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:
72
(9 sources)
72
(9 sources)
-
100
The New York Times
Mr. Lee means for Malcolm X to be an epic, and it is in its concerns and its physical scope. In Denzel Washington it also has a fine actor who does for Malcolm X what Ben Kingsley did for “Gandhi.” [18 November 1992] Read Full Review » -
100
Chicago Sun-Times
The film is inspirational and educational - and it is also entertaining, as movies must be before they can be anything else. Read Full Review » -
90
Washington Post
A spiritually enriching testament to the human capacity for change -- and surely Spike Lee's most universally appealing film. Read Full Review » -
80
-
80
TV Guide
Lee's biography of the slain civil rights leader treats Malcolm, not as a political rallying point, but as a fully rounded individual whose life defies reduction to symbolic status. Read Full Review » -
67
Austin Chronicle
A mortal movie about an immortal subject and the very fact that it succeeds as well as it does is a testament to Lee's skills as a filmmaker. Read Full Review » -
60
Variety
The picture comes up short in several departments, notably in pacing and in giving a strong sense of why this man became such a legend. Read Full Review » -
60
The New Yorker
The movie is disappointingly impersonal; it doesn't provide readers of the autobiography anything like a fresh vision of its remarkable subject. Read Full Review » -
40
Chicago Reader
Lee has tried hard to give this shapeless picture some visual patterning though the cluttered effect created by his mistrust of silence is even more harmful than in the past. Read Full Review »
