Name : Stephanie Zacharek / Alias : Village Voice
Works both as a celebration of Bernstein, whose spirit is at once gentle and boldly generous, and as a way of exploring creativity and the meaning it can have in our lives.

Name : Joe Williams / Alias : St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Hawke's cinematic etude may not unlock all the mysteries of music, but "Seymour: An Introduction" is universal enough to be understood by a bananafish.

Name : Justin Chang / Alias : Variety
In his calm defense of beauty, craftsmanship, intellectual curiosity and emotional connection as vital human needs, this is one artist who knows he doesn't have to raise his voice to speak volumes.

Name : Joe McGovern / Alias : Entertainment Weekly
Hawke's gaze is too adoring, but the solitary sight of Bernstein putting together his foldout couch/bed in his one-room apartment is as poignant as his recital of the "Moonlight" Sonata.

Name : Ann Hornaday / Alias : Washington Post
"Seymour: An Introduction" gives viewers a soaring, sublime and enduringly meaningful glimpse of a man who is undoubtedly the real thing.

Name : Stephen Farber / Alias : Hollywood Reporter
Hawke's film is very well crafted, tightly edited and elegantly photographed. The acute musical selections only add to our appreciation of Seymour's selfless devotion to his art.

Name : Linda Barnard / Alias : Toronto Star
A fondly made portrait . of a gentle philosopher with a wicked wit, a superbly talented pianist who intellectually challenges and charms in equal parts.

Name : Anthony Lane / Alias : New Yorker
The sweetness of the subject's nature and the gentle modulations of his speaking voice are so potent that it would seem not just uncivil but futile to contradict him; yet Hawke is too alert and too inquiring to let the movie subside into worship.

Name : Peter Rainer / Alias : Christian Science Monitor
The unfortunate disconnect between great artistry and great commercial success runs throughout history. But Bernstein is a special case because, unlike so many great musicians who fell unwillingly by the wayside, he chose his own path.

Name : Bill Goodykoontz / Alias : Arizona Republic
His playing is beautiful - he was a gifted concert pianist who gave up the stage at 50 to concentrate on teaching and composing. His stories are tremendous. And his voice, clear and strong, is magnetic.

Name : Joe Neumaier / Alias : New York Daily News
Some very special aspects of New York City hide in plain sight. A case in point is Seymour Bernstein, the subject of actor Ethan Hawke's assured, meditative debut as a documentary director.

Name : Tom Long / Alias : Detroit News
The great joy of the film, whether you know piano or not, is watching Bernstein teach.

Name : Colin Covert / Alias : Minneapolis Star Tribune
Like a touching master class on living correctly, listening to the charming Bernstein will have you changing keys.

Name : Mike D'Angelo / Alias : AV Club
The film claims to be an introduction, but it's really a long series of conclusions.

Name : Manohla Dargis / Alias : New York Times
So effective does it close the distance between you and Mr. Bernstein that afterward you may find yourself scanning the streets, hoping to catch sight of him, as if for an old friend.

Name : Peter Travers / Alias : Rolling Stone
Ethan Hawke's remarkable documentary puts us in close proximity to 80-something classical pianist Seymour Bernstein, whose funny, touching and vital presence is something you don't want to miss.

Name : Bruce Ingram / Alias : Chicago Sun-Times
Coming off of his superb one-two performances for Richard Linklater in Before Midnight and Boyhood, Hawke continues to work at a creative high level. He demonstrates a rapport and openness with his subject that proves exceptionally affecting.

Name : Leba Hertz / Alias : San Francisco Chronicle
Bernstein in action is a study of what a teacher should be: kind but with a steely resolve. He analyzes the music and figures how to overcome its obstacles.

Name : Peter Keough / Alias : Boston Globe
Whether or not Hawke got any answers to his questions about the purpose of being artist, seeking them under the guidance of a teacher like Bernstein resulted in this work of art.

Name : David Ehrlich / Alias : Time Out
Hawke's first documentary is a perfect movie for a gray Sunday afternoon, a gentle and loving tribute to a man . anachronistically convinced that talent is its own reward.

Name : Joe Morgenstern / Alias : Wall Street Journal
More than a musical offering, it's a study in boundless passion, plus a wellspring of wisdom about art and life from a man who sees no dividing line between the one and the other.

Name : J. R. Jones / Alias : Chicago Reader
The movie's real subject is the difficulty - and the critical importance - of bringing into harmony one's personal and artistic lives, of being not only a good artist but a joyful one.

Name : John Anderson / Alias : Newsday
Unusual, intelligent documentary whose subject is a pleasure to spend time with.

Name : Brad Wheeler / Alias : Globe and Mail
It's hard to find much wrong with this film, itself a meditation on art and the practice of craft.

Name : Inkoo Kang / Alias : TheWrap
"Seymour: An Introduction" is a compendium of tutorial anecdotes and poetic aphorisms he's collected over the years. Hawke's approach is apostolic, as if he's recording for posterity the sublime wisdom of a philosophical master.

Name : Steven Rea / Alias : Philadelphia Inquirer
Seymour: An Introduction is just that - not too much biography, or history. And one needn't be a music aficionado, or a musician, to appreciate the modest erudition coming from this man.

Name : Variety Staff / Alias : Variety
Birth of a Nation is a great epoch in picture making; it's great for pictures and it's great for the name and fame of David Wark Griffith. When a man like Griffith in a new field can do what he has done, he may as well be hailed while he is living.

Name : Dave Kehr / Alias : Chicago Reader
Griffith's later films are unquestionably superior. But here, in a very real sense, is where the movies began, both as an art and as a business.

Name : Justin Chang / Alias : Variety
Debuting writer-director Nate Parker stars in this searingly impressive account of the Nat Turner slave rebellion.

