American Animals is one of the most unique experiences of 2018 so far. Perhaps its editing and tonal shifts will be too cumbersome for some audiences, but for me, there’s a lot of profound layers to Layton’s direction.

| Original Score: A | Aug 7, 2024

The harder the movie worked at reminding me of its "This is Based on a True Story" bonafides I kept watching it through Fargo-tinted "True Story" glasses

| Jul 2, 2021

What makes the movie good is that it is also a condemnation of same, illustrating just how quickly those worries burn off in the face of the alternative, a difficult life.

| Dec 10, 2020

A movie that takes a tattered genre and manages to add some fresh elements to it.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Nov 2, 2020

They merit no such sympathy-and really, they didn't merit a movie, period.

| Oct 26, 2020

It's incredibly well-acted and features insightful storytelling. This is one that shouldn't be missed.

| Oct 9, 2020

It's a movie about strange, unfocused people and so the result is a film that reflects those characteristics.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Aug 14, 2020

...It leaves American Animals feeling a bit hollow. But, it's still a ride well worth taking.

| Jul 27, 2020

It might be amusing, sure, but so is a one-panel cartoon in the New Yorker, and a single statement just isn't worth two hours of a person's time.

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Jul 24, 2020

Occasionally fun and engaging, with an inventive storytelling mechanism and an only-in-reality tale, American Animals is ultimately hollow and ends in a shrug.

| Original Score: C | Jul 1, 2020

The film entices us to empathize with the leads so that it can hit us on the head with our own empathy. But that's the thing about empathy: It literally doesn't judge.

| Jun 30, 2020

Observes a cocktail of boredom, ambition and peer pressure, topped off with romanticizing the first two-thirds of a movie and shrugging off the inevitable downfall.

| Original Score: A- | Jun 19, 2020

Shifting the docudrama balance to the latter half of the portmanteau, AMERICAN ANIMALS is well paced and inventive with the truth in a way that grips rather than grates.

| Feb 13, 2020

[T]hanks to first-person accounts of the real-life robbers, not to mention Layton's highly tense direction, the ambiguity of the whole piece leaves you wanting to go over it again and again.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 11, 2019

Life imitating art is a real dynamic for these boys, as it is for the film itself (which opts for actors and thrilling heist tropes rather than a straightforward documentary).

| Aug 19, 2019

American Animals is entertaining while answering the question most people have thought about at one time or another...If I tried to commit a crime, could I get away with it?

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Jul 15, 2019

In his account of good Kentucky boys gone inexplicably rogue, documentarian Bart Layton puts his reality-bitten experience to good use, cutting between the actual men the boys became and an ensemble of actors playing them as their misguided 2004 selves.

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

Just as I remember.

| Jun 17, 2019

By blending the fleeting thrills and real world consequences of this wild heist, American Animals is true crime at its finest.

| May 21, 2019

American Animals starts off like a fun heist movie - until reality comes crashing down in a tonal shift that has no right to work as well as it does.

| Original Score: 8/10 | May 16, 2019