Newsweek

Russell has created what is surely the loudest, most assaultive movie musical ever made and stretched the genre into a new realm - the phantasmagorical nightmare. [24 Mar 1975, p.24]

Variety

Ken Russell's filmization of Tommy is spectacular in nearly every way. The enormous appeal of the original 1969 record album by The Who has been complemented in a superbly added visual dimension.

Newsweek by Charles Michener

Russell has created what is surely the loudest, most assaultive movie musical ever made and stretched the genre into a new realm - the phantasmagorical nightmare. [24 Mar 1975, p.24]

Variety by Staff (Not Credited)

Ken Russell's filmization of Tommy is spectacular in nearly every way. The enormous appeal of the original 1969 record album by The Who has been complemented in a superbly added visual dimension.

The A.V. Club by Noel Murray

For all that Tommy bungles or overdoes, it’s still a powerful experience, musically and visually.

Time

There has never been a movie musical quite like Tommy, a weird, crazy, wonderfully excessive version of The Who's rock opera.

Time by Jay Cocks

There has never been a movie musical quite like Tommy, a weird, crazy, wonderfully excessive version of The Who's rock opera.

Chicago Sun-Times by Roger Ebert

Russell doesn't give a damn about the material he started with, greatest art work of the century or not, and he just goes ahead and gives us one glorious excess after another. He is aided by his performers, especially Ann-Margret, who is simply great as Tommy's mother.

Village Voice by Andrew Sarris

Tommy is turning out to be the kind of movie most people probably like more than they care to admit. Modest charm and unpretentiousness are hardly the qualities that I ever thought I would associate with Ken Russell, but there you are, and there Tommy is. [31 Mar 1975, p.68]

The New York Times by Vincent Canby

Mr. Russell's Tommy virtually explodes with excitement on the screen. A lot of it is not quite the profound social commentary it pretends to be, but that's beside the point of the fun.

Time Out

The Who's ludicrous rock opera was in fact tailor-made for the baroque, overblown images and simplistic symbolism of Russell's style, which only means that this is both the movie in which he is most faithful to the ideas and tone of his material, and one of his very worst films.

Chicago Reader by Dave Kehr

This 1975 film's inventiveness begins to flag about halfway through, but by then it's a relief.

Time Out by Staff (Not Credited)

The Who's ludicrous rock opera was in fact tailor-made for the baroque, overblown images and simplistic symbolism of Russell's style, which only means that this is both the movie in which he is most faithful to the ideas and tone of his material, and one of his very worst films.

TV Guide Magazine

Ken Russell applies his rococo outpourings to Pete Townshend's rock opera and botches not only the visuals but the fine score.

TV Guide Magazine by Staff (Not Credited)

Ken Russell applies his rococo outpourings to Pete Townshend's rock opera and botches not only the visuals but the fine score.