We Need to Talk About Kevin (2012)
We Need to Talk About Kevin (2012)
TOMATOMETER
AUDIENCE SCORE
Critic Consensus: We Need to Talk About Kevin is a masterful blend of drama and horror, with fantastic performances across the board (Tilda Swinton especially, delivering one of her very best).
We Need to Talk About Kevin Photos
Movie Info
Watch it now
Cast
as Eva
as Franklin
as Kevin (Teenager)
as Celia
as Lucy
as Kevin (6-8 Years)
as Wanda
as Kevin (Toddler)
as Mary Woolford
as Colin
News & Interviews for We Need to Talk About Kevin
Critic Reviews for We Need to Talk About Kevin
All Critics (192) | Top Critics (45) | Fresh (147) | Rotten (45) | DVD (3)
It becomes a film about her [Swinton] scattered mind. That produces wonders from Swinton, but it ignores the plea in the title. What about Kevin? Kevin deserves so much more attention-indeed, he deserves being played by Tilda Swinton.
Fragmented, dreamlike, a whir of memories and misery, We Need to Talk About Kevin is unsettling, but also somehow unnecessary.
"We Need to Talk About Kevin" is confrontational cinema that will leave you speechless.
Director Ramsay makes Kevin's impact all the more felt by coming at it from all angles.
It's a hallmark of "Kevin's" emotional bravery and intellectual honesty that the questions haunt us long after the end credits roll.
Some movies punish you, but you take it because you're getting something out of the bargain: an insight, a performance, art, adrenaline. Then there are the movies that punish you for the heck of it.
Audience Reviews for We Need to Talk About Kevin
A disturbing, terrifying and emotionally devastating drama that examines how evil can grow inside people from the way they are raised - and Tilda Swinton is wonderful in an Oscar-deserving performance as a mother who doesn't have any idea how to raise her son.
Super Reviewer
A mother whose life is ruined by her son's violent act struggles to make sense of his actions and move on. A slow and meandering film, Lynne Ramsay's contemplative drama asks many questions about parenthood, violence, and sociopathy but offers very few answers; for such high topics, one can't blame it for that. For example, we don't get easy answers like gratuitous child abuse or violent video games to saddle Kevin's behavior on. The flashback moments of Kevin's early childhood are all unsettling, and while the multiple storylines don't always mesh to a consistent narrative, Ramsay succeeds in creating an oppressive and tense mood. Overall, if you're tied to the traditional three-act narrative, this film isn't for you, but it is a strong character-based mediation.
Super Reviewer
Basically the Anti-Boyhood, this film hints at a horrible crime carried out by a teenage son and then tells us in flashbacks about his upbringing and the mother's coping with the tragedy. That's quite a demanding task for Swinton who aces her role in every aspect. She's the center of attention. While we get glimpses of Kevin's childhood and how things already went badly there, we're never told why or what exactly went wrong. In the end, his final act of violence is so unadulterated evil and shocking, that it feels like you have been watching a horror film all along. Of course the director was out for that, while refusing to give a comfortable explanation. But it also takes away some of the realism and leaves you so disturbed you're wondering what you've been watching for two hours. A film that is hard to love but should be viewed at least once. I bet some of the images will stay for a very long time.
Super Reviewer
We Need to Talk About Kevin Quotes
| Eva: | Why? |
| Kevin: | I used to think I knew. Now I'm not so sure. |
| Kevin: | Have I ever been? |
| Eva: | Two years. Plenty of time to think about it. I want you to tell me ... why? |
| Eva: | Two years. Plenty of time to think about it. I want you to tell me... why? |
| Kevin: | I used to think I knew. Now I'm not so sure. |
| Kevin: | It's like this: you wake and watch TV, get in your car and listen to the radio you go to your little jobs or little school, but you don't hear about that on the 6 o'clock news, why? 'Cause nothing is really happening, and you go home and watch some more TV and maybe it's a fun night and you go out and watch a movie. I mean it's got so bad that half the people on TV, inside the TV, they're watching TV. What are these people watching, people like me? |
Discussion Forum
Discuss We Need to Talk About Kevin on our Movie forum!