Metascore
87 out of 100

Universal acclaim - based on 25 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 22 out of 25
  2. Negative: 0 out of 25
  1. Reviewed by: Kyle Smith
    100
    Profound and majestic.
  2. Reviewed by: Ken Fox
    100
    This exceptional film features some of the most beautiful cinematography ever seen on film, in service of some of the most horrible images imaginable.
  3. This is a Holocaust movie that is so relentlessly observed and so aware of woe that it never feels like it belongs to a genre.
  4. 100
    One of the greatest of all Holocaust films.
  5. In the juxtaposition of cataclysmic matter-of-fact misery and cinematic poetry, the filmmaker finds a calmly stunning way to convey the experience of living with death as something intimate, and, unnervingly, almost natural.
  6. 91
    Fateless is a strangely beautiful film, enhanced by a typically lyrical Ennio Morricone score and by Koltai's hazy, grayed-out images.
  7. Fateless is both haunting and poetic. It also is visually stunning.
  8. 90
    Like "The Pianist," Fateless painstakingly builds up the reality of what it is like to be drawn into a perfectly arbitrary hell you can neither comprehend nor rationalize.
  9. 90
    Fateless has a remarkable absence of sentimentality. The movie is obviously artistic, but there are no cheap or superfluous effects. It's almost mystically translucent.
  10. 90
    A first-rate contribution to the Holocaust canon.
  11. It represents something stranger and, to those of us with only a secondhand or thirdhand knowledge of that history, more disturbing: a survivor's conviction that there were aspects of the experience itself that can only be described as beautiful.
  12. Reviewed by: Eddie Cockrell
    90
    Exquisitely modulated and superbly mounted, the directing debut of skilled cinematographer Lajos Koltai went through an extended, unpredictable production history to emerge as a genuinely new way of looking at the Holocaust that is markedly different in tone from other such stories including "Schindler's List" and "The Pianist."
  13. 90
    Koltai is an accomplished, Oscar-nominated cinematographer (for 2000's "Malena"), and Fateless is meticulously composed and shot.
  14. It contains little that will be new to any informed viewer; yet it fascinates for all of its 140 minutes.
  15. 88
    This unique and devastating look at the Holocaust is drawn from the autobiographical novel of 2002 Nobel Prize winner Imre Kertesz.
  16. It's a work that sears the heart and conscience. The events are annihilating, the way they're told both beautiful and terrifying.
  17. Reviewed by: Ty Burr
    88
    Fateless looks man's inhumanity to man square in the eye and pronounces it standard operating procedure, and that may be the greater horror.
  18. 75
    The film never lacks dignity. Fateless doesn't look at life at the camp like Roberto Benigni did in "Life is Beautiful."
  19. Accomplishes the near impossible, bringing a fresh perspective to a horrific subject.
  20. At first startling, even disengaging, that strange style eventually dovetails with the awful substance.
  21. The film's power also lies in the honesty of its observation. Though Gyuri survives unfathomable horrors, he can't forget them and, in the end, doesn't want to. They're the only history he has.
  22. Reviewed by: Steve O'Hagan
    60
    Holocaust drama shot like costume drama, creating a sense of aesthetic disharmony.
  23. Viewers still need a window into a character's soul if they are to connect on a deep emotional level. And that is missing here.
  24. 60
    Long, heavy, and not particularly edifying Holocaust drama.
User Score

Universal acclaim- based on 26 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 12 out of 14
  2. Mixed: 0 out of 14
  3. Negative: 2 out of 14
  1. RobertT.
    1
    Pretentious shooting, struggling actors, unbearable.
  2. AlishaT,
    10
    The cinematography was amazing. This movie moved me beyond words. Seeing atrocities being carried out in a concentration camp through the eyes of a young boy in his teens made me weep. Its an intense tale of survival through unimaginable situations. Full Review »
  3. justins.
    10
    The cinematography is incredible. Just a really moving and haunting movie, one you truly won't forget. The ending was amazing; I won9;t give it away, but Nagy says something that totally changes your perception of what happened to him. Terrific acting by him. This movie should be a strong contender for best foreign film, if not best film. Full Review »