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Generally favorable reviews - based on 6 Critics What's this?

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  • Summary: Based on the testimonies of the survivors that experienced the dramatic event at the Polytechnic School of Montreal on December 6th 1989, the film tells the story of two students whose lives are rocked when a dying young man breaks into the school with the intention of taking as many women as he can into death with him. (Remstar Distribution) Expand
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 2 out of 6
  2. Negative: 0 out of 6
  1. Reviewed by: Ed Gonzalez
    Jun 28, 2011
    88
    Though it's as schematic in construction as "Incendies," the film doesn't grind along to a ponderous plot; it's unnerving abstraction of its subject matter more daringly relays Villeneuve's view of the human cost of gender warfare.
  2. Reviewed by: David Fear
    Jun 28, 2011
    80
    Though the characters are fictional, Polytechnique hews close to the facts regarding the 1989 incident, down to its misogynistic Marc Lépine avatar (Gaudette) separating "feminist" coeds in a classroom.
  3. Reviewed by: A.O. Scott
    Jun 28, 2011
    60
    It is neither floridly melodramatic nor showily minimalist. The virtue - and also the limitation - of this movie is that it confronts senselessness and insists on remaining calm and sane.
  4. Reviewed by: Melissa Anderson
    Jun 28, 2011
    60
    Polytechnique smartly exposes the spectrum of misogyny without overplaying the connection between the two incidents. Which makes the concluding flash-forward scene all the more disappointing: Designed to give hope, it comes off as an emotional sop instead.

See all 6 Critic Reviews

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