The talent of Mirren as Golda Meir is overwhelmed by the mediocrity of a dull and desiccated film.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Sep 18, 2024

There's too much reliance on news footage of the real Meir. Characters appear with who-they-are explanatory captions that a good script would not need. It's worth watching because of its relevance, and for Mirren's performance

| Original Score: 3/5 | May 10, 2024

Golda isn’t a failure of skill, but one of vision.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Nov 17, 2023

Golda is more like a chapter of a dusty history book than an invigorating, timely glimpse into the past.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Oct 10, 2023

Golda lives in the shadow of the film it wants to be, but Mirren’s warm performance and the claustrophobia of it all make it linger regardless.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Oct 9, 2023

Never less than compelling, her [Helen Mirren] work here feels true from scene to scene. But even this star needs more to crack the central mystery.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Oct 9, 2023

There’s a stifling quality to this portrait of Israeli prime minister Golda Meir (Helen Mirren, encased in spongy-looking layers of prosthetics), even before she has filled every frame with a fug of secondhand smoke.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Oct 8, 2023

Film probably not the ideal medium for this fascinating but complex episode.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Oct 5, 2023

[Mirren's] relentless courage and self-assurance have obviously convinced her she can play any role she so desires. True, she can play a lot of them. Aging, dowdy Israeli prime minister Golda Meir is not one of them.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Aug 29, 2023

There is no trace of Helen Mirren in Golda, and that’s the way it ought to be. To say that she becomes the fabled Israeli Prime Minister is a mild understatement, and it should come as no surprise that she delivers a great performance.

| Aug 28, 2023

Perceptions may be colored by revisionist political opinions of Meir, but Mirren embodies a complex character of conscience and empathy, who feels deeply and acts decisively to preserve an independent state even as she herself is disappearing. A gem.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Aug 26, 2023

Helen Mirren gets lost beneath layers of heavy prosthetics and a swirl of incessant cigarette smoke in “Golda."

| Original Score: 2/4 | Aug 25, 2023

It’s a war film told from a statewoman’s point of view, which both works and doesn’t.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Aug 25, 2023

The real Meir has more energy and charisma in the few seconds when she’s shown onscreen than Mirren has in 100 minutes.

| Original Score: 1.5/4 | Aug 25, 2023

The more glaring problem is that Golda itself never rises above the level of an actor’s showcase, never achieves — despite some noticeable effort — a more complicated, challenging reading of history.

| Aug 25, 2023

It is the woman at the center of the story whose personality and contradictions are given short shrift, in any deep sense.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Aug 25, 2023

Though the contours of its story are fairly standard statesman-at-war drama, “Golda” is unusually blunt about the internal devastation that comes with overseeing military operations.

| Aug 25, 2023

Nattiv mixes real footage with re-creations and you can’t help but wonder if the subject matter could have been explored more thoroughly in nonfiction format.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Aug 24, 2023

[Mirren's] so-so performance is weighed down all the more by a disappointing dearth of context about this fascinating woman.

| Original Score: 1/4 | Aug 24, 2023

It’s not clear why smoking is so important to the filmmakers. Perhaps it’s to show Meir’s stubbornness or single-mindedness or stress release, but it just becomes a filmmaking crutch, like real nicotine.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Aug 24, 2023