First reactions to 'Mother!'

I expect that with any of his films to begin with.

Mylo Carbia said:

"Folks, no words can describe this cinematic masterpiece. I can only say it's like nothing you've ever seen before. It pushes the envelope in ways you can't even imagine... It's crazy, gorgeous, violent, powerful... And will be the most controversial movie since A Clockwork Orange, sure to be studied in film schools for decades to come."

Wow that's some extreme praise right there, can't wait for more reviews to pour in.

sounds hyperbolic.

The early reviews are in! The majority is extremely positive, but there is also a significant group with a more negative opinion about the movie.
It received raves and cheers, but also boos after its screening in Venice today. It seems like a love it or hate it movie, but whatever you think about it
people say it's one of the craziest (and probably will be one of the most controversial ones) movies ever made. Nevertheless all full reviews so far are positive and it's still at 100% on Rotten Tomatoes. Most negative reactions so far are just tweets. I always find it very interesting when movies receive wildly different responses upon its initial release. It reminds me of most movies from Kubrick which also received many negative reviews upon its release. Film Ink also named Kubrick in their review for the movie. Whatever people thought of it, the one thing I'm getting from the reviews is that the third act is one of the craziest (and according to some 'one of the best') things to happen in a movie in a very long time. Here are a few quotes:

Rotten tomatoes: 93%, 9.4 average, 14 reviews

Metacritic: 86/100, 9 reviews

Positive reviews

"It’s a dense, delirious, playful and serious work of capital A art, and easily the most ambitious film to come out of a major studio since… well, let’s just say it: since Kubrick died. It's easily the best film of Aronofsky’s career." - Filmink (rave review)

"mother! begins as a slow burn and builds toward a furious blaze. Awash in both religious and contemporary political imagery, Darren Aronofsky’s allusive film opens itself to a number of allegorical readings, but it also works as a straight-ahead head rush." - Indiewire (A-)

“mother! is something truly magnificent, the kind of visceral trash-arthouse experience that comes along very rarely, means as much or as little as you decide it does, and spits you out into the daylight dazzled, queasy, delirious, and knock-kneed as a newborn calf. Seldom has a title ever earned its exclamation point in more emphatic fashion. In fact, it deserves a few more, so here they are: !!!!!!!!!" - The Playlist (A)

"Mother! is filmed with loving oppressiveness, only using three basic, handheld camera shots: seeing what Jennifer Law sees, looking over her shoulder or into her face, for the whole film. Arty! And scary." - Evening Standard (5/5)

"Darren Aronofsky delivers an expressionistic ode to the times we live in." - Screendaily (rave review)

"A sick joke, an urgent warning and a roar into the abyss, Mother! earns its exclamation mark three times over and more." - The Telegraph (5/5)

"The longer I sit with Mother!, the more moved I am by its madness—after the initial, head-lolling rush of watching it transpire. You can go to town listing the references to other artists’ work here, from the poster-teased Rosemary’s Baby to Repulsion to Antichrist to, hell, the Southern Gothic gunge of that underrated Kate Hudson potboiler The Skeleton Key. But they all seemingly add up to one idiosyncratic artist’s unforgiving self-examination—with an undertow of humility, even apology, to the big, swaggering gut-slinging up on screen." - Vanity Fair (rave review)

Mixed and negative reviews

"Darren Aronofsky's head-trip horror movie, starring Jennifer Lawrence as a woman who slips down a rabbit hole of paranoia, is dazzling on the surface, but what lies beneath? Maybe nothing." - Variety (mixed review)

"Is mother! Darren Aronofsky’s worst film to date? (No, but it’s a close second.) In what can only be described as pretentious nonsense (and that is putting it kindly), mother! is an abstract attempt at metaphysical poetry, much like The Fountain, and Aronofsky’s debut Pi." - Loose Lips (negative review)

"#mothermovie gets booed at its #venezia74 press premiere. And deservedly so: a self referential, near ridiculous trip. Big disappointment." - Leonardo Goi

Currently a 9.4 average with 14 reviews on Rotten Tomatoes.

I saw this poster at a bus stop today



Which is weird because I swear they stopped putting film posters up at bus stops in my country, so I suppose they might be bringing them back

But anyways, I am excited.

Extreme reactions, positive or negative, can usually be dismissed outright. 10's and 1's should be extremely rare. In this case, considering the talent involved, a score of 1 seems especially immature.