The Swamp
Metascore
75 out of 100

Generally favorable reviews - based on 18 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 15 out of 18
  2. Mixed: 3 out of 18
  3. Negative: 0 out of 18
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  1. Austin Chronicle
    Reviewed by: Marrit Ingman
    67
    Doesn't necessarily make for a crowdpleasing experience, though it is a provocative and uncomfortably authentic one.
  2. Boston Globe
    Reviewed by: Jay Carr
    75
    The triumph of La Cienaga lies in Martel's way of fashioning the kind of ensemble performance that draws us in by convincing us we're watching behavior, not acting.
  3. Chicago Reader
    Reviewed by: Meredith Brody
    100
    Every frame is dense with life, with children and animals running in and out, yet it's not messy. Instead it's highly focused--and something of a small masterpiece.
  4. Chicago Sun-Times
    Reviewed by: Roger Ebert
    75
    It's better to know going in that you're not expected to be able to fit everything together, that you may lose track of some members of the large cast, that it's like attending a family reunion when it's not your family and your hosts are too drunk to introduce you around.
  5. Chicago Tribune
    Reviewed by: Patrick Z. McGavin
    88
    Argentinean filmmaker Lucrecia Martel takes fundamental risks with form and style, and it pays off brilliantly.
  6. Christian Science Monitor
    Reviewed by: David Sterritt
    50
    The title means "The Swamp," and you may feel you're in one after 103 minutes with such a generally unlikable gang.
  7. Entertainment Weekly
    Reviewed by: Owen Gleiberman
    42
    It sounds churlish to argue that a movie can have too much integrity for its own good, but that's exactly the problem with La Ciénaga.
  8. L.A. Weekly
    Reviewed by: Ella Taylor
    80
    Martel's off-the-cuff candor and intelligent eye for the quietly telling detail charts the progressive rot not only of a family, but of an entire social class.
  9. Los Angeles Times
    Reviewed by: Kevin Thomas
    90
    Martel's sharp observations of the foibles of human nature are expressed perfectly in the telling images of cinematographer Hugo Colace and tight editing of Santiago Ricci.
  10. New Times (L.A.)
    Reviewed by: Bill Gallo
    90
    For better or worse, the filmmaker says nothing directly political about the cruel fate suffered by her people, but the dark poetry of her allusions is powerful.
  11. New York Daily News
    Reviewed by: Elizabeth Weitzman
    75
    A fascinating, damning picture of bourgeois boredom that manages to be both epic and intimate at the same time.
  12. New York Magazine (Vulture)
    Reviewed by: Peter Rainer
    80
    There's a new sensibility at work here, wry yet lushly disaffected, and it will be worth watching what Martel does next.
  13. New York Post
    Reviewed by: Lou Lumenick
    50
    It may take a scorecard to keep track of the complicated relationships in this sorry clan.
  14. Seattle Post-Intelligencer
    Reviewed by: Sean Axmaker
    100
    Vital and alive. Frustration and malaise rumble through every richly textured frame, but behind it all is a restlessness and a desire for something better.
  15. The New York Times
    Reviewed by: Stephen Holden
    90
    As La Ciénaga perspires from the screen, it creates a vision of social malaise that feels paradoxically familiar and new.
  16. TV Guide
    Reviewed by: Ken Fox
    80
    Martel can barely contain her disgust, and like Bunuel before her, she knows just when to cut the laughs and go straight for the throat.
  17. Variety
    Reviewed by: Eddie Cockrell
    80
    An atmospheric and cumulatively impressive feature-length debut from Argentine writer-director Lucrecia Martel.
  18. Village Voice
    Reviewed by: Amy Taubin
    80
    A veritable Chekhov tragicomedy of provincial life.

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