The Baader Meinhof Complex
Vitagraph Films | Release Date: August 21, 2009 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
76
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 22 Critic Reviews
Positive:
19
Mixed:
3
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
An explosive but scrupulously journalistic drama about the radical group that terrorized Germany for nearly 30 years. Read full review
91
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
It leaves us with a question that may be unanswerable: How does one extinguish terrorism when its causes are myriad? Read full review
90
The Hollywood ReporterBonnie J. Gordon
A long but powerful true-life drama of 1970s German terrorists features masterful storytelling and bravura performances. Read full review
90
The New York TimesManohla Dargis
A taut, unnerving, forcefully unromantic fictional film. Read full review
89
Austin ChronicleMarc Savlov
The end result is an electrifying, morally complex story of the evil that men (and women) do in the name of the greater good. Read full review
88
St. Louis Post-DispatchCalvin Wilson
Has been criticized as endorsing or condoning violence, but that assessment is unfair and inaccurate. If terrorism is to be eliminated, it must be understood, not oversimplified. Read full review
88
Baltimore SunMichael Sragow
The result is an exciting, infuriating, combative experience. Read full review
80
EmpireKim Newman
Fascinating history, very good movie -- but demanding, and its lack of easy answers will frustrate some. Lessons about 21st century terrorism are implicit, but not overly stressed. Read full review
80
SlateDana Stevens
Edel's clear-eyed and exhaustively researched account is unique in its refusal to either romanticize or villainize the terrorists. It's a study in the seductive appeal, and inevitable failure, of the attempt to bomb one's way to a better world. Read full review
80
The New YorkerAnthony Lane
I have seen The Baader Meinhof Complex three or four times now, and, despite exasperation with its fissile form, I find it impossible not to be plunged afresh into this engulfing age of European anxiety. Read full review
80
Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan
A fascinating hybrid of a film. Even though its purpose couldn't be more serious, its style could hardly be more pulp. Read full review
80
Washington PostAnn Hornaday
Seems propelled by a doomed sense of inevitability and is all the more gripping for it. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle
For a thoroughly fascinating, true glimpse into the horrors that vanity and self-delusion can wreak, take some time to see The Baader Meinhof Complex. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerSteven Rea
If Edel's Oscar-nominated film drags in its final 40 minutes, it's a function of the director's fidelity to the facts - and the fact that the founding trio (and the film's stars) have become prisoners of the state, confined and confused. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeWesley Morris
Swift, brutal, lurid, often overheated, and occasionally comical, but it’s also a serious, well acted, and unromantic exploration of the rise and demise of a terrorist gang whose radicalism ultimately reached beyond the young men and women who set it in motion. Read full review
75
Portland OregonianShawn Levy
The film is gummed up by Bruno Ganz as an intelligence officer who wants not only to capture the bad guys but to understand them -- and to explain them, hand-wringingly, endlessly. Read full review
70
Village VoiceJ. Hoberman
The movie is a sweeping, hectic docudrama that would have been immeasurably helped by the use of informational intertitles. Read full review
70
SalonAndrew O'Hehir
This is no art film, but Edel and Eichinger supply an action-packed, reasonably coherent account of youthful rock 'n' roll idealism run amok, and how it produced the craziest phenomenon of the crazy European far left. Read full review
63
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
The film would have benefitted by being less encompassing and focusing on a more limited number of emblematic characters -- Meinhof and Herold, for starters. Read full review
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