Critic Reviews

• Wesley Morris, Boston Globe

  Working from Yuri Arabov and Jeremy Noble's script, Sokurov has a wonderful time not simply with Hirohito and history, but with his filmmaking, which can be oblique to the point of being stultifying. Here he plays with scale.

• Walter V. Addiego, San Francisco Chronicle

  Alexander Sokurov's The Sun demands and rewards patience.

• Manohla Dargis, New York Times

  First shown at the Berlin Film Festival four years ago, The Sun is finally receiving its welcome American theatrical release, which means that one of the best movies of 2005 is now also one of the best of 2009.

• J. Hoberman, Village Voice

  Though he successfully humanizes Hirohito, who is shown happily shedding his divinity, Sokurov doesn't entirely exonerate him.

• Keith Uhlich, Time Out New York

  Sokurov sees his titans of history as men playing gods, and Hirohito's climactic renunciation of his divinity is the deeply affecting end point.

• Leslie Felperin, Variety

  As usual, Sokurov's unhurried pacing will test the patience of more fidgety viewers, although the script is more accessible than some of his recent efforts.

• Sean Axmaker, Seanax.com

  ... not a conventional biographical portrait by any definition, but rather a reflection in the inner life of the Emperor, a man who was considered a god by his people and treated as such.

• Janos Gereben, San Francisco Examiner

  Alexander Sokurov's "The Sun," arriving in the U.S. five years after its release in Europe, is a stunning film, fascinating to some, probably sleep-inducing to others.

• Rob Thomas, Capital Times (Madison, WI)

  Those with the patience to stick with Sokurov's stately pacing will find an engrossing character study in "The Sun," that of a very odd, polite man who also happened to lead a nation at war during World War II.

• Janos Gereben, Entertainment Insiders

  It's been called maddeningly meditative and a vision of life shrouded in dust and cobwebs

• Kelly Vance, East Bay Express

  Sokurov takes a few steps back and observes Hirohito and MacArthur with something like amused equanimity.

• Peter Keough, Boston Phoenix

  Sokurov doesn't answer MacArthur's disingenuous question, but ... he suggests why no one else can either.

• Robin Clifford, Reeling Reviews

  ...a fine historical biography of man, little known to most of the world, but one who held the Pacific Rim and China in his hands (and almost won it) nearly 70 years ago.

• Laura Clifford, Reeling Reviews

  ...Aleksandr Sokurov films the first half of his movie as if underwater, a sinking ship as it were, with slightly tilted angles, the sound of groaning metal, and staircases spiraling down to an underground bunker.

• Nick Schager, Lessons of Darkness

  Finds beauty, madness and outright bizarreness in the sight of a lost, slightly freakish man attempting to understand his altering reality.

• Gabe Leibowitz, Film and Felt

  The early portions of The Sun are almost nightmarish in their cold shots of Hirohito trudging slowly through bleak hallways, coiffed to a sterile perfection.

• Sam Adams, AV Club

  The Sun took four years to reach American theaters, but the long delay hasn't diminished the force of Sokurov's experimentation.

• Avi Offer, NYC Movie Guru

  Boasts stylish cinematography and a well-nuanced, gentle performance by Issey Ogata, but it often drags and fails to be truly captivating and engrossing as a character study.

• Dennis Schwartz, Ozus' World Movie Reviews

  A grippingly disturbing film that presents a new perspective on the Emperor than the usual one ladled out in most American school history courses.

• Anton Bitel, Film4

  Finely observed, exquisitely shot and immaculately performed, The Sun portrays a tormented leader redeemed by his own adaptability.

Read all 21 critic reviews