Wordplay: Critic Reviews

MovieWeb: 0 reviews

95%

RottenTomatoes: 124 reviews

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Lisa Schwarzbaum Entertainment Weekly (Top Critic)

67

[An] amiable brainiacs-are-cool documentary.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Phillip Lopate New York Times (Top Critic)

60

Whatever the documentary's flaws, the filmmakers should be saluted for giving us a rare glimpse of life in these trenches.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Claudia Puig USA Today (Top Critic)

88

Wordplay captures the exhilaration that comes from navigating the ins and outs of complex puzzles. It also celebrates the English language in a way that is stimulating and immensely entertaining.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Ann Hornaday Washington Post (Top Critic)

Warm, lively and organized around an ingenious structural conceit.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Ty Burr Boston Globe (Top Critic)

63

The most minor entry in the brainiac-doc genre to date, it's nevertheless a perfectly entertaining hour and a half for crossword adepts.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Michael Atkinson Village Voice (Top Critic)

Wordplay has no subject, finally, besides the puzzle you could be solving instead.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Jack Mathews New York Daily News (Top Critic)

75

Affectionate, smartly done promo for puzzling.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Joe Morgenstern Wall Street Journal (Top Critic)

What's an eight-letter word for a non-fiction feature that is witty, wise and wonderful?
Full Review » 6 years ago
Chris Vognar Dallas Morning News (Top Critic)

75

Writer and director Patrick Creadon makes us care about this passionate cast and finds visually inventive ways to illustrate the players' thought processes.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Michael Booth Denver Post (Top Critic)

100

A film so crammed with characters and quirks that you'll smile all the way home.
Full Review » 6 years ago
David Edelstein New York Magazine (Top Critic)

Niceness... takes the edge off Patrick Creadon's otherwise revitalizing documentary.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Roger Ebert Chicago Sun-Times (Top Critic)

75

The film is made with a lot of style and visual ingenuity.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Michael Phillips Chicago Tribune (Top Critic)

75

It's a simple tribute to a smart man [Shortz], an elite, who knew what he wanted.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Carrie Rickey Philadelphia Inquirer (Top Critic)

63

A composite portrait of the estimated 50 million Americans weekly -- including Bill Clinton, Bob Dole and Jon Stewart - who clear the cobwebs from their mental machinery by completing a crossword.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Colin Covert Minneapolis Star Tribune (Top Critic)

63

Though it doesn't delve deep into the personalities of the amiably nerdy players, the nimbly edited film manages to eke some tension out of a three-way championship match.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Tom Long Detroit News (Top Critic)

67

There's a surface satisfaction to Wordplay that's absolutely undeniable. But there are also just enough smarts here to make you wish for something more.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Kerry Lengel Arizona Republic (Top Critic)

60

Thankfully, just when you're ready to nod off, Stewart comes back. Watching him attack the Times with his pen and screaming 'Bring it!' is worth the price of admission.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Andrew Sarris New York Observer (Top Critic)

[Wordplay] cheerfully and winningly celebrates the passionate practitioners of crossword puzzles.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Justin Chang Variety (Top Critic)

Punsters, linguists and crossword puzzle fanatics everywhere couldn't ask for a more bracing tribute than helmer Patrick Creadon's buoyant and exhilaratingly brainy docudocu Wordplay.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Lou Lumenick New York Post (Top Critic)

75

It has a charming protagonist in Will Shortz, the crossword editor of the New York Times.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Roger Moore Orlando Sentinel (Top Critic)

80

A playful, informative and very sweet documentary about the world of words 'across' or 'down.'
Full Review » 6 years ago
Peter Howell Toronto Star (Top Critic)

88

It's entertaining, brainy and eye opening.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Rick Groen Globe and Mail (Top Critic)

75

Oh, Beckham can bend it and Shaq can dunk, but, in the annals of spectator sports, nothing can compare with the sight of rugged down-and-acrossers strutting their stuff on the vast playing field of words.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Stephanie Zacharek Salon.com (Top Critic)

Even though these puzzles are mapped out with utmost precision -- and even though logic is an extremely useful tool for solving them -- they're still, somehow, objects of intrigue and mystery.
Full Review » 6 years ago
Duane Byrge Hollywood Reporter (Top Critic)

A delightful diversion.
Full Review » 6 years ago