Critics Scoreboard
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Average Critic Score:
62
(32 sources)
62
(32 sources)
-
100
Chicago Tribune
A shockingly powerful screed against racism that also manages to be so well performed and directed that it is entertaining as well. [30 October 1998, Friday, p.A] Read Full Review » -
91
Portland Oregonian
Feels as true as a documentary, as painful as a blow to the heart. Read Full Review » -
90
TNT RoughCut
What makes this film so powerful is that its unanswered questions force the audience to examine hate and its consequences making American History X one lesson you can't miss. Read Full Review » -
83
Entertainment Weekly
This is the sort of incendiary role a lot of actors would kill for, yet the shock of Norton's performance isn't its showboat flamboyance. It's that he makes this sadistic junior sociopath rueful and intelligent. Read Full Review » -
80
-
80
Mr. Showbiz
American History X is a crash course on how to make a message movie that resonates with crackling power. Read Full Review » -
80
-
80
Film.com
A true achievement -- no matter who eventually wants to take, or deny, credit for its creation. Read Full Review » -
80
Film.com
Despite a cheap, Hollywood ending and despite Kaye's kooky campaign, X is a killer. Read Full Review » -
75
Chicago Sun-Times
A series of well-drawn sketches and powerful scenes, in search of an organizing principle. Read Full Review » -
75
San Francisco Examiner
Such an ambitious, well-acted film that it's easy to overlook its flaws as relatively minor. Read Full Review » -
75
New York Daily News
Unflinching in its depiction of racism, anti-Semitism, violence and jailhouse politics. Read Full Review » -
75
USA Today
While this movie is sometimes overbaked, it is the first major studio release in a while to engross wall-to-wall. Read Full Review » -
75
-
70
Washington Post
Trenchant and visceral, American History X may not be perfect, but it's a darn sight better than good. Read Full Review » -
70
Chicago Reader
The movie can't explain as much as it wants to about what makes (and unmakes) a skinhead, but it carries us a fair distance. Read Full Review » -
70
TV Guide
It's Norton who makes the film such an enlightening experience, and he's mesmerizing. Read Full Review » -
70
Slate
It's a testament to Norton's utter immersion in the role that he can even halfway connect the dots between this fundamentally sweet, brainy kid and the magnetic, white trash monster who'll haunt our minds long after the movie's liberal pieties fade into static. Read Full Review » -
70
Film.com
Norton's performance, which is every bit as varied as his Oscar-nominated work in Primal Fear, once more demonstrates that he's one of the most remarkable chameleons working in film. Read Full Review » -
67
Austin Chronicle
A violent, sober cautionary tale, strictly middle-of-the-road when it comes to its much-ballyhooed politics and grimly obvious in its telling. Read Full Review » -
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Excellent in flashes, unintentionally absurd and lead-footed at other moments, the movie stumbles under the weight of its own grandiose intentions. Read Full Review » -
60
The Onion (A.V. Club)
There may be much to like about his movie, but it's all been done before to more challenging degrees of moral ambiguity. That's a pretty fatal flaw. Read Full Review » -
60
LA Weekly
Director Tony Kaye may be reaching for opera, but screenwriter David McKenna has set his sights distinctly lower. Read Full Review » -
60
Newsweek
This material is charged enough without piling on the melodrama and the lip-smacking violence. The movie too often sacrifices reportage for razzle-dazzle. Read Full Review » -
60
Time
It's hard to know whom to blame for the film's choppiness, its mixture of rage and sentimentality, the stridency of some of the acting. Read Full Review » -
50
New York Post
The picture is smothered by solemn right-mindedness, and hobbled by scripter David McKenna's simplistic, knee-jerk liberal take on suburban white racism. Read Full Review » -
50
Los Angeles Times
For all its surface verisimilitude and for all its focus on a problem that couldn't be more current, this film can't manage to feel more than sporadically real. Read Full Review » -
50
San Francisco Chronicle
As a visit to a world and a way of life most of us will never experience, American History X is vivid, and it feels honest. At the very least, it's not typical. Read Full Review » -
40
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25
Christian Science Monitor
Norton's high-energy acting is the only element that saves the picture from being a total loss. Read Full Review » -
20
-
20
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