78
Metascore
16 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 90The Hollywood ReporterLovia GyarkyeThe Hollywood ReporterLovia GyarkyeOne could walk away with deep thoughts about modernity and the relationship between nature and man, but that’s not required. Appreciating the beauty of an intricate process unfolding is more than enough.
- 90The New York TimesA.O. ScottThe New York TimesA.O. ScottFrammartino connects the physical with the metaphysical. The world as he renders it is an anthology of concrete objects and unrepeatable moments that are somehow infused with abstract, even spiritual meanings.
- 80The GuardianXan BrooksThe GuardianXan BrooksIt’s not quite a documentary, yet nor is it exactly a narrative feature. It lives alone; the cinematic equivalent of a hermit on a mountaintop.
- 75The PlaylistCharles BramescoThe PlaylistCharles BramescoFrammartino handles the collision between a vanishing then and the encroaching now with a light touch, mournful yet not quite damning.
- 70Screen DailyLee MarshallScreen DailyLee MarshallIl Buco proves that cinema still has the capacity to astonish in a very innocent, childlike way as a medium in which light illuminates a black screen and creates beauty.
- 63Slant MagazineKeith WatsonSlant MagazineKeith WatsonThe film meticulously evokes a 1961 speleological expedition, but its search for thematic resonance is frustratingly general.
- 60VarietyJessica KiangVarietyJessica KiangA docufiction that tenderly, wordlessly and rather too obliquely recreates a 1961 speleological expedition to measure the depth of an unexplored crevasse in Italy’s Calabria region.
- 60Time OutTrevor JohnstonTime OutTrevor JohnstonIl Buco is certainly thoughtful and worthwhile, but perhaps just short of the revelation we were hoping for.
- 60The New YorkerRichard BrodyThe New YorkerRichard BrodyIn excluding conversation, commentary, analysis, context, and personality, Frammartino is a cinematic Icarus: he strains high for sublimity and finds a deck of picture postcards.