New Black Mass Movie Got Mostly Positive Reviews From Top Critics

New Black Mass movie got mostly positive reviews from top critics. Warner Bros. Pictures released their new action/drama flick, “Black Mass,” into theaters today, September 18th, 2015, and all the reviews are in from the top movie critics. It turns out that most of them liked it with an overall 69 score out of a possible 100 across 34 reviews at Metacritic.com.

The movie stars: Benedict Cumberbatch, Dakota Johnson, Joel Edgerton and Johnny Depp. We’ve included blurbs from some of the critics,below.

Scott Foundas over at Variety, gave it a great 90 score, saying: “If Johnny Depp’s mesmerizing performance — a bracing return to form for the star after a series of critical and commercial misfires — is the chief selling point of Black Mass, there is much else to recommend this sober, sprawling, deeply engrossing evocation of Bulger’s South Boston fiefdom and his complex relationship with the FBI agent John Connolly, played with equally impressive skill by Joel Edgerton.”

Brian Truitt from USA Today, gave it a an 88 score, saying: “As notorious gangster James “Whitey” Bulger, Depp astounds with one of the best performances in his long career while co-star Joel Edgerton steps up equally well as John Connolly, an ethically questionable FBI agent who flirts with the wrong side of the law.”

Peter Travers at Rolling Stone, gave it an 88 score, stating: “Ice-cold. Dead eyes. Demonic laugh. His face a mask you can’t read until he’s up in yours. Then run. That’s Johnny Depp giving everything he’s got in a riveting, rattlesnake performance as South Boston gangster James “Whitey” Bulger in Black Mass.”

Kenneth Turan from the Los Angeles Times, gave it a an 80 score. He said: “If the final result doesn’t transcend emotionally in the manner of the gold standard of Boston noir, Clint Eastwood’s “Mystic River,” the fault is not in the execution but the unyieldingly oppressive nature of the underlying material.”

Joe Morgenstern from the Wall Street Journal, gave it an 80 grade, saying: “The film, directed with exceptional flair and elegant concision by Scott Cooper, even comes from Warner Bros., the studio that specialized in psychopathic monsters played by such stars as James Cagney and Edward G. Robinson during Hollywood’s golden age.”

Lou Lumenick at the New York Post, gave it a 75 grade, saying: “While highly entertaining and sometimes inspired, Black Mass is more like Scorsese lite. In perhaps the most memorable sequence, Bulger sardonically tests a childhood friend (Joel Edgerton) for loyalty by teasing out a “secret” steak sauce in what’s basically a reworking/homage of Joe Pesci’s famous “I’m funny, how?” scene in “GoodFellas.”

Richard Roeper from the Chicago Sun-Times, gave it a 75 score, saying: “This is a good, solid, well-executed crime story. Nothing more, nothing less.”

Peter Hartlaub at the San Francisco Chronicle, gave it a 75 score, saying: “A solid piece of filmmaking, from subtle beginning to the excessive end.”

Michael Phillips from the Chicago Tribune, gave it a 75 score. He stated: “If anything, director Cooper is so intent on portraying Bulger as a man, not a monster, the man comes off a little softer than he was, probably.”

Chris Nashawaty from Entertainment Weekly, gave it a 75 grade, stating: “Cooper, the director of Crazy Heart and the underrated Out of the Furnace, has made a tight and tense gangster film with Black Mass. But it’s a pretty straight-ahead entry in the genre, albeit one peppered with spicy performances.”

Todd McCarthy at The Hollywood Reporter, gave it a 70 grade, saying: “Depp’s instinct for observing, underlaying and keeping things in, then letting it all out when required, pays big dividends here in a performance far more convincing than his previous big gangster role, John Dillinger in Michael Mann’s Public Enemies; it’s unexpected, very welcome at this point in his career, and one of his best.”

Ty Burr from the Boston Globe, gave it a 63 score. He said: “It’s a solid if not stellar crime drama, well put together, very well acted, and lacking only a genuine reason to exist.”

Joe Neumaier at the New York Daily News, gave it a 60 score, saying: “The movie itself is an intriguing but ultimately unspecial Feds-vs.-hoods drama. But as the sinister, snakelike South Boston criminal Whitey Bulger, Depp delivers.”

Ann Hornaday at the Washington Post, gave it a 50 grade, saying: “Even filmmakers and actors as fine as these haven’t managed to solve one of cinema’s most enduring challenges — making criminals interesting without exalting them.”

Lastly, A.O. Scott from the The New York Times, gave it a 50 grade. He said: “Mr. Cooper’s direction is skillful, if overly reliant on borrowed Scorseseisms (especially when it comes to music), and the cast is first-rate, but the film is a muddle of secondhand attitudes and half-baked ideas. It feels more like a costume party than a costume drama.” Stay tuned. Follow us on Facebook by Clicking Here. Follow us on Google Plus by Clicking Here. Follow us on Twitter by Clicking Here.

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