Sweetie

Empire by

Sweetie is a deeply uncomfortable, distressing yet wholly rewarding experience.

Washington Post by Desson Thomson

This Australian film by New Zealand director Jane Campion comes at you, and keeps coming at you, in peculiar, oddly enchanting bursts of detail.

Slant Magazine by Glenn Heath Jr.

Sweetie’s brilliance stems from how Campion inventively explores the relationship between inanimate objects and personal memory, Sally Bongers’s static camera lingering on the precipice of a family unit brimming with secrets and lies.

Washington Post by Hal Hinson

In making her first film, Campion has done thrillingly atmospheric work, and in the process, established herself as perhaps the most perversely gifted young filmmaker to rise up in years.

The Guardian by Luke Buckmaster

Campion offsets what could have been a morose drama with an atmosphere that becomes increasingly, and unnervingly, mystical.

Chicago Sun-Times by Roger Ebert

The acting style edges toward parody, the material is unforgiving of Australian middle-class life in the boondocks and then, pow! - Sweetie waltzes onto the screen.

The A.V. Club by Tasha Robinson

Campion's merciless staging forces a more intimate relationship between viewers and characters; it's hard to take a detached stance when she's smearing raw emotions all over the screen.

The New York Times by Vincent Canby

Sweetie looks like a small movie, and in every measurable way it is, but it possesses remarkable strength and tenacity.