a Sisyphusian tale about idealists devoting their lives to bringing about change.

| Jan 30, 2013

A well-made and entertaining descent into a black-comic hell.

Full Review | Jul 6, 2010

It's as if filmmaking brothers Joel and Nash Edgerton (Joel cowrote, produced and costars, Nash directed) sat down and said, "Let's watch these suckers wreck their lives, and the lives of everyone around them."

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jul 6, 2010

A perverse delight, the rare film that makes you feel good about feeling bad (or at least watching others do so).

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Jun 22, 2010

Things go from bad to worse to downright disastrous in the enthralling Australian import The Square.

| Original Score: B+ | May 14, 2010

The Square is a solidly constructed thriller with some missing pieces at the center but vivid splashes of color outside the lines.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | May 13, 2010

The Square suggests an exciting future for a pair of brothers with a dark view of pitiless fate.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | May 7, 2010

The Square announces the arrival of a new talent worth watching.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | May 7, 2010

When the first 10 minutes of film introduce us to an illicit affair, a kickback scheme, and a hidden bag filled with money, we know we're in for a twisty thriller.

| Original Score: B+ | May 6, 2010

The Square is a morality noir in which there's very little onscreen morality.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Apr 30, 2010

A riveting tale of a small group of people doing very bad (and pretty dumb) things, The Square works from beginning to end and stands as one of the best feature debuts of the year to date.

| Original Score: 4.0/5 | Apr 30, 2010

There are no blacks and whites here just lots and lots of glorious gray, each flawed soul quickly coming to damning realizations that the choices they've made might not have been the best ones after all.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Apr 29, 2010

Some have called this neo-noir, but aside from the setting there's nothing "neo" about it; as in classic noir, the characters are slowly but surely ensnared by their own baser impulses.

| Apr 29, 2010

The string-along, bad-to-worse nature of The Square affords a distinct, if sour, sort of satisfaction. Yet its construction is a thing of considerable soundness.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Apr 29, 2010

The Square moves with implacable logic toward catastrophe, as its desperate heroes try to squirm out of a tightening noose.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Apr 29, 2010

There's a bit of everything in The Square, so much so that after a while it starts to feel generic.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Apr 22, 2010

The Square is a terrific film noir with an Aussie twist.

| Original Score: A- | Apr 16, 2010

There isn't a character in The Square you can care about, beyond pity for their foolishness and exasperation with their greed.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Apr 16, 2010

It's a finely calibrated, spiraling lesson in what not to do when engaging in adultery, blackmail, arson, and general antisocial behaviors, and in its best moments it recalls the everyday darkness of James M. Cain.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Apr 16, 2010

You wonder how the characters could be so inept about their dirty deeds. How did they get so badly in over their heads? It's almost Biblical in the way it metes out rough justice.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Apr 16, 2010