While High Life flopped upon its release in 2019, Claire Denis’ English-language debut is not a film that should be forgotten. On the contrary, it’s a movie to discover and fall in love with.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Feb 7, 2025

There’s such conviction in its refusal to bend to convention that I find it hard not to admire the film in some way, shape or form.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Jul 14, 2024

Composed of equal parts mystery, thriller and speculative fiction, High Life starts off slowly but rewards patience, gradually working towards a finale which weaves elements of Interstellar and 2001: A Space Odyssey into something uniquely Claire Denis.

| Jul 19, 2023

It may be too lofty to call High Life a microcosm of humanity; then again, it may not be. Denis seems to liken the isolation of a few people trapped on a ship hurtling through space to the entire human experience.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Mar 3, 2022

Episode 37: Edge of Tomorrow / Forbidden Planet / High Life

| Original Score: 78/100 | Oct 4, 2021

With each thread you find yourself trying to unravel, Denis stays just on the opaque end of decipherable...for sci-fi diehards that read about a big movie star in a new space movie, it's definitely something other than what you'd expect.

| Jul 28, 2021

Combining aspects of horror, sci-fi and prison drama, the film is a challenging puzzle that even the most devout Denis fans may struggle to piece together, but that doesn't negate its thrilling, terrifying viewing experience.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Mar 8, 2021

Frozen bodies vertically floating in space, meteor showers, baby eating dirt in the vegetable garden, dead dog in the stream, sudden burst of violence and emotions that puts High Life very much in the top tier of all Claire Denis-ean film.

| Feb 13, 2021

Pattinson soars ahead despite a strong cast, fully embracing his recently discovered ability for expressive silence. Aboard the vessel, sex, hostility and violence seem inevitable, but are still so shocking.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Feb 8, 2021

A perfect grown-up antidote to all of the usual whiz-bang summer blockbusters.

| Feb 8, 2021

A merciless inspection of what becomes of people if they forsake their own corporeal poetics and desires, High Life shows how inescapable the tight grip of desire is, even when it's drained of its lively fluids.

| Jan 29, 2021

In spite of the restrictions imposed, the situation can turn very emotional, erotic, and perverse at the same time [Full Review in Spanish]

| Sep 19, 2020

There's no doubt that Denis conjures a woozy, dreamlike nightmarescape here, but it doesn't amount to all that much.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Aug 15, 2020

Not many filmmakers can pull off such idiosyncrasies without drawing attention to themselves, but Denis makes a cogent meditation on humankind and its ingrown constructs.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Jul 27, 2020

In its final moment, High Life transforms the scientific unknown into transcendent hope - the only kind of hope it accepts.

| Jun 30, 2020

It is a science fiction sensory journey, one that is existential, lubricious, and highly stimulating. [Full review in Spanish]

| Original Score: 7/10 | Jun 27, 2020

High Life is a sufficiently sinister space voyage, but one without all that much to say.

| Original Score: 5/10 | Jun 24, 2020

HIGH LIFE is a story so simple it loops back to the profound and so focused on its characters it collapses through the event horizon to feel universal.

| Feb 13, 2020

High Life is just the right kind of gradual sci-fi film we need, interweaving reality and the truth of our fragility with the fragmented solitude of space.

| Feb 6, 2020

It's an interesting premise, but the structural flaws and unlikable screenplay put to waste the attractive production design.

| Original Score: 1/5 | Jan 8, 2020