Irina Palm Reviews
Uruguay Total
Un drama sensible y austero, no exento de cierto sentido del humor, que deja de lado cualquier aspecto sórdido del asunto para concentrarse en una historia de amor y sacrificio.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/5
Guardian [UK]
A gobsmackingly awful British film -- awful in the way that somehow only British films can be: our TV drama, of whatever quality, is never as creaky, naive, badly written and flatulent as this.
Full Review
| Original Score: 1/5
ViewLondon
Engaging, enjoyable and quietly thought-provoking British drama with a refreshingly offbeat script and a great central performance from Marianne Faithfull.
Full Review
| Original Score: 4/5
NewsBlaze
Garbarski combines social satire, hand jobs, feminism, and romantic grace to create a tenderhearted tale of found love and female empowerment. And he actually pulls it off, give the guy a hand. On second thought...
Top Critic
Jam! Movies
The performances will keep you watching, and make Irina Palm well worth seeing.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3.5/5
Empire Magazine
There's a heartwarming quality that softens the hardcore setting but this does lack an assured, er, hand.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/5
takes the notion of risqué empowerment a few preposterous steps further.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/4
KPBS.org
Irina Palm is a showcase for Faithfull but it never truly allows her to shine.
Full Review
| Original Score: 5/10
Oregonian
At first blush, it seems like another entry in the saucy-but-safe Brit genre, a la Calendar Girls, Saving Grace or The Full Monty, but it turns out to be both more ambitious and less successful than those diversions.
Full Review
| Original Score: C
Although director and co-writer Sam Garbarski takes great care in tracing this difficult dramatic path (he has to balance the twin tracks of other people's morality and Maggie's personal course), he can't avoid the predictability.
This would never have worked with anyone else but Faithfull, who gives a touching performance even as she flaunts her 40-year metamorphosis from porcelain pop diva to elderly bad girl.
Irina Palm is saddled with an odd title, an outlandish plot and an unlikely star--notorious rock maven Marianne Faithfull cast as a suburban frump. But it turns out a success
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/4
Let's Not Listen
An alleged story of determination and empowerment, about the lengths -- and girths -- a formerly timid dowager will go to in order to save someone's life.
Even if there aren't many other reasons to give this contrived and too often silly film a chance, Faithfull makes a captivating leading lady.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/4
Gabarski's low-budget realism is nicely matched to a deceptively stolid performance by Faithfull, who combines infinitely subtle expressions with the smoky, still-sexy voice that made her famous as a '60s pop songbird.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/4
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
The camera is discrete, the characters humane and the mood introspective in director Sam Garbarski's character study of a lonely woman who finds dignity where others might see only degradation.
Full Review
| Original Score: B
Although Faithfull only sporadically makes movies anymore, it's hard to imagine anyone who could have done this role better.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/4
ColeSmithey.com
Far from the exploitation movie that you'd expect from its subject matter, "Irina Palm" is a significant piece of cinematic satire that comes straight from the heart.
Full Review
| Original Score: B
Genially preposterous and pleasantly diverting, it balances calculation against humanity and generally comes out on top.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3.5/5
