Skinamarink
IFC Midnight | Release Date: January 13, 2023 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
66
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 25 Critic Reviews
Positive:
16
Mixed:
6
Negative:
3
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
ColliderChase HutchinsonJan 11, 2023
Whatever you take away from it, the uniting fear Skinamarink creates ensures it will be remembered as an unparalleled achievement in horror cinema in how it paints a portrait of oblivion that beckons us into dark recesses from which there is no escape. Read full review
100
The A.V. ClubMatthew JacksonJan 10, 2023
We have a long way to go in 2023, but Skinamarink is already a top contender for the year’s most frightening film. Read full review
90
The New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisJan 12, 2023
Ingeniously evoking a child’s response to the inexplicable, Skinamarink sways on the border between dreaming and wakefulness, a movie as difficult to penetrate as it is to forget Read full review
88
LarsenOnFilmJosh LarsenJan 19, 2023
The long, seemingly monotonous shots in Skinamarink will be trying for some, yet there are rewards if you have the patience: occasional, eerie beauty (that night-light evokes a twinkling star dangling in space) and clever filmmaking. Read full review
75
The AtlanticDavid SimsJan 21, 2023
In reality, Skinamarink is just a 100-minute symphony of the vibes being very, very off, a crescendo of creeping dread that eventually overwhelms the viewer. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comBrian TallericoJan 13, 2023
It spends too much time in some of its beats—there’s a stronger, tighter version that’s more disquieting by not wearing out its welcome at 100 minutes—and a couple of loud jump scares are misplaced in a film that generally avoids that crutch, but this is a major debut from a filmmaker who is willing to tell horror stories in a way that's both different for the genre and yet also like something we’ve all experienced before. Read full review
75
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsJan 11, 2023
It’s a low-fi rumination on inexplicable and gradually more threatening loneliness — the sort of childhood trauma typically explained to death by horror movies less interesting than this one. Read full review
75
IndieWireDavid EhrlichJan 10, 2023
While Skinamarink is rather devious for how it lulls viewers into an uneasy stupor — Ball’s esoteric design and go-nowhere pace lower your guard just long enough for him to slip a couple of insidious jolts past your defenses — the film’s somnambulant rhythms soon become as static as its backdrops, and long stretches of naked ambiance separate the spine-tingling setpieces. Read full review
72
Paste MagazineJim VorelJan 17, 2023
This is a daring, unsettling, inscrutable and at times deeply boring venture into the farthest boundaries of horror esotericism, utterly unlike anything that most viewers will have ever seen before. Read full review
70
New York Magazine (Vulture)Alison WillmoreJan 13, 2023
When Skinamarink sets out to actively scare . . . it’s very good at it. But the idea of the movie is more beguiling than the overall experience of watching it. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesNoel MurrayJan 12, 2023
It’s the kind of movie destined to baffle and irritate as many people as it beguiles. Read full review
70
VarietyOwen GleibermanJan 10, 2023
I found Skinamarink to be terrifying, but it’s a film that asks for (and rewards) patience, and can therefore invite revolt (not to mention abysmal grades from Cinemascore). Yet if you go with it, you may feel that you’ve touched the uncanny Read full review
70
Rolling StoneK. Austin CollinsJan 10, 2023
Skinamarink isn’t scary because of what it depicts. It’s scary because it already knows that our imagination will do half of the work. Read full review
70
Little White LiesAnton BitelJan 6, 2023
A child’s anxieties about what might be under the bed or in the shadows are also precisely those primal fears that fuel horror, ensuring that, with all its obfuscations, evasions and abstractions, Skinamarink strips the genre down to its most basic elements: a vulnerable individual alone in the dark. Read full review
70
SlashfilmMatt Donato
Skinamarink is an experience of warped mundanity, dreary moods, and repressed paranoias most prevalent in our youths, which Ball recreates with alarming intimacy. We often seek comfort in feeling like kids again, but in this case, Ball presents a monkey's paw solution brimming with supreme juvenile terrorization. Read full review
67
ConsequenceCady SiregarFeb 3, 2023
Skinamarink clocks in at a hefty 100 minutes, and as Ball’s approach to horror lies in the hidden and the mysterious, it might have been more effective if left as a short film instead — because of Skinamarink’s ambiguous and nebulous fear factor, viewers are left more wanting than satisfied after the striking final scene. Read full review
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