Sasquatch Sunset: reviews

What the critics say average 6.6 from 45 outlets

• 10 IGNClint Gage A bizarre tale about a family of sasquatch is an emotional masterpiece of experimental cinema and fart jokes. Read
• 10 San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle It’s a special movie that can make you laugh out loud numerous times at gross comedy and then make you think and feel something, too. There’s also something to be said for a movie that seems like the most fun these actors ever had. Read
• 9.0 Screen DailyTim Grierson Writer-directors David Zellner and Nathan Zellner’s fifth feature is easily their finest, a portrait of a Bigfoot community that starts out as an absurdist comedy before slowly transforming into a moving study of survival and loss. Read
• 8.8 The Washington PostTy Burr Sasquatch Sunset is a goofball curio touched with genuine sadness. It’s “The Cherry Orchard” of cryptozoology. Read
• 8.0 VarietyPeter Debruge Sasquatches may not exist, but miraculously enough, this movie does, and like the creatures it depicts, it must be seen to be believed. Read
• 8.0 The GuardianPeter Bradshaw It is entirely gripping and a witty and unnerving way of representing the mysterious silence of animals and a future world in which human beings can no longer exist. Read
• 8.0 The New YorkerRichard Brody Even as the film abounds in behavioral details, rendering its four protagonists’ personalities in sharp outlines, it never presumes to know too much about them; the movie shows what Sasquatches are like without assuming what it’s like to be a Sasquatch. Read
• 8.0 Los Angeles TimesAmy Nicholson Are we looking for the human in the Sasquatch? Or for the Sasquatch in us? The movie works either way, but in its refusal to hew to a familiar plot trajectory, it holds up a mirror to our own narcissism. Read
• 8.0 Total FilmJamie Graham As time passes, a real sadness creeps in as we suspect that we might be witnessing the extinction of a species, though an inspired sight gag is never far away. This is a film that needs to be seen to be believed. Read
• 8.0 EmpireJohn Nugent Sasquatch Sunset is a gloriously vulgar film about made-up monsters from children’s stories — but it is also a terribly melancholy adult story about the violence of progress. What a remarkable, unique, sad little cult oddity it is. Read
• 8.0 The Irish TimesTara Brady Hang in there and it’s rewardingly novel, touchingly human and agreeably nutty.
• 8.0 Time OutOlly Richards Sasquatch Sunset’s mood sits somewhere between the queasy surreality of Jim Hosking’s The Greasy Strangler and the winsome daftness of Daniels’ Swiss Army Man. It’s easy to see this following in the (big)footsteps of those and acquiring its own cult following. Read
• 7.5 IndiewireKate Erbland There’s a tenderness here, not just between the Sasquatches (and even then, not always just tenderness!) but for nature itself. Read
• 7.5 The PlaylistMarshall Shaffer Until the final shot, the Zellner Brothers leave unclear whether all of their oddball observations are building to a grand statement about humanity or a punchline. “Sasquatch Sunset” can accommodate readings of both. Read
• 7.5 Slant MagazinePat Brown What we’re confronted with in Sasquatch Sunset, then, may be less the quaint idiocy of four dull simians and more our own inability to loosen up and just live. Read
• 7.5 The A.V. ClubMatt Schimkowitz Everything works best when it’s coming through the performance, not the edit. Often, the directors’ touch isn’t light enough, and their forced attempts at humor upset the film’s natural balance. Read
• 7.5 New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike Scott Messages, metaphors and micturition aside, the journey is the thing, and in this case, “Sasquatch Sunset” is a pretty good journey — and thus a pretty good thing. Read
• 7.5 The Boston GlobeNatalia Winkelman Consistently weird and frequently wonderful, “Sasquatch Sunset” uses its high-concept premise to consider a host of themes: collective living, coexistence with nature, longing stirred by seclusion. Read
• 7.5 Original-CinKaren Gordon If you’re willing to go with it, the Zellner brothers and their cast have delivered something that is by turns funny, sad, and, in the end, surprisingly poignant. Read
• 7.0 SlashfilmBill Bria As a celebration and an elegy for a creature that isn't and never was, "Sasquatch Sunset" is kind of beautiful and kind of ridiculous. Read
• 7.0 New York TimesJeannette Catsoulis Surrender to its shaggy rhythms and you’ll find this sometimes tiresome portrait of a family of mythical beasts is not without intelligence and a strangely mesmeric intent. Read
• 7.0 Rolling StoneDavid Fear It works far better as a free-floating vibe than a movie, which can be read as a backhanded compliment or a sign of surrender. Read
• 7.0 The Arizona RepublicBill Goodykoontz It is scatological in the extreme and filled with absurdist and slapstick humor, particularly in the early going. Read
