20th Century Women encapsulates the beautiful way parents and children love each other, but may never fully understand one another.

| Jul 25, 2023

Mike Mills’s 20th Century Women (2016) is a masterpiece of intuitive plotting. The one part that doesn’t feel complete is Jamie’s (Lucas Jade Zumann) arc.

| Apr 20, 2023

20th Century Women feels intimate beyond measure, and those who can relate will undergo a deep and meaningful connection to its characters.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Apr 5, 2022

Just like Beginners, there's so much beauty in the conversations that the characters have here -- discussions about death and sex and vulnerability.

| Original Score: A- | Aug 10, 2021

Just like the characters themselves, the script roams free, filling in all the swirling colors of the world and expressing a time and place that might have just been the last when human connection was tactile and fearless.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Jul 25, 2021

Though there isn't much story to speak of in '20th Century Women,' there are plenty of observations, enough to hold your attention. It also helps to have performances this good.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Jun 2, 2021

Structurally the film suffers from the odd hiccup but tremendous performances that feels airy and grounded at the same time bring humanity and empathy to a story that is specific in its time and place but universal in its scope.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Feb 28, 2021

The film feels brilliantly both of another time and of our own.

| Feb 17, 2021

The dynamic of family, love, and living life that exist in Mike Mills newest film 20th Century Women is just about the greatest thing I have seen in a movie in a long time.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Feb 7, 2021

I think the messages not only transcend the time period but also the particulars of individual relationships. There is a bit of all our familial relationships somewhere in these characters...

| Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 23, 2020

With all due respect, given the overall banality of 20th Century Women, why does Mills continue to think his life will be so fascinating to the rest of us?

| Aug 17, 2020

A fabulous homage, specifically to Mills' mom, but also to any woman and her true family about what to value, and when not to shut up when bullies threaten.

| Jun 9, 2020

It feels passive-aggressively preachy, vague in its lessons, and overwritten to the point where I was genuinely dreading every moment Bening was gearing up to speak.

| May 1, 2020

There are so many small tidbits about life, love, and happiness in 20th Century Women that it feels like therapy.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Feb 9, 2020

Mills, to his credit, creates realistic scenarios with natural dialogue, but this also happens to make the movie, well, very boring.

| Jan 7, 2020

What did it mean to be born, to grow up in, to die in, the 20th century? Well, it meant a lot of different things.

| Sep 11, 2019

This is not a great movie, but it is another one of [Annette] Bening's great performances.

| Aug 30, 2019

20th Century Women is a sun-drenched search for wisdom in changing times that's no less relevant today than it was when Jimmy Carter gave his "Crisis of Conscience" speech.

| Original Score: 8/10 | Apr 17, 2019

Whether it's discussions about how questioning one's happiness is a shortcut to depression or having your heart broken to learn about the world, 20TH CENTURY WOMEN is a film that informs, educates, and entertains.

| Original Score: A | Mar 30, 2019

20th Century Women might not follow usual conventions, or tie up all its loose ends neatly, but it still manages a coherent, brilliantly witty story. One that satisfies its audience far more than similar films with happier endings.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Mar 7, 2019