TheWrap

Past Lives is an exquisitely wistful drama that speaks with an honesty so affectingly crisp it will turn your conceptions of love, identity and fate on their head.

Screen Daily by Tim Grierson

There are three superb performances at the picture’s centre, but none is more radiant than that of Greta Lee, gracefully capturing the spirit of a searching soul who seems to understand things about the nuances of love that are beyond the grasp of the rest of us.

Vanity Fair by Richard Lawson

Past Lives is not concerned with regret. It is instead a thoughtful, humane rumination on what may be fixed in personal history but remains forever fluid in the mind.

Variety by Peter Debruge

For all the films that have been made about love triangles, Song has fashioned hers in the form of a circle, defying so many of the clichés in her quietly devastating way.

RogerEbert.com by Monica Castillo

The film explores the tender feelings of relationships at various stages, from budding playground crushes to adulthood’s alleged certainty. It’s the kind of nuanced movie that allows for self-reflection as well as entertainment, following two characters who illustrate how relationships—both fully realized and not—influence our lives.

ScreenCrush by Matt Singer

However you write its title, Past Lives is a great romance, a great coming-of-age story, a great tale about the ways technology can bring people together (but only so far), a great New York City film, a great story about immigrants — and a great movie, period.

Time Out by Lou Thomas

It’s a nuanced, careful work that will resonate strongly with everyone who has loved and lost, as well as offering a warning of possible heartbreak ahead for those who haven’t.

Collider by Ross Bonaime

Song’s work here is incredible, as this story of the past and present, and what it means for the future is a carefully handled story told with love and heart. Greta Lee, Yoo Teo, and John Magaro make an incredible trio of performances, each of which hits on a unique and important perspective on this tale, in a film that you won’t want to leave, and will stick with you for long after.

The Hollywood Reporter by David Rooney

It’s difficult to convey the multilayered beauty of Past Lives beyond just urging people to see it and lose themselves in its transfixing spell.

Vox by Alissa Wilkinson

It’s hard to imagine Past Lives not being one of 2023’s most talked-about films, and it richly deserves the honor.

TheWrap

Past Lives is an exquisitely wistful drama that speaks with an honesty so affectingly crisp it will turn your conceptions of love, identity and fate on their head.

TheWrap

Past Lives is an exquisitely wistful drama that speaks with an honesty so affectingly crisp it will turn your conceptions of love, identity and fate on their head.

The Playlist

Past Lives shows that living in what-ifs is not good. Instead, it’s important to be grateful for our time with people, even if it’s not forever.

IndieWire by David Ehrlich

The absolute immediacy of Lee’s performance allows you to feel every frame of Past Lives on your skin, which is crucial to a film that conveys the brunt of its meaning through sense instead of story; a film that commands its placid rhythms and ethereal fussiness with a confidence that elevates Song’s “people don’t talk like that” dialogue into a decisive plus.

Screen Rant by Mae Abdulbaki

It’s soulful, tender — an understated triumph. Song’s directing and writing is confident, bringing so much heart and nuance to a simple story that is inspiring, delicate, and evocative.

Slashfilm by Chris Evangelista

The dreamy, deliberate pacing of all of this never feels overlong. Instead, the film gathers you up in its hands and carries you along with it, resulting it what will surely be one of the best films of 2023.

The Guardian by Benjamin Lee

Song is a writer of elegant restraint and as the final act progressed, I worried that perhaps this restraint might end up a little too delicate for the years that have preceded and the feelings that have amassed. But then in a bar scene for the ages, we find ourselves floored, a slow buildup that finally hits like a bus.

The Film Stage by Jordan Raup

It’s a warm, patient film culminating in a quietly powerful, reflective finale, though its sum is greater than its parts when the first two sections register a touch underdeveloped.