Until The Birds Return(En Attendant Les Hirondelles)

The New York Times by Devika Girish

Although each chapter is built around an event — a tryst or a revelation — the film comes to life in quiet, conversational details that capture the textures of people’s lives across different generations and classes.

The Hollywood Reporter by Jordan Mintzer

Moussaoui captures the drama with a simple style that can seem a bit lackluster at times, although he makes good use of the Algerian locations and coaxes compelling performances from his cast. In the end, his narrative's three-pronged structure is perhaps the film's strongest asset.

The Playlist by Kyle Kohner

Moussaoui’s underwhelming use of fractured storytelling technique not only dilutes any organic narrative development, but he completely jeopardizes the impactful nature of the film’s potentially poignant message: how we as humans are in one way or another connected to each other.

Screen Daily by Lee Marshall

There’s an observational authenticity that is refreshing in an audiovisual culture whose attempts at self-analysis are too often skewed by melodrama. It’s also heartening to see such delicate stories of ordinary people come to the fore in a country whose filmmakers faces enormous hurdles; technical, financial and bureaucratic.

Paste Magazine by Oktay Ege Kozak

Over all, the profound performances, the even-lit digital cinematography that gives the film a docudrama feel, and Moussaoi’s impressive voice as a first-time feature helmer turns Until the Birds Return into an engaging work on the universality of human nature.