A sad and desolate story that will leave you with no desire to ever revisit it...

| Original Score: C | Jul 8, 2024

Australian writer, director and actress Leah Purcell not only creates a powerful, original character for herself to play in The Legend of Molly Johnson, but she gives the durable, male-centered western genre a feminist slant.

| Sep 30, 2022

An intense Western set in Australia dealing with the toxic trinity of violence, chauvinism, and injustice.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 8, 2022

It’s a flawed but nevertheless compelling western.

| Original Score: B | Sep 5, 2022

While the direction of Molly’s story feels inevitable–the patriarchy doesn’t let divergence alone for long–that makes it no less emotional or relevant.

| Sep 1, 2022

It’s exciting to see a creator have such free reign to explore the dynamics of their heritage and history in film like this, and I hope to see more films of this type in the future.

| Original Score: 7/10 | Aug 30, 2022

This Aboriginal-Australian film by director, writer and star Leah Purcell is an emotional, compelling story of a woman’s plight in rural Australia in the 19th century, a well-acted western and drama, but too often veers towards heavy-handed lessons.

| Aug 23, 2022

Beneath its surface Western cliches, this character-driven 19th century Australian drama is an uneven but powerful story of resilience and cultural heritage with a feminist spin.

| Aug 19, 2022

This throwback to the films of Australian New Wave is a stirring tribute to its subject and its writer-director-star.

| Original Score: A- | Aug 19, 2022

Purcell has taken Lawson’s character and given her a name, a history, and a story worthy of the word 'legend.'

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Aug 19, 2022

Purcell [gives] a heartrending lead performance, playing a woman whose iron will may not be able to withstand the mob’s prejudices.

| Aug 19, 2022

[S]ome narrative and filmmaking choices on Purcell's part become too much of a distraction from the movie's central point.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Aug 19, 2022

I’m frankly a little ticked off at the good people in Australia, who have apparently for decades been keeping the astonishingly talented actor/director/writer Leah Purcell all to themselves.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 18, 2022

The weighty and sparingly shot, Legend of Molly Johnson is not so much an ode but a lamentation, part thriller, part commentary, and harsh to its bones... This one is going to hurt but don’t flinch because no part of it should be missed.

| Aug 18, 2022

[Leah Purcell] delivers a mesmerizing and memorable turn on screen as she takes on such issues as women’s rights, racism and the brutal disease of colonial rule in the late 19th century.

| Aug 18, 2022

It’s an earnest film, one that glows with pride at Aboriginal resilience. But the impression it leaves is didactic, a saints and demons fable that meanders to foregone conclusions.

| Aug 18, 2022

Indigenous Australian actor Leah Purcell’s reframing of a foundational Australian pioneer story nails the Western iconography and the fierce central performance. But too often the plot feels like an illustrated lesson plan.

| Original Score: C | Aug 17, 2022

Purcell and Collins are unfortunately made to suffer for their trouble, their performances a moving tribute to the sacrifices so many have made for their people to live on with the promise of more.

| Original Score: B | Aug 17, 2022

Purcell expands upon the tragic titular character’s backstory, providing her protagonist with a feminist backbone, a pronounced connection to Aboriginal culture and, most vitally, a name.

| Original Score: 7.6/10 | Aug 17, 2022

Purcell has inflated what should have been a down-and-dirty western into a conscience-scouring national epic.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Aug 8, 2022