
    5
    This movie is best described as a bunch of 25 year-olds, acting like 17 year-olds, acting like 35 year-olds. It's ridiculous. This isn't high school, and it never will be. It tries to be original by placing a 50-years-late, washed-up detective genre into a high school setting, and it comes off as plain absurd. As the Wall Street Journal puts it, "It's original, yet it's not". No high school is filled with smooth talking, drug-running teenagers, who spit 1940's lingo like it's the normal thing to do. If you like detective stories and you just HAVE to have a new angle, despite the complete lack of believability, then this is for you. The movie isn't a bad one, don't get me wrong. The writing and the confined presentation just prevents it from being the amazing movie it desperately wants to be. And I mean desperately.… Full Review »
  2. Vltra88
    10
    Well written, Well acted, solid artful piece. The Film Noir/Hard boiled "who dunnit" feel fits really well in the director's childhood California high school setting while only feeling forced for brief moments. It's in my top ten films for sure. The pace is for the patient, and the entire vibe requires an understanding or appreciation of Film Noir. Maybe not for everyone, but I saw it as an incredibly well written script with an obvious intended goal for the film.… Full Review »
  3. rdavies
    3
    I am a big fan of film noir and I am open to the concept of neo-noir but this didn't do anything for me. It seemed to be off the pace that it should be keeping up with and although it has some good noir elements to it it didn't provide much entertainment value.---- ACTING was all round quite odd. The characters seemed pretty unrealistic and dull to me, although there was some good acting. I have to be honest, Gordon Levitt was more or less abysmal. ----PLOT. All the characters seemed dark and there was constant themes of mistrust, which is obviously in keeping with the noir side. Except, film noir was made at a dark time (40s-50s) and I think that now, it is irrelevant to use the same plot devices and themes. It just doesn't work, especially with a colour picture. ----DIRECTING. It was OK, but it didn't save this film from being a drag. ----CINEMATOGRAPHY: Well, a dark theme film and there is a dark tone to it, but I think the film was too active and full on as oppose to being kept subtle with clever fighting scenes blended in, like a noir film should be. ----Overall, I thought the idea of basing a noir in a high school COULD have been good, but was ultimately risky and in the end I think it just didn't work. A modern day Noir (neo noir) shouldn't stray too far away from the old 40s/50s films, after all, it is based on them. Too many elements were changed in Brick and the elements that remained didn't fit it as a result of the off-pace story and the unnecessarily unspecific character depth. Remember, characters like Sam Spade were dark, suspicious and cynical, but not completely distant to the point where we can't relate to them. ----Final thought: Brick tries to borrow from the classic noir but by trying to make it too modern it's changed the dynamic and become a failure.… Full Review »
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