Living
Sony Pictures Classics | Release Date: December 23, 2022 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
81
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 40 Critic Reviews
Positive:
37
Mixed:
3
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
89
Austin ChronicleRichard WhittakerJan 26, 2023
While though the influence of 19th-century Russian literature has always been evident and admitted in Ishiguro's work, Living is even further removed from the The Death of Ivan Ilyich than Kurosawa's film. It is even smaller and more intimate, and much of its suppressed wonder comes from a career-best performance from Nighy. Read full review
100
The Seattle TimesMoira MacdonaldJan 23, 2023
This quiet tale of an ordinary 1950s London man (Bill Nighy) facing the end of his life is a joy: elegantly written, movingly performed, evocatively filmed. Read full review
83
Original-CinJim SlotekJan 18, 2023
Nighy performs a considerable character arc with only the smallest of emotional reveals, as if tentatively exercising unused muscles of humanity and even joy. Read full review
80
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Barry HertzJan 17, 2023
Living just doesn’t quite vault over its self-imposed challenges. Except, that is, when it comes to Nighy. Read full review
88
Boston GlobeOdie HendersonJan 12, 2023
Living acknowledges the bitter irony of impending death bringing a man back to life. Nighy makes it look effortless; he gives an Oscar-worthy performance that made me cry almost as much as Takashi Shimura did in Kurosawa’s classic. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperJan 5, 2023
Throughout, Bill Nighy carries the film effortlessly on his slender shoulders, reminding us of why he’s an international treasure. Read full review
75
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanJan 4, 2023
Living mostly avoids sappiness. And it shows an actor at the peak of his powers. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleJan 4, 2023
Because Living is all about unexpressed emotion — and an unexpressed life — there are times when we’ll feel impatient with the characters; we’ll want them to throw off their restraints and say everything they’re thinking. Just don’t be in a hurry. Living gets where it needs to go, and gets its characters where they need to be, in its own good time. Read full review
80
Rolling StoneDavid FearJan 2, 2023
It’s the star himself who, even more than the decor and the change of cultural scenery, lifts Living out of the realm of a remake and into something far more profound. It becomes another story of a man at long last learning how to embrace the world, yet one that is completely substantial and shattering and, yeah, even life-affirming on its own. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comMatt Zoller SeitzJan 2, 2023
Bill Nighy is a fun, uninhibited actor, but there's an abashed, melancholy quality to him that hasn't been fully explored until Living, a drama about a senior citizen reckoning with his life. Read full review
88
New York PostJohnny OleksinskiJan 2, 2023
Director Oliver Hermanus has as much restraint as his star (and for a modestly sized movie, impressively manages a visually believable 1950s Britain), and the viewer never feels emotionally manipulated. Read full review
50
The Associated PressJake CoyleJan 2, 2023
There’s a stale emptiness to Living that doesn’t entirely dissipate in even its most moving scenes. Read full review
70
The New York TimesBeatrice LoayzaDec 28, 2022
As in a David Lean movie, passion mingles elegantly with repression, and Williams emerges as a kind of romantic figure, a man shocked, then delighted, by the thrill of finding himself. Read full review
100
Wall Street JournalKyle SmithDec 28, 2022
In Living, Mr. Nighy excels again in a performance that is magnificent in its restraint and eloquent in its sparseness of words. Read full review
100
The A.V. ClubMatthew HuffDec 23, 2022
Living is not a big movie, despite the pedigree of its creators. But it is an artistically masterful one—a film that, while deceptively simple, may linger in your mind for years to come. Read full review
90
Los Angeles TimesJustin ChangDec 22, 2022
Nighy lures you into the impression that he’s sharing a private joke with you, a glimmer of comic insight into an unbearably sad situation. Read full review
88
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliDec 20, 2022
Living offers restrained optimism leavened with enough cynicism to win over those who might be less enamored of something more artificial. It’s one of the year’s best films. Read full review
80
TheWrapRobert AbeleDec 20, 2022
With its aura of melancholic humanity and last-minute grace, Living reminds us that we’re all susceptible to a personal “infrastructure week,” but that it’s never too late to do something about it. Read full review
60
The New YorkerAnthony LaneDec 19, 2022
So compelling are Nighy and Burke that I will watch them in anything, yet their spree, drenched in rich and hazy colors, doesn’t quite ring true. Read full review
88
