Metascore
72 out of 100

Generally favorable reviews - based on 25 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 20 out of 25
  2. Negative: 1 out of 25
  1. The beauty of the Turkish film Climates, a small but indelible masterpiece, is more than skin-deep. No 2006 film meant more to me. It's as sharp and lovely as the best Chekhov short stories.
  2. 100
    It's one of the great movies on the vicissitudes of love, commitment, and attraction.
  3. Exquisitely structured, pitiless study of a middle-aged man trapped in a stagnant emotional weather pattern.
  4. 88
    Ceylan examines human relationships with an eye for details and a soul for the big picture.
  5. 83
    Though Climates lacks "Distant's" haunted, poetic melancholy, it has a vivid, sensual texture that's unmistakably Ceylan's. He's one of those rare directors who doesn't need a credit for identification.
  6. Reviewed by: Patrick Peters
    80
    Making masterly use of sound and image, this is a desperately sad study of the difficulty people have to communicate and commit in an increasingly insular world.
  7. 80
    It's something of a family affair -- only this time, instead of casting his relatives in the leading roles, Ceylan has cast himself and his real-life wife, Ebru, as Isa and Bahar. And if, in the hands of a lesser filmmaker, such a decision might foster a mood of lurid home-movie voyeurism, both Ceylans are such commanding and subtly expressive performers that any charges of nepotism here are as erroneous as in the storied collaborations of John Cassavetes and Gena Rowlands.
  8. 80
    A terrific movie in the Antonioni tradition, Climates confirms 47-year-old Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan as one of the world's most accomplished filmmakers--handling the end of a relationship and the cloud of human confusion rising from its wreckage as if the subject had never before been attempted.
  9. 80
    An intimate drama that views the deterioration of a relationship from the inside out. Moving from summer through fall and concluding in winter, it's minimalist cinema that turns on subtle emotion rather than narrative and demands the audience's full attention.
  10. This film paints a haunting portrait of existential solitude, one in which the images speak louder and often more forcefully than do any of the words.
  11. 75
    As with "Distant," the dialogue is minimal, the takes are long, the narrative is laconic (too much so for many viewers, I imagine) and the cinematography is painterly.
  12. Winner of a prize at the Cannes Film Festival in May, the quiet, solemn Climates is a bit like those towering ancient columns that Isa photographs to show his class. The fragmented architecture is beautiful and striking, but also extremely dated.
  13. This is contemplative moviemaking, with its deliberate pace, often static scenes and emphasis on direct sound. The director keeps the dialogue pared to the bone.
  14. It's more admirable than enjoyable, beautifully crafted and artfully unpleasant.
  15. 70
    Contrary to what you may read elsewhere, Climates is not a masterpiece, a word that gets pompously thrown around a lot at pictures few paying customers actually want to see. It is, rather, a meticulous study of a crumbling relationship, marked by many luminous small moments and a startling interruption of violent eroticism.
  16. We realize that this romance, like the beautiful land, is doomed almost inevitably to earthquake fissures, to irreversible change. But rather than making us despondent, Climates leaves us peacefully philosophical.
  17. Admittedly, the setting does heighten interest, but this film is much more than an ideational travelogue.
  18. 67
    There's much to admire here, but less to like.
  19. Like Ceylan's earlier films, Climates is as gorgeous as it is self-consciously composed, but an hour and 40 minutes is a long time to spend with Isa, forget three seasons.
  20. Reviewed by: Ken Fox
    63
    What is interesting is Ceylan's depiction of life among the Turkish upper-middle classes, a world rarely seen in international art-house cinema outside his own films.
  21. Reviewed by: Derek Elley
    60
    Immaculately shot and composed as always, and moving at Ceylan's usual measured pace, this one is slightly enlivened by more likable perfs and a trim 98-minute running time.
  22. Reviewed by: Duane Byrge
    50
    Under Ceylan's dull direction and the equally leaden editing, technical contributions are lackluster and straight-forward. Similar to the script, they only serve to distend an undernourished central story.
  23. Reviewed by: Aaron Hillis
    50
    Technically, it rewards with nothing less than painterly cinematography and a seamless surge of organic soundscapes, but the story is entirely predicated on a weather metaphor so obvious that even an unplugged Doppler radar could detect it.
  24. The husband learns nothing, and his monstrous behavior makes the movie relentlessly downbeat. No one, including the viewer, achieves catharsis.
  25. Reviewed by: Phil Hall
    30
    The film is professionally made but a thorough bore at every imaginable level.
User Score

Generally favorable reviews- based on 7 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 2 out of 3
  2. Negative: 0 out of 3
  1. BrianW.
    5
    A major disappointment. I loved Distant, which was the work of a major, mature filmmaker. I didn't expect Ceylan to remake Distant, but I was surprised by the shallowness of the lead characters. The woman whines throughout, and the man just comes off as unpleasant and dim. A lovely final shot almost makes up for the monotony, but this film was an extreme disappointment for me. Full Review »
  2. AliE.
    6
    Mostly seen as a disappointment in Turkey, Climates tells a much more low-scale story compared to Ceylan's previous films. I liked it as a story of a pathetic man, but it's really nothing more. So there's no need to take it any more seriously. Nuri Bilge's real-life wife Ebru Ceylan is great though as an actress. Full Review »
  3. richardk.
    9
    Having seen Distant and enjoyed it, I was eager to see Ceylan's newest film. This is quite a beautiful and very involving film. Visually it is stunning and it is quite real in every aspect of it. The couple--the director and his real life wife--are involved in a finished relationship that neither can fully release each other from and it makes for a wonderful film. Full Review »