New York Post by Sara Stewart

This Belgian drama is the real deal, an alternately wrenching and ecstatic viewing experience, adapted from a play by lead actor Johan Heldenbergh.

New Orleans Times-Picayune by Mike Scott

That's the kind of movie this is, the kind that sticks with you, that prods you to examine things. In the process, it reveals itself to be something of an emotional roller coaster -- but one well worth riding.

IndieWire by Eric Kohn

You couldn't ask for a more appropriate genre of music to carry a movie. As Didier explains the bluegrass appeal, "the banjo sort of snarls," bringing a primal form of energy that even he can't put into words. It's also the element that manages to rescue "Broken Circle" from the meandering nature of its structural looseness, which sometimes distracts from a thoroughly involving story.

Film.com by William Goss

A superb tearjerker in between beautiful bluegrass ballads.

RogerEbert.com by Joyce Kulhawik

It's a rich, raw, heartache of a film, a beautifully composed, soul-stirring drama about love, family, sex, sorrow, faith, and music.

Philadelphia Inquirer by Steven Rea

Rare, too, is the way The Broken Circle Breakdown incorporates music into its narrative. The songs - traditional bluegrass and country, and a clutch of new ones rooted in same - are as integral to the characters and their relationships as the dialogue.

Chicago Sun-Times by Bruce Ingram

Director Felix Van Groeningen takes a story that might be too much to bear in a straightforward, linear narrative and explodes it, then artfully reassembles the pieces by jumping back and forth in time.

The A.V. Club by Kyle Ryan

Once viewers adjust to the cognitive dissonance between intense Flemish dialogue and English performances of country and bluegrass songs,The Broken Circle Breakdown is a film that will likely stick with them long after the credits roll.

The Playlist by Jessica Kiang

While Felix von Groeningen's film, which centers around a couple whose child is diagnosed with cancer, could easily have strayed into maudlin territory, the deft, non-chronological structure and the constantly surprising, beautiful performances -- both acting and the musical -- elevate it well clear of any Movie of the Week associations.

Portland Oregonian by Marc Mohan

It’s possible the movie’s actually too unflinching; there are moments where your nose is dangerously close to being rubbed in this pile of emotional trauma. Then again, when you come from the same country as the Dardennes brothers, you’ve got to pull out all the stops to compete in the misery department.

The Telegraph by Tim Robey

A tough, vital, electrifying film.

The Dissolve by Keith Phipps

At its best, The Broken Circle Breakdown has the feel of life as it’s remembered—moments out of time tethered together by the feelings of those living them.

Village Voice by Jon Frosch

The Broken Circle Breakdown crashes as frequently as it soars, but the ache at its center feels real.

Time Out by David Fear

Both Baetens and Heldenbergh do their best to sell the story’s ups and downs even when the narrative gets bogged down with science-versus-religion ranting, yet you’re still left with a movie a little too reliant on playing clawhammer on your heartstrings.

Time Out London by Cath Clarke

Heldenbergh and Baetens pull you in with committed performances ­– their raw pain and grief is totally believable. But all that honest, intense emotion is thrown away as the film outstays its welcome by 40 minutes or so, piling one tragedy on to another.

The Hollywood Reporter by David Rooney

The non-linear structure works extremely well, making the drama a bracing emotional roller coaster of feel-good/feel-bad turns.

Variety by Boyd van Hoeij

Sophisticated cutting brings out the story’s complex emotional undercurrents, though “Breakdown’s” less convincingly scripted second half sputters more often than it shines.

Slant Magazine

Felix Van Groeningen's film owes more than a debt to the unwieldy narrative schematics of Susanne Bier's narratives.