Zwick is ardently devoted to entertainment value, even if it means sacrificing the dignity of his otherwise stimulating story.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Dec 15, 2023

It doesn’t take many risks and it never strays too far from the more conventional survival movie path. But it’s a very well made film that captures the look and tone of the period.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 20, 2022

Every minute that the cast and crew shot Defiance on location in Lithuania was worth it.

| Jul 19, 2021

Defiance survives its sometimes pedestrian tone and personality due to a serious and honest attitude towards its principal subject matter.

| Mar 5, 2021

The script can't quite manage enough pathos for its band of oddly anti-heroic protagonists to create a lasting impression.

| Original Score: 6/10 | Nov 28, 2020

As the leader with a checkered past, Craig shows off both his action hero chops, his sensitive side and a nifty little Belorussian accent that occasionally wavers.

| Original Score: 3.0/4.0 | Sep 5, 2020

I recommend the movie as a redemptive and uplifting tale of heroism... if only to call attention to the real heroism of the historic Bielski brothers.

| Apr 10, 2020

If only Defiance could offer up a treatment of this historical phenomenon with more originality and mettle and less faith in war-movie razzle-dazzle.

| Jan 27, 2020

Very displeased that the Holocaust is used, once again, as a place and time to pass off entertainment as art.

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Oct 2, 2019

The kind of big, old-fashioned prestige entertainment Hollywood seems to have forgotten how to do

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 6, 2019

Bielski's extraordinary achievement is fairly and finely rendered...

| Aug 29, 2018

I've admired Craig's work in all his movies, and though it is unfair to compare his work here with his appearance as James Bond, I regard Defiance as the Daniel Craig movie I admire most.

| Jan 2, 2018

The actors are compelling. And Director Edward Zwick inflects the material with his trademark mix of moral zeal and high adventure, as in previous epics like Glory, Legends of the Fall and Blood Diamond.

| Dec 30, 2017

Zwick wants to tell timeless stories on a grand scale. I know that's not what people want anymore. I know it's not breathtaking. But it's not something many are doing now, and definitely not doing it this well.

| Original Score: B+ | Jun 22, 2013

| Original Score: 3/5 | Nov 16, 2011

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 16, 2011

Zwick does not deal in gratuitous grotesquery or far-fetched metaphor. "Operatic" and "surreal" are not in his vocabulary.

| Aug 16, 2011

Full Review | Original Score: 4.5/5 | Apr 4, 2011

For all its pomp and ruminating, Defiance isn't really interested in drama. It really just wants to entertain us. But it's not any better at that.

| Original Score: 5.5/10 | Mar 18, 2011

Defiance is heavy-handed, but emotionally compelling, engaging and inspiring throughout.

| Original Score: 8/10 | Oct 20, 2010