• 7.0 Little White LiesDavid Jenkins What makes Sasquatch Sunset a cut above what some might perceive to be an extended Funny or Die sketch is that it’s crafted with such care and with a sense of cinematic grandeur, achieved via Mike Gioulakis’ gorgeous, mussy cinematography and the gentle pastoral sounds of The Octopus Project on the soundtrack. Read
• 6.8 PolygonMatt Patches No bodily function goes untapped in Sasquatch Sunset, which happens to be a meditative communion with North America’s glorious woodland. Read
• 6.7 The Film StageJordan Raup The rigorous perspective solely on these mythical creatures is a daring decision––a more compelling experiment than the overdramatized recent entries into the Planet of the Apes franchise––but the end result is more commendable than dramatically captivating. Read
• 6.7 The Austin ChronicleKimberley Jones This thing’s a journey, y’all – the miraculous coexisting with yawning boredom. Read
• 6.3 Roger EbertMonica Castillo It took a second screening to better appreciate what the Zellners brought to the screen, but for some, that might not be enough to get past some of the movie’s weirder notes. Read
• 6.3 ReelViewsJames Berardinelli Sasquatch Sunset is sufficiently different that it’s almost worth seeing for that reason alone. Alas, I don’t think it sufficiently rises above the gimmick of its premise to provide a compelling reason to spend 90 minutes in a movie theater. Read
• 6.0 The Hollywood ReporterLovia Gyarkye The Zellners’ fondness for wacky scenarios, the film’s unexpected turns and its deep appreciation for the natural world culminate in a project at once committed to a comedic bit that overstays its welcome and a somewhat poignant narrative competing for space and attention. Read
• 6.0 ColliderRoss Bonaime The film isn’t without its flaws and weird choices, but the fact that it works at all is a testament to the Zellner brothers and this incredible cast being willing to give their all for such a deranged idea. Read
• 6.0 Screen RantStephen Holland However, for those willing to dig deep, there is a lot to be gained from Sasquatch Sunset about what it means to be alive, our connection to nature, and the enduring power of family and resilience. Read
• 6.0 NMENick Levine And while there are glimmers of drama, there are also extended sections where this deliberately bewildering film gets a bit boring. Despite this, Sasquatch Sunset is worth seeking out if you have a taste for the absurd. Read
• 5.0 The WrapMatthew Creith Executive produced by Ari Aster, “Sasquatch Sunset” is sometimes hilarious, often unique, and otherwise forgettable. Read
• 5.0 The Wall Street JournalKyle Smith The gags seem fun and refreshing at first, but they get stale quickly. Moreover, since there is no plot and no dialogue, the quirky central idea never takes on any narrative momentum. What might have been a brilliant short subject—at, say, 15 minutes—gets stretched to its limits, and then some. Read
• 5.0 35 MilímetrosRoger Bach It is an outlandish, urine-scented exercise in imagination that wants to be comedy and drama at once, although its eagerness to ridicule its characters largely dilutes any rapport the viewer might eventually build with them. Read
• 4.6 Paste MagazineFelicia Reich As much as I delighted in the whimsy, chuckled at the art-house ambiguity and applauded two men’s depiction of how taxing it is to be a woman, I couldn’t get past her pain and suffering. Read
• 4.0 The TelegraphTim Robey Sasquatch Sunset barely gets started – though it does have remarkable prosthetics and some lovely sunsets. Read
• 4.0 VultureAlison Willmore The glee everyone involved obviously felt in getting this improbable flick made is never balanced out by a sense of why anyone would need to actually watch it. Read
• 4.0 TimeStephanie Zacharek But the real problem with Sasquatch Sunset is that it’s distancing, in an art-project way. The movie is just too coy, too overt in the way it signals when we’re supposed to be appalled and when we’re supposed to be moved; it advertises its weirdness even as it strives to convince us how much these Sasquatch are like you and me. Read
• 4.0 El antepenúltimo mohicanoLuis Enrique Forero Varela That is perhaps the most notable thing about a film that, for all its reach toward the universal in its visible themes, never gets beyond the anecdotal and ends up as an 88-minute gag. Read
• 4.0 El Séptimo ArteJuan Pairet Iglesias A film as entertaining... as it is boring. You follow it (if you follow it) with curiosity, but it never quite satisfies that curiosity. Read
• 3.8 Chicago Sun-TimesRichard Roeper “Sasquatch Sunset” is the kind of film that seems almost pre-ordained to reach some level of cult status. Godspeed to those who will embrace its epic-level gross-out factor. I guess I’m just more of a Bucky Badger guy. Read
• 3.0 CinemagaviaGuillermo Sánchez Ferrer Sasquatch Sunset is the typical film that tours festivals like Sitges and leaves no mark. Read
• 2.5 Associated PressMark Kennedy Even so, “Sasquatch Sunset” from filmmaking brothers David and Nathan Zellner, is a bewildering 90-minute, narrator-less and wordless experiment that’s as audacious as it is infuriating. It’s not clear if everyone was high making it or we should be while watching it. Read