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Devils on the Doorstep
Devils on the Doorstep Image
Metascore
70 out of 100

Generally favorable reviews - based on 7 Critics What's this?

User Score
9.3 out of 10

Universal acclaim- based on 4 Ratings

Your Score
10 out of 10
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  • Starring: Kenya Sawada, Wen Jiang
  • Summary: By turns an elaborate wartime drama of China, suffering under Japanese occupation during the 1930s and 40s, and an absurdist comedy of madness, cultural disconnects and historical booby-traps that Samuel Beckett would recognize in an instant. (Film Forum)

Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 5 out of 7
  2. Mixed: 2 out of 7
  3. Negative: 0 out of 7
  1. The A.V. Club
    Reviewed by: Scott Tobias
    90
    Though shorn of 20 minutes for its U.S. debut, the film's wry comic portrait of the Japanese Occupation during WWII hasn't lost any of its incendiary brilliance, both as a political provocation and as a brusquely humane take on the horrors and absurdity of war.
  2. TV Guide
    Reviewed by: Ken Fox
    80
    Jiang draws a great deal of humor from the situation, but the film inevitably explodes in terrible violence.
  3. Village Voice
    Reviewed by: Dennis Lim
    50
    By the final shot, which assumes the viewpoint of a decapitated head, its appalled comedy has swelled, beyond outrage, to a pitch of punch-drunk hysteria.

See all 7 Critic Reviews

User Reviews

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Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1 out of 1
  2. Mixed: 0 out of 1
  3. Negative: 0 out of 1