Costa-Gavras wasn’t holding back with his 1969 masterpiece Z, opening with a bold declaration, a printed statement reading: “Any similarity to persons or events is deliberate.”

| Nov 15, 2023

It is such a shame that a film that holds up with so much relevancy is not not as widely discussed today as it was back when it was first released. “Z” should be essential viewing to every governmental official in every country around the world.

| Sep 28, 2022

Z is a hell of an exciting movie, and it carries you along, though when it's over and you've caught your breath you know perfectly well that its techniques of excitation could as easily be used by a smart Fascist filmmaker, if there was one.

| Jul 6, 2022

It is a fast-paced, relentless action thriller and a political allegory that both underlines and transcends the modern Greek tragedy of Junta fascism. As political satire, Z is the kind of film that only hurts you when you laugh.

| Jun 15, 2022

Trintignant's performance is masterful.

| Jan 7, 2021

[Director Costa-Gavras's] handling of the Lambrakis facts resulted in an uptempo, taut, jazzy type movie designed to hold the interest of even Hollywood-conditioned, mystery-action addicts.

| Jul 15, 2020

For some reason foreign movies about sex and political life are so far above American movies on the subjects that there is really no comparison. Such is the case with Z.

| Jul 15, 2020

The film-makers' sense of immediacy transforms itself into style. Z is a film in a hurry, always trying to get ahead of itself, to explore itself.

| Jun 30, 2020

There hasn't been a better foreign language movie in 1969.

| Jan 16, 2020

What's so great about Director Costa-Gavras' simple, forceful reconstruction of the event is its understatement.

| Oct 2, 2019

A political film that is sincere and, above all, explicit, without any tedious symbolism or irrational messages. [Full Review in Spanish]

| Jul 25, 2019

There is a snapping-up of glib trifles which somewhat undercuts the gravity of Z's overt pretensions.

| Jul 10, 2018

It is a great film for many reasons, not the least of which is that it can be enjoyed as a political thriller as well as a political statement.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Jan 18, 2013

| Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 18, 2011

Z is indeed, per Pauline Kael's prominent quote in the press materials, "intolerably exciting." It's also, in a good many ways, intolerable.

| Original Score: 3/6 | Nov 17, 2011

| Original Score: A | Nov 17, 2011

It's hard to overstate the impact that this Oscar-winning procedural thriller had in 1969, on a world roiling in political activism, repression, and discord.

| Jan 15, 2010

Required viewing for any lover of political thrillers.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Dec 8, 2009

... thrilling, compelling, run through with vivid supporting characters and narrative twists and turns that have the dramatic punch of fiction even when based on real events.

| Dec 6, 2009

Four decades later, this glimpse into the machinations of political violence, intolerance, willful ignorance, and systemic oppression has lost none of its urgent relevance.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Dec 3, 2009