History Boys, The

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

In The History Boys, as in all of Bennett's work, irony is what the characters live and breathe - and I mean irony in its truest sense, of using language to present opposite and often sly alternatives to accepted wisdom.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Nathan Rabin

History Boys boasts a dazzling verbal cleverness--the gleeful rat-a-tat of snappy banter expertly executed--that doesn't keep it from also being deeply, exquisitely sad.

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

If the literacy of The History Boys is deemed uncinematic, then give me uncinema anytime.

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

A shrewdly acted, bittersweet comedy.

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

Vibrates with exuberance and erudition.

Washington Post Peter Marks

Wildean panache of this caliber is not the norm in movie dialogue, so on this score alone, The History Boys is a blessing. The top-drawer work of a fine ensemble is another.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

The screen, like the stage, can barely contain this marvelous play of intelligence.

Village Voice Scott Foundas

The film version of The History Boys is a lesser thing, more fixed in space and time and rendered almost unbearably "cinematic" in patches by Hytner's gymnastic camerawork. Yet the ideas and feelings of the piece remain so rich that it almost doesn't matter.

New York Magazine David Edelstein

The movie is brilliant and infectious, much like Bennett's voice: English-deadpan but never snide, and generous to a fault.

The New Yorker David Denby

Revved by the stage performances, the cast courses through the material with disciplined exuberance--especially the eight young actors at the center of the drama, many of whom have never appeared in a film before.

The New York Times Stephen Holden

The current of intellectual energy snapping through the ferociously engaging screen adaptation of Alan Bennett’s Tony Award-winning play feels like electrical brain stimulation.

Austin Chronicle Toddy Burton

Clearly, the filmmakers did manage to capture some measure of lightning in a bottle.

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

As you can reliably expect of a work by Alan Bennett, The History Boys is bubbly, witty, sneaky-smart entertainment with the additional virtues of heart and cunning.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

Though all but two students look too old, their interpretations are unanimously fine.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

The History Boys is as much about the meaning and value of reading and learning as it is about the ho-humness of genital fondling by sir with love.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

The film can't hide its stage origins, and in cutting almost an hour on the journey from stage to screen some resonance is lost. But Bennett's dialogue sparkles and skewers with killer wit. Dig in.

USA Today Claudia Puig

The History Boys is an erudite, sharply written film with consummate performances, but its origins on the stage are all too obvious.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

This is a piece engineered to run on the high octane of clever dialogue. It's chatty, it's wordy, but a passion for the well-written word lies at the thematic heart of the thing, and cinematic flourishes would only clog the arteries. Purists can rest assured -- there's no clogging.

Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips

The film is worth seeing, if you have any fondness for the writer who co-created "Beyond the Fringe" and who is second only to Stoppard in his sprightly but mellow wit.

Premiere Glenn Kenny

There's no one today writing English dialogue as sharp as Bennett's, and hearing it delivered expertly is a pleasure worth sitting through some dodgy montages for.

Los Angeles Times Carina Chocano

A lively and entertaining disquisition on the purpose and uses of knowledge in a world that cares less about scholarship than quantifiable results.

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

If you liked the play and the compelling ideas Bennett kicks around, the movie makes for an intellectually invigorating couple of hours.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

The material has crackle, but its vibrancy feels far off and muted, like a fireworks display going off in a neighboring town.

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

An excellent British drama adapted by Alan Bennett (The Madness of King George) from his celebrated play.

The New Republic Stanley Kauffmann

At the last, despite the modern touches in Bennett's screenplay, The History Boys fills the traditional bill. Wellington would probably not be too upset by it. Eventually it tells us that Waterloo is still in pretty good hands.

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

A funny thing happened to The History Boys on the way to the screen. The players are the same, the dialogue is pretty much identical, but the vibrancy of the play -- its exhilarating immediacy -- has been muted.

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

The play's most acclaimed performance - rotund Richard Griffiths as the closeted teacher Hector - is great in the movie, too.

TV Guide Ken Fox

Now seen for the first time in close-up, these "boys" are well past adolescence, which makes Bennett's sympathy for poor Hector a bit easier to take.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

Though it preserves the terrific lead performance of Richard Griffiths - best known to film audiences as Harry Potter's evil stepfather - The History Boys is essentially filmed theater, with minimal, and usually clumsy, attempts to take the action out of the classroom.

Variety Leslie Felperin

Audiences coming cold to this largely faithful adaptation of Alan Bennett's clever but contrived classroom comedy won't be so wowed, given picture's irrevocably stagy feel. Nicholas Hytner's flat-footed direction doesn't help, nor do picture's younger cast members' over-rehearsed performances, although the seasoned thesps shine.

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

Somewhere in the translation from stage to screen, The History Boys has become an intelligent misfire. What's left is a literate but listless film.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

With the original stage cast, the film is doggedly faithful to the play but has failed to translate it into much of a film.