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:
61
(21 sources)
61
(21 sources)
-
88
Chicago Tribune
Mamet is a writer who turns off some audiences, and almost everything that might bother them is in Edmond: foul language, raging machismo, violence and seemingly bigoted tirades. But almost everything audiences like about him is there too: candor, suspense, ideas, crackling slang, vivid characters. Read Full Review » -
83
The Onion (A.V. Club)
Edmond would probably be completely unapproachable were it not spiked with so much dark wit, much of it coming from Macy's painful naïveté and cheapness, which comes through in negotiations with various women of the night. Read Full Review » -
80
Salon.com
It's hilarious, and contains some of Mamet's best dialogue. And that somehow, by making a racist, murderous, Everycreep his protagonist, Mamet is able to produce some of his most penetrating psychological and spiritual insights. Read Full Review » -
80
Film Threat
While the episodic script feels fragmented, Macy's consistency unifies Edmond's journey. Read Full Review » -
80
LA Weekly
It manages, in the course of a single tersely delineated story, to say more about the dark pathology of American racism than any five character arcs in "Crash." So go, by all means, but be prepared to take a beating. Read Full Review » -
75
Boston Globe
In Mamet's understanding, straight white maleness is the most powerful weapon such men have. It can also be illusory, which is why the last scenes of Edmond are so touching. Read Full Review » -
75
Miami Herald
Admirers of the author will find in Edmond all the elements that turned Mamet into a favorite. Read Full Review » -
70
The New York Times
Mr. Macy, a master at playing sticks of human dynamite in mild-mannered camouflage, gives the nerviest screen performance of his career. Read Full Review » -
67
Entertainment Weekly
We're in David Mamet World. William H. Macy -- the quintessential player of Mamet men in all their impacted rage -- stars in this claustrophobic adaptation. Read Full Review » -
63
TV Guide
Written in the aftermath of a bitter divorce, Mamet's paranoid rant -- an explosion of middle-aged, white-collar, white-men's rage at losing ground to everyone, from women, hustlers, African Americans and homosexuals to the younger generation nipping at their heels -- is as bilious as ever, but time has overtaken and defanged it. Read Full Review » -
63
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60
New York Magazine
Depressing, disgusting, and dated, Edmond is worth braving to experience America's best-known serious playwright at his most gruesomely undiluted. Read Full Review » -
50
The New Yorker
This, to put it mildly, is new terrain for Macy, and his journey--from Arthur Miller, as it were, to Céline and Dostoyevsky--does not always convince. Read Full Review » -
50
New York Daily News
From the beginning, Edmond is too self-absorbed for us to care much about his fate, but like the proverbial train wreck, you can't tear your eyes - or your ears - away from the spectacle. Read Full Review » -
50
The Hollywood Reporter
For hard-core David Mamet fans only...Edmond serves to remind you how artificial the dialogue and dramaturgy truly was in early Mamet. Read Full Review » -
50
Variety
Despite agreeably short running time and committed performances, Edmond is rendered inert by its stagy atmosphere and failure to fully mine the depths of its protagonist's complex psyche. Read Full Review » -
50
Village Voice
As the full-length sorta-satire it has become, Edmond is all sizzle and little meat, a veritable tangent act dropped from "Glengarry Glen Ross" because it was several marks too silly. Read Full Review » -
50
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50
Los Angeles Times
Edmond does, on the surface, seem very much a contemporary tale of urban terror. Yet despite the best efforts of all concerned, what seemed explosive and provocative two decades ago now comes across as schematic and artificial. Read Full Review » -
50
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50
The New Republic
What the role needs, and what Macy cannot quite provide, is the sense not of a robot but of a potent man who has been imprisoned by rote. Remember Jack Nicholson in "About Schmidt." Read Full Review »
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