ABC NewsPeter TraversDec 16, 2022
Bill Nighy delivers a master class in acting as a stifled bureaucrat Brit who decides to seize the day before it's too late. Working in miniature to achieve major truths, this deeply human drama has the power to sneak up and knock you sideways. Read full review
80
The Observer (UK)Mark KermodeNov 8, 2022
This deceptively gentle 50s-set film addresses weighty matters of life and death with a winning simplicity that is hard to resist. Read full review
80
Little White LiesElla KempNov 5, 2022
This is Nighy’s film and his impact is felt even when he’s nowhere to be seen. But when he is, it’s all the more stunning, not least down to cinematographer Jamie D Ramsay’s striking visuals which pay homage to ’50s melodramas, with colours so vivid it feels like it’s too good to be true and will snap back to reality at any moment. Read full review
75
Movie NationRoger MooreNov 4, 2022
If you know “Ikiru,” you remember how all this plays out. And Ishiguro’s script hits not just the same notes as Kurosawa’s original screenplay, but the right ones. Read full review
100
The Irish TimesTara BradyNov 4, 2022
Living, which is composed entirely of delicate movements and earnest pleasantries, maintains a quietude and stiff upper lip in the face of tragedy. Read full review
80
The IndependentClarisse LoughreyNov 4, 2022
Hermanus is more than happy for his film to live in the shadows of Kurosawa’s. There’s still much to savour. Read full review
100
EmpireJohn NugentNov 3, 2022
Really quite something: a rare remake that only augments and enriches the original. For Bill Nighy, meanwhile, it feels in every sense like the role of a lifetime. Read full review
80
Film ThreatAndy HowellSep 22, 2022
Living is a good remake and a solid film on its own merits. Read full review
63
Slant MagazineKenji FujishimaSep 19, 2022
Living has the feel of a film afraid to fully step out of its predecessor’s giant shadow. Read full review
75
Vanity FairCassie da CostaFeb 3, 2022
The language of the film is found not in the thoughtfully restrained dialogue Ishiguro has written—which accurately reflects the collective repression of polite British society—but in the images Hermanus, cinematographer Jamie Ramsay, and editor Chris Wyatt have constructed, in collaboration with production designer Helen Scott and costume designer Sandy Powell. Read full review
100
Time OutPhil de SemlyenJan 31, 2022
Nighy has never been better than in this richly rewarding ’50s-set drama about a repressed and terminally ill man who discovers life just as it comes to an end. Read full review
83
The Film StageDan MeccaJan 25, 2022
Formally, Living is unimpeachable. . . . That said, Living begins and ends with Nighy. Read full review
71
Paste MagazineJacob OllerJan 25, 2022
While certainly not an epiphany like the original, Nighy makes Living worthwhile through sheer force of will. In the film’s picturesque, composed, nearly stagnant beauty, he finds something honest in repression. Read full review
70
VarietyPeter DebrugeJan 25, 2022
Living isn’t nearly as subtle as it purports to be, although it can feel that way, considering how much these characters hold back — and this, one supposes, is what audiences want from an Ishiguro script. Read full review
83
The PlaylistGregory EllwoodJan 24, 2022
In the end, it’s a stellar turn from Sharp that dots the I’s and crosses the t’s when the tear ducts begin to flow. And you realize how marvelously constructed the whole endeavor is. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterAngie HanJan 24, 2022
At the end of Living, I felt not like I’d seen an old favorite in a new light, but like I might want to go back and watch Ikiru again. There are worse outcomes for a remake than reviving affection for the original, or retelling an old story for a new audience that may not have heard it before. There are better ones, too. Read full review
80
Screen DailyWendy IdeJan 24, 2022
Bill Nighy brings a quiet dignity to the role of Mr Williams, an anchor of buttoned-up solidity in an old-fashioned weepie which captures the lush sentimental swirl of the original while also evoking a distinctive sense of backdrop and period. Read full review
100
The GuardianPeter BradshawJan 24, 2022
A gentle, exquisitely sad film. Read full review
58
IndieWireDavid EhrlichJan 24, 2022
The moral of this story is supposed to be shrugged off despite its overwhelming honesty, but Living downplays its drama to such an extent that it can feel as if Hermanus and Ishiguro lacked the nerve to attempt the same trick. Read full review
70
SlashfilmEthan AndertonJan 24, 2022
Nighy brings a dignity to the proceedings that you can't help but admire, especially when it comes to Williams' sudden self-awareness in his final days, and that helps keep your attention. Read full review
100
The TelegraphRobbie CollinJan 24, 2022
It’s a film that could have so easily smacked of an exercise, but its beauty feels thrillingly natural, and its considerable emotional power is honestly earned. Read full review
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