Name : Todd McCarthy / Alias : Hollywood Reporter
The film offers up more than enough in terms of intelligence, insight, historical research and religious nuance as to not at all be considered a missed opportunity .

Name : Richard Brody / Alias : New Yorker
Problematically, Birth of a Nation wasn't just a seminal commercial spectacle but also a decisively original work of art - in effect, the founding work of cinematic realism, albeit a work that was developed to pass lies off as reality.

Name : Alison Willmore / Alias : BuzzFeed News
Turner deserves this treatment; he deserves a film that doesn't soften the era or apologize in any way for his anger; and he deserves a salute for making it happen.

Name : Bilge Ebiri / Alias : New York Magazine/Vulture
More than a movie about a slave rebellion, it's about the difficulty of reconciling the great moral chasms between thought, vision, and deed.

Name : Stephanie Merry / Alias : Washington Post
"The Age of Adaline" works best as a simple story of boy meets girl; girl falls in love; girl mulls whether or not to reveal that she'll stay young forever. Everything else is just a lot of unnecessary noise.

Name : Jon Frosch / Alias : Hollywood Reporter
Lively is an odd screen presence - somehow both warm and cold, accessible and recessive. She's long been ripe for a breakthrough lead role that allows her to stretch and surprise.

Name : Leah Greenblatt / Alias : Entertainment Weekly
Adaline is consistently gorgeous to look at-and a good reminder that love, even when it's complicated or painful or doesn't last, is a whole lot better than immortality.

Name : Inkoo Kang / Alias : TheWrap
Lively's never been better, but "Adaline" is more interested in what she's wearing than what her character's thinking.

Name : Bill Goodykoontz / Alias : Arizona Republic
The makings of an interesting movie are here, but the script, written by J. Mills Goodloe and Salvador Paskowitz, collapses on itself in the third act.

Name : Joe Williams / Alias : St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Starved of sufficient comedy or drama, "The Age of Adaline" is a pipsqueak.

Name : Kyle Smith / Alias : New York Post
The film is as tender and endearing as a lamb, a lamb at rest in a fragrant atmosphere. It's a film that has a determined, unironic respect for things past.

Name : Katharine Pushkar / Alias : New York Daily News
Plausibility, shmausibility. This is pretty schmaltz done right.

Name : Linda Barnard / Alias : Toronto Star
Lovers of the genre will find plenty to love about the stylish Age of Adaline and may find themselves rooting through pockets for a tissue at points, a romance movie equivalent of a standing ovation.

Name : Jesse Hassenger / Alias : AV Club
For a movie that emulates literature, The Age Of Adaline never fits comfortably into a particular form-literary or cinematic.

Name : Justin Chang / Alias : Variety
Blake Lively's subtle, expressive performance sets the tone for this thoroughly ludicrous, thoroughly enjoyable romantic drama.

Name : Rene Rodriguez / Alias : Miami Herald
The Age of Adaline is a modern romantic fairy tale set in San Francisco, marred by bad narration and an unnecessary desire to overexplain random magic.

Name : Claudia Puig / Alias : USA Today
Lively's performance is appropriately mysterious but too shallow to allow audiences to empathize with her character. The fault lies more in the screenplay, which doesn't give her character much depth.

Name : Moira MacDonald / Alias : Seattle Times
Ultimately, you believe Lively as an old soul in a young body, carrying a heavy secret; you hope, somehow, that love will bring her a happy ending.

Name : John Anderson / Alias : Wall Street Journal
Okay, it's hooey. "Adaline" is not a documentary. What it is, though, is seductive.

Name : Stephen Whitty / Alias : Newark Star-Ledger
Burstyn is as beautiful and emotionally present as always and Ford - after so many years of grumpily picking up paychecks - seems delighted to be acting again, and in a real movie.

Name : Andrew Lapin / Alias : NPR
Again and again, director Lee Toland Krieger (Celeste & Jesse Forever) allows shades of a more nuanced movie to pop up along the margins, only to steer instead toward innocent niceties.

Name : Mick LaSalle / Alias : San Francisco Chronicle
Someone should steal this concept and make a decent movie out of it.

Name : Tom Russo / Alias : Boston Globe
Leave it to Harrison Ford to pull off a rescue that one of his signature heroes might envy. In a deftly crafted supporting role, Ford does as much as Lively herself to shape Adaline's strange predicament into something genuinely resonant.

Name : Adam Graham / Alias : Detroit News
For a movie about a 106-year-old - albeit one trapped in the body of a 29-year-old - "The Age of Adaline" doesn't have a lot of wisdom.

Name : Tirdad Derakhshani / Alias : Philadelphia Inquirer
It fails to pursue any of the fascinating questions its premise raises. Instead, it dives headfirst into Nicholas Sparks territory and explores, though not without some charm, Adaline's romantic life.

Name : Nathalie Atkinson / Alias : Globe and Mail
Lively glides across the screen from scene to scene - like the ballroom of a grand old hotel with a suitor in hot pursuit - with all the emotional weight of a model in a perfume commercial.

Name : Betsy Sharkey / Alias : Los Angeles Times
A sweeping romance beautifully wrapped in classy couture and slightly suspect in the way it uses metaphysics to manipulate matters of the heart.

Name : Manohla Dargis / Alias : New York Times
Far too often here, Adaline's parade of period dresses, coats and handbags stand in for the richness of human experience.

Name : Bilge Ebiri / Alias : New York Magazine/Vulture
The Age of Adaline has a fundamental weakness: The tepid romance is supposed to structure everything else, so the film feels disjointed - a series of good, sometimes even great scenes in search of an organizing principle.

Name : Rafer Guzman / Alias : Newsday
A preposterous premise treated with great solemnity. Lively shines, though, as does Ford.