The intimacy of the film-making puts the viewer in the middle of the square, making this documentary an important tool to understanding the events

| Original Score: 4 | Jan 29, 2025

A remarkable piece of documentary filmmaking that is both riveting and eye-opening.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Aug 25, 2022

Brilliantly shot by Muhammad Hamdy, filled with passionate, articulate young activists.

| Aug 28, 2019

No revolution has ever been filmed from the inside with such intimate detail and breathtaking scope. The footage is at times horrific and heartbreaking.

| Aug 7, 2019

An engrossing, transportive experience, but more importantly, it's a galvanizing one. The film's greatest victory isn't simply that it makes you feel like you're in Tahrir Square; it's that it makes you want to be there.

| Original Score: 9/10 | Apr 3, 2019

The Square is a shrewd application of cinéma vérité in the midst of mass communication and a sensible and thorough approach to the events that gave birth to the Arab Spring. [Full review in Spanish]

| Original Score: 9.5/10 | Mar 21, 2019

What it is able to do is give a vital and vibrant look at what being a part of the revolution was and is like.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Mar 7, 2019

The rise and fall of political leaders in a country struggling to have civil rights is a heavy subject to tackle, but director Jehane Noujaim makes this issue easy to understand and connect to, even from watching half a world away.

| Jan 27, 2019

A beautiful and electric documentary that captures so vividly both the rapture at the heart of the Tahrir Square protests of 2011 and the sense of betrayal that followed.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Jan 27, 2019

Tipped for an Oscar nomination, Jehane Noujaim's kaleidoscopic documentary offers a gripping, behind-the-headlines account of Egypt's 2011 Tahrir Square uprising and the complexities of its aftermath.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 6, 2017

Nothing short of literature

| Original Score: 5/5 | Jun 5, 2014

While it's significant as a historical document, The Square, simply by existing, also reminds us of how new media has begun to transform the way the world witnesses war and oppression.

| Apr 16, 2014

Jehane Noujaim's ground-level account of the Arab Spring from 2011 to mid-2013 in Cairo's Tahrir Square has heart, wit, poetry and fire.

| Apr 7, 2014

Unflinching, violent but excellent docu on Arab Spring.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Mar 13, 2014

What does a revolution really feel like? You learn the answer in The Square, an extraordinary documentary that puts its cameras on the ground to take us in the heart of the troubled, betrayed, idealistic and sad movement for democracy in Egypt.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Mar 6, 2014

One of the very best documentaries of 2013.

Full Review | Feb 14, 2014

Noujaim's film attests to how quickly joyous weeping in the streets gave way to sectarian arguments over the army's role and fissures in promising alliances.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Feb 14, 2014

A stirring tribute to democracy and those willing to fight for it.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Feb 12, 2014

An essential chronicle.

| Feb 4, 2014

The Square doesn't slack for a minute. Quite a voice. Quite a film...

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Jan 26, 2014