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Half social allegory, half home-invasion thriller, The Purge attempts to make an intelligent point, but ultimately devolves into numbing violence and tired clichés.
All Critics (149) | Top Critics (36) | Fresh (58) | Rotten (91) | DVD (2)
Writer-director James DeMonaco's The Purge fritters away its promise in lurid, frenzied violence. Jun 13, 2013 | Rating: C | Full Review…
Writer-director James DeMonaco's The Purge fritters away its promise in lurid, frenzied violence.
Michael Sragow
DeMonaco clearly hopes to make a significant moral statement on the level of Shirley Jackson's literary masterpiece The Lottery. Alas, his aim at political conservatives who support the gun lobby falls flat before he can pull the trigger. Jun 12, 2013 | Rating: 1/4 | Full Review…
DeMonaco clearly hopes to make a significant moral statement on the level of Shirley Jackson's literary masterpiece The Lottery. Alas, his aim at political conservatives who support the gun lobby falls flat before he can pull the trigger.
Rex Reed
If The Purge is as far-sighted as Network proved to be, we are in for very ugly times. Jun 10, 2013 | Full Review…
If The Purge is as far-sighted as Network proved to be, we are in for very ugly times.
David Thomson
That old horror-movie standard, a homestead besieged by psychos, gets remixed with a bit of Occupy-era class-conflict satire in the disappointing future-set thriller The Purge. Jun 7, 2013 | Full Review…
That old horror-movie standard, a homestead besieged by psychos, gets remixed with a bit of Occupy-era class-conflict satire in the disappointing future-set thriller The Purge.
Leslie Felperin
Gimmicky chiller lacks the robustness and distinction needed to support its social-commentary ambitions. Jun 7, 2013 | Full Review…
Gimmicky chiller lacks the robustness and distinction needed to support its social-commentary ambitions.
Neil Young
The blunt instrument plot allows for a few sneaky moments of satire and social commentary lite. Jun 7, 2013 | Rating: 2/4 | Full Review…
The blunt instrument plot allows for a few sneaky moments of satire and social commentary lite.
Peter Hartlaub
It gets sillier and sillier as it goes, with the characters constantly doing dumb things. The film then tries to take a moral stand in the final act, but it feels false. Apr 9, 2019 | Rating: D+ | Full Review…
It gets sillier and sillier as it goes, with the characters constantly doing dumb things. The film then tries to take a moral stand in the final act, but it feels false.
Micheal Compton
While it is entertaining enough, it never feels like the quasi-Orwellian allegory it was clearly meant to be. Feb 20, 2019 | Rating: 3/5 | Full Review…
While it is entertaining enough, it never feels like the quasi-Orwellian allegory it was clearly meant to be.
Allen Adams
While The Purge can be compared to plenty of other movies about families under siege, DeMonaco is good at winding up suspense and keeping the action going. Jan 25, 2019 | Rating: B | Full Review…
While The Purge can be compared to plenty of other movies about families under siege, DeMonaco is good at winding up suspense and keeping the action going.
Abbie Bernstein
The Purge draws audiences in with one big idea, but doesn't deliver a narrative that effectively takes advantage of the theory. Oct 24, 2018 | Full Review…
The Purge draws audiences in with one big idea, but doesn't deliver a narrative that effectively takes advantage of the theory.
Sarah Gopaul
Were it not for one inconvenient fact, The Purge could easily have passed into movie history as a rather decent slasher-thriller. Unfortunately, The Hunger Games got there first and got there better. Oct 31, 2017 | Rating: 3/5 | Full Review…
Were it not for one inconvenient fact, The Purge could easily have passed into movie history as a rather decent slasher-thriller. Unfortunately, The Hunger Games got there first and got there better.
Matthew Bond
... though the film struggles to flesh out this rather Dystopian concept (something nearly every futuristic film has these days), it succeeds in its gripping suspense and romantic eye for violence. Sep 6, 2017 | Rating: C+ | Full Review…
... though the film struggles to flesh out this rather Dystopian concept (something nearly every futuristic film has these days), it succeeds in its gripping suspense and romantic eye for violence.
Candice Frederick
Couldn't agree more with the critic consensus.
Super Reviewer
What comes up as a thought-provoking allegory that doesn't shy away from the sociopolitical implications of its premise soon gets lost in a last half hour that falls flat with a ridiculous excess of dei ex machina and reduces the Purge to what seems like a laughable sect.
You will go into The Purge intrigued by its premise and you will leave very disappointed. In a futuristic America, the new government (called the Founding Fathers) has managed to eliminate murder and unemployment by making all crime legal for one night each year. The logic is that this night of "purging" allows us to let loose our animalistic nature as well as letting the poor, less contributing members of society kill each other off. The film does not expand on these concepts, leaving much to be desired. It'll be too easy for critics to expose all of its flaws as a plausible system. Instead, the plot devolves into a standard home invasion movie that is predictable and populated with really, really stupid characters. The Purge is an example of taking a cool set up and turning it into cliche, forgettable crap.
Cliches around every corner, "The Purge" tries very hard to be original, but in the end, it's clever twist on the genre that the trailers make it out to be, kind of falls flat, with hardly any suspense or genuine terror throughout the film. Ethan Hawk is a great actor, so the film is held together well performance-wise, but the script is so simple and uninspired that the plot of the film is completely shit on in the final act. There is hardly any development as to why this "Purge" happens every year and by the end, anything that has been set up in the first two acts is completely ruined. Once the third act kicks off, moments that are supposed to be intense have no suspense, and sad moments happen in an instant and then move on to something else, leaving you no time to cope. Once the killers get possession of the home, the entire film pretty much goes downhill. This movie has LAME written all over it. The idea is interesting but that is all I will remember this for, just a missed opportunity, and the final 10 minutes will have you laughing, unintentionally. "The Purge" is a bad film that had the potential of being great in the right hands.
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