Film Review: "The Critic" (2024)

Ian McKellen goes evil, really well.

Yesterday, specifically surrounded by cats watching with me, I watched The Critic, starring Ian McKellen. This little British movie reminded me of something I didn’t realise I’d been missing as an American submerged in influencer land: a film not ruined by texting. OK, I bring that up a lot. Saying it again.

Set in the old age of theatre, the story treads some familiar ground at first, but your patience in the audience is rewarded. The slow burn is deliberate, and when it finally pays off, it sizzles. McKellen’s character is deliciously dangerous, a man who wields the written word like a weapon and manipulation like an art form. The evil lurking beneath the civility is subtle, precise, and utterly compelling. Gandalf the Grey goes Gandalf the Bada**.

What struck me most was how alive the film feels in its restraint. There’s confidence in the filmmakers letting silence breathe, in trusting the audience to stay present rather than constantly stimulated by oh, hey there’s a tree, here’s an undressed lady, look a CGI explosion! A passionate love triangle without any Euphoria scenes. It’s a reminder of what cinema can be when it doesn’t rush to explain itself or compete with TikTok as a plot, sigh.

And then there’s the quiet joy of something else: ageism, for once, feels absent. McKellen isn’t sidelined as someone’s sweet old gramps. He’s given a truly juicy lead, complex and powerful, allowed to be sharp, seductive, sexual, and morally corrupt. Watching an older actor command the screen with this much authority and danger, you don’t see a whole lot of it nowadays in any characters.

The Critic doesn’t act like it owns the place. It shows you, unveiling the world it inhabits. Check it out with a good bowl of popcorn and your best fedora.