Critic Reviews

Repulsion (1965) Rank 5 Reviews

Expert Review Summary

Movie critics combined give Repulsion (1965) a score of 3.2304 out of 4

based on (25) reviews

Click on the numbers to the right of the graph to see reviews of that rating

Excellent

(9)

Very Good

(12)

Good

(4)

Fair

(0)

Poor

(0)

Reviews by Score:

Ozus' World Movie Reviews (Dennis Schwartz)

This is an austere, scary, and timeless Grand Guignol work -- one with little dialogue. ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Ozus' World Movie Reviews (Dennis Schwartz)

San Francisco Chronicle (Edward Guthmann)

Repulsion is a frightening, fiercely entertaining experience that holds up to time. ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at San Francisco Chronicle (Edward Guthmann)

Slant Magazine (Ed Gonzalez)

Its two-way prism of audio-visual embellishments intuits a woman's fractured psyche and catches super-cool flashes of the audience's perverse cine-desires. ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Slant Magazine (Ed Gonzalez)

MovieJustice (Dan DeVore)

Carol, a manicurist from Belgium, is flatting in London with her sister Helen. Helen goes away for the weekend with her boyfriend, leaving Carol behind in the flat. ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at MovieJustice (Dan DeVore)

New York Times (Bosley Crowther)

Prepare yourself to be demolished when you go to see it -- and go you must, because it's one of those films everybody will soon be buzzing about. ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at New York Times (Bosley Crowther)

TV Guide's Movie Guide (--)

One of the most frightening and disturbing pictures ever made, REPULSION contains a scene in which a man's face is slashed with a razor until he dies, captured by Polanski's camera with a clinical expertise that pushes the viewer's nervous system to the ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at TV Guide's Movie Guide (--)

Science Fiction, Horror and Fantasy Film Review Database (--)

Combustible Celluloid (Jeffrey M. Anderson)

This is Roman Polanski's most microscopically focused tale of paranoia, and arguably his greatest achievement. ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Combustible Celluloid (Jeffrey M. Anderson)

Friday and Saturday Night (--)

It's fair to call Roman Polanski's "Replusion" a somewhat-dated classic. Its views on sex may strike modern viewers as outmoded 1960s non-conformity, or maybe an extremist side of the sexual revolution. ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Friday and Saturday Night (--)

not coming to a theater near you (Ian Johnston)

Repulsion was the first film Roman Polanski made in the West, after his brilliant beginnings in his native Poland. There, he had directed a series of striking shorts (most notably, Two Men and a Wardrobe) and an exceptional first feature, Knife in the ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at not coming to a theater near you (Ian Johnston)

eye WEEKLY (Jason Anderson)

Polanski displayed a much more troubling kind of thinking, forever banishing the possibility of safety for his characters. ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at eye WEEKLY (Jason Anderson)

Austin Chronicle (Marjorie Baumgarten)

A film that seems as fresh as the day it was released. ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Austin Chronicle (Marjorie Baumgarten)

San Francisco Examiner (Barbara Shulgasser)

Deneuve gives a scary and believable performance as a young woman who has never been completely integrated and who loses all sanity while we watch. ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at San Francisco Examiner (Barbara Shulgasser)

Classic Horror (--)

...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Classic Horror (--)

Time Out (--)

Still perhaps Polanski's most perfectly realised film, a stunning portrait of the disintegration, mental and emotional, of a shy young Belgian girl (Deneuve) living in London. When she's left alone by her sister in their Kensington flat, she becomes ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Time Out (--)

Senses of Cinema (Didier Truffot)

Confinement stands as a recurring theme in Polanski's Repulsion. Beyond operating as a means of distributing space, it can be said to act as an aesthetic and narrative structure, feeding the film as a whole. If such a principle already appears in the ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Senses of Cinema (Didier Truffot)

Village Voice (Michael Atkinson)

The ordeal we and Polanski craved for Deneuve turned out to be just a sport, and we were the ball -- just as we'd hoped. ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Village Voice (Michael Atkinson)

Georgia Straight (Ken Eisner)

When was the moment that Catherine Deneuve became an icon of inaccessible sexuality? Although Luis BuÃ�Â±uel's Belle de Jour, from 1967, has remained the more famous film, Roman Polanski's Repulsion was made a full two years earlier, when the French ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Georgia Straight (Ken Eisner)

Joe Bob's Ultimate B Movie Guide (Joe Bob Briggs)

Compuserve (Harvey S. Karten)

A contemporary audience might find the horror in Repulsion occurring too little, too late, but the fun of the movie is in the details, the careful etching of the mind of a woman cracking under the strain of her alienation. ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Compuserve (Harvey S. Karten)

filmsgraded.com (Brian Koller)

This opinion reveals major details about the movie's plot After the critical success of his film Knife in the Water (1962), talented Polish director Roman Polanski emigrated to the West. His first English-language film was Repulsion. It was a horror ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at filmsgraded.com (Brian Koller)

Goatdog's Movies (Michael W. Phillips, Jr.)

A fascinating if slow-moving study of the onset of madness. ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Goatdog's Movies (Michael W. Phillips, Jr.)

Edinburgh U Film Society (Keith H. Brown)

Repulsion is perhaps Polanski's and Deneuve's finest ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Edinburgh U Film Society (Keith H. Brown)

Cinescape (--)

One of the great psychological horror films, Roman Polanski's first English film is an almost clinical examination of a beautiful young woman (Catherine Denuvue) slowly going mad. Set mostly in her apartment, the film's limited locals are actually a ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Cinescape (--)

Boulder Weekly (Thomas Delapa)

A methodical but fairly repellent exercise in claustrophobic horror. ...read the complete Repulsion movie review at Boulder Weekly (Thomas Delapa)