Chicago Tribune by Michael Phillips

It's not for all tastes; it requires some patience. The more your own job involves absurd, time-consuming bits of minutiae, the more familiar (and amusing) it'll seem.

Variety

Porumboiu is one of the few helmers working today who so completely understands both the power of language and the power of visuals.

Village Voice by J. Hoberman

Police, Adjective is a deadly serious as well as dryly humorous analysis of bureaucratic procedure and, particularly, the tyranny of language. Images may record reality, but words define it.

The A.V. Club by Scott Tobias

A clever, exceedingly wonky procedural about a undercover cop (Dragos Bucur) who quietly refuses to do what he's told.

Los Angeles Times by Kenneth Turan

Police, Adjective may not be the film you're expecting, but it's one that will stay on your mind.

Chicago Reader by J.R. Jones

The climax, in which the detective's commanding officer gives him a dictionary and subjects him to a sort of linguistic browbeating, is a marvel of dead air and unspoken oppression.

NPR by Mark Jenkins

Police, Adjective has considerable power, and the issues it raises linger in the mind.

Chicago Sun-Times by Roger Ebert

Its surprisingly effective key scene involves an argument with his captain over the dictionary definitions of the words "conscience" and "justice." This may not sound exciting, but it was welcome after legions of cop movies in which such arguments are orchestrated with the f-word.

Wall Street Journal by Joe Morgenstern

The movie comes on like a put-on--next to nothing happens for an excruciatingly long time--and ends as a fascinating dialectic between following one's conscience or following the law.

Time Out by Joshua Rothkopf

Shockingly dull.