Tyson
Sony Pictures Classics | Release Date: April 24, 2009 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
83
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 28 Critic Reviews
Positive:
27
Mixed:
1
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
New York Daily NewsElizabeth Weitzman
The result is an often-anguished monologue built on pride, despair and self-defense. Accuracy aside, Tyson does work hard to analyze his own, clearly complex character. So while we only get half the picture, it makes for consistently compelling viewing. Read full review
100
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
A documentary with no pretense of objectivity. Here is Mike Tyson's story in his own words, and it is surprisingly persuasive. Read full review
100
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle
Toback has found a documentary subject as tragic and ridiculous, as bizarre and driven, as the heroes of his other films. Read full review
100
Baltimore SunMichael Sragow
What emerges is a fallen warrior's tale: the inside story of a man bloodied and bowed. Read full review
90
NewsweekAllison Samuels
An extraordinary documentary. Read full review
90
VarietyTodd McCarthy
By getting Tyson to open up as he has, Toback has succeeded in illuminating one of the most polarizing, complex and -- the film almost forces one to admit -- misunderstood figures of our time. Read full review
90
New York Magazine (Vulture)David Edelstein
No filmmaker I know has gotten as close to a professional athlete as James Toback gets to Mike Tyson in his new documentary. Read full review
90
Village VoiceScott Foundas
Tyson is more like a particularly riveting therapy session, with Tyson as both analyst and patient. Read full review
90
The New York TimesA.O. Scott
Mr. Toback's film, partly because it restricts itself to Mr. Tyson's point of view, offers a rare and vivid study in the complexity of a single suffering, raging soul. It is not an entirely trustworthy movie, but it does feel profoundly honest. Read full review
90
Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan
The result is as gripping as a title fight and as mesmerizing as a conversation with a cobra. You may not be happy with everything said, but you will not be bored. Read full review
88
Rolling StonePeter Travers
You won't know what hit you after watching Tyson. This power punch to the gut is one of the best movies of any kind this year. Read full review
88
Boston GlobeTy Burr
Terrifically compelling and, more than that, unexpectedly moving. Read full review
83
Portland OregonianShawn Levy
No other sporting figure has ever been afforded so much screen time for self-revelation: just another instance of Iron Mike's one-of-a-kind status. Read full review
80
EmpireDamon Wise
Very humane portrait of a potentially extremely unlikeable character. Read full review
80
Film ThreatWhitney Borup
If you’re not really interested in Mike Tyson as a boxer and a person, the film doesn't give you much to go on. This is a movie called Tyson and it is about Mike Tyson – and nothing else. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterRay Bennett
It's a sympathetic portrait of a complex man driven by an anger that still bubbles beneath the surface. Read full review
80
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
What's so affecting about him in the film, though, is that he doesn't seem monstrous at all. To the contrary, Iron Mike, having meted out epic suffering in the ring and other venues, seems to be a man who has suffered genuinely, even terribly, in the course of a life that he never believed would last 40 years. Read full review
80
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
The resulting portrait shows a seriously troubled man whose brutality was bred into him on the punishing streets of Brooklyn and whose modest wisdom seems as hard-won as any title. Tyson's fight career may be over, but his battle with himself has many rounds to go. Read full review
78
Austin ChronicleMarc Savlov
It's brutal to watch the bigger-they-are-the-harder-they-fall tragedy of this once-great heavyweight. In fact, it's enough to make you cry. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
Ultimately, this may be the closest we'll ever get to understanding how Mike feels about himself, and there's value in viewing that assessment. Read full review
75
New York PostKyle Smith
Gives a taste of what it might be like to live inside Mike Tyson's mind. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Liam Lacey
An absorbing and not-too-uncomfortable experience, so long as you remember there's a camera lens and a big distance between you and the film's violent subject. Read full review
75
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
The movie humanizes Tyson and brings him down to the land of mortals, making his achievements loom larger. And if the boxer hasn't entirely made peace with his troubled soul, Tyson suggests the struggle is going his way. Read full review
70
SalonAndrew O'Hehir
Tyson does succeed in humanizing a deeply troubled individual who has been depicted as an almost animalistic stereotype of African-American manhood. Read full review
70
The New YorkerDavid Denby
The movie makes it clear that, for all his snarls and outbursts, he is intelligent, candid, and easily wounded; that he is by turns inordinately proud and inordinately ashamed and, above all, intensely curious about himself, as if his own nature were a mystery that had not yet been solved. Read full review
67
Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum
The result is flashy, but the meaning is a bit of a bob and weave. Read full review
67
The A.V. ClubNathan Rabin
Tyson can be brutal with himself, but Toback's fawning documentary lets him off easy. Read full review
60
SlateDana Stevens
It's a movie that's thought-provoking without being intelligent and candid without being truthful. The same aesthetic choices that Toback seems convinced will set his documentary apart are also what diminishes its credibility. Read full review
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