Like the serious-minded daughter in the story, the audience's expectations are wonderfully challenged and satisfyingly upended by Toni Erdmann.

| Nov 4, 2021

Toni Erdmann is the fastest and funniest 164 minute film you'll ever see; [director Maren] Ade steers her story with a confident hand.

| Feb 17, 2021

Maren Ade's Toni Erdmann is a testament to the precision necessary for really good comedy, proving that fart jokes, sophisticated black humour and a profound sensitivity to broadly experienced human emotions can ... find perfect balance.

| Aug 25, 2018

Toni Erdmann is a thing of rare beauty.

| Original Score: 10/10 | Dec 8, 2017

An offbeat and sometimes off-putting German farce/drama hybrid that features a father-daughter pair that are two of the most fully realized characters in recent memory. [Full review in Japanese]

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jul 31, 2017

A diptych character study featuring characters well-worth studying, Toni Erdmann is an affecting, delightful original. Prepare to face-palm - in a good way.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Mar 3, 2017

When Ade's opus works it admittedly does so with a level of precision and genius that's mesmerizing, making this a modern comedy of heartbreak, forgiveness and family deserving of multiple looks.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Feb 27, 2017

"Toni Erdmann" has plenty to say about parenting, ambition, feminism and modern happiness, but not enough to justify its absurdly longwinded running time.

| Original Score: C+ | Feb 24, 2017

Hüller is amusingly discombobulated as the uptight Ines. But the film is perhaps best appreciated as a showcase for the gifted Simonischek, whose portrayal of Winfried/Toni is one for the ages.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Feb 16, 2017

Simonischek, all ruddy, playful bearishness, and the amazing Hüller allow themselves to sink deep within these two characters, and the end result is nothing short of unforgettable.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Feb 16, 2017

At nearly three hours, "Toni Erdmann" is expansive but rarely self-indulgent, and the emotional payoff, when it comes, feels truly and bizarrely earned.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Feb 16, 2017

Funny, tender, outrageous - this unpredictable movie belongs in a category all its own.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Feb 8, 2017

"This will not be a comedy," Ade reportedly told her co-producer. "This will be a very long and sad film." In fact, it is both and more.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Feb 5, 2017

The first thing to note is that Toni Erdmann is wholly original. It doesn't follow any of the usual "rules" of narrative cinema.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Feb 3, 2017

While I appreciate that the film contains multitudes -- and, yes, maybe even the spark of genius -- I must confess that I'm not fully down with the hype.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Feb 3, 2017

Boasts two fascinating characters and a string of surreal set-pieces that you can't afford to miss.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Feb 3, 2017

The story of a nuttily disguised father stalking his uptight business executive daughter is surreal and screamingly funny, but also a tender dissection of their relationship.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Feb 2, 2017

Toni Erdmann is as strange, delightful and dementedly funny as the hype has it. But repeat watching reveals a film that plays first as comedy, then as tragedy.

| Feb 2, 2017

Force of feeling and intelligence meets force of comic metaphor and invention, somewhere in a Dadaist deep space miraculously liberated from solemnity.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Feb 2, 2017

A weird, thoughtful, affecting treat.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Feb 2, 2017