The filmmaker wants to be forceful, bold, enigmatic, but his conceptions about life are limited, so much of the work has the feeling of something done largely for effect.

| Feb 16, 2021

While its narrative arc couldn't be simpler, Reygadas' first film maintains a mystical, otherworldly ambience, paralleling primal urges and mother nature as its human characters waffle about on Maslow's hierarchy.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 14, 2020

Has a lingering, dreamlike quality, a sense of mystery and portent that infuses every moment with a kind of otherworldly beauty.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | May 18, 2019

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 30, 2006

obese in length and overflowing in pretension like so many prototypical art films

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Jul 2, 2006

Nothing shy of enthralling.

| Original Score: A- | Apr 19, 2006

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 26, 2005

If you're in synch with its heartbeat, and with Reygadas' tendency to pursue visual detours that intensify the film's sensual impact, this is a remarkable first effort that is equal parts disturbing, bold, mysterious and primal.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Nov 7, 2003

Its pretensions have the ring of, if not exactly a vanity project, a strictly personal obsession.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Sep 5, 2003

The sacrificed female body is used to resurrect a condemned soul and with her ascension comes the spiritual renewal of (The) Man.

| Original Score: C | Aug 1, 2003

An obscure and haunting and unpredictable parable.

| Original Score: A- | Jul 28, 2003

All these references, though, form a jambalaya that doesn't go down so easy.

| Original Score: 2/4 | May 29, 2003

The one thing that is clear from Japn is that a major new visual stylist has hit the screen and that Reygadas' first film represents the beginning of an auspicious career.

| Original Score: 3/5 | May 18, 2003

Unfolding at an elliptical pace that feels like a revelation, or tedium, or both, Japon recalls the glory days of 1970s art-house filmmaking.

| Original Score: 3/4 | May 9, 2003

Unlike a lot of young filmmakers, the 31-year-old Reygadas takes his ideas about the world and our place in it as seriously as his filmmaking ambitions.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Apr 24, 2003

Reygadas grapples with the most elemental of issues ... and the result is sly, touching and more than a little loony.

| Apr 24, 2003

It is the work of a remarkable new talent.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Apr 17, 2003

Reygadas has an impressive eye for otherworldly landscapes and an impressive ear, too.

Full Review | Mar 23, 2003

It's not a movie to see if you're in a hurry, but its deliberate pace and thoughtful mood are refreshing antidotes to the hyperactive speed of most Hollywood pictures.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Mar 20, 2003

Strange and beautifully expressive.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Mar 19, 2003