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The Color Purple

1985

Steven Spielberg

Danny Glover, Whoopi Goldberg, Adolph Caesar, Akosua Busia ...

7.4

23,601

Drama An acclaimed drama, spanning a period of forty years, in which Celie, a black girl, is mistreated by two men until suddenly a blues singer enters her life and her real self begins to emerge. The story is based on Alice Walker's Pullitzer Prize-winning novel.

	Media	Author	Review
		Janet Maslin The New York Times	"Mr. Spielberg directs it as a kind of slapstick, which doesn't work."
		Roger Ebert rogerebert.com	"'The Color Purple' is the year's best film (...) Rating: ★★★★ (out of 4)"
		Variety	"There are some great scenes and great performances in 'The Color Purple', but it is not a great film."
		Tim Robey Telegraph	"The movie has emotional generosity to spare (...) Spielberg’s handling of Walker’s story is sober and impassioned without being cripplingly reverential."
		Dave Kehr Chicago Reader	"It's almost impossible to discern the narrative line (...) A lot of good actors (...) are lost to Spielberg's shallow melodrama"
		Andrew Collins Empire	"Spielberg's dalliance with race is not entirely successful, but it's still an emotionally brave film with some fine performances (...) Rating: ★★★ (out of 5)"
		Bilge Ebiri Rolling Stone	"A lavish, expansive, emotional epic (...) Spielberg's ability to turn the harsh, sometimes unforgiving tragedies into grand, moving triumphs of the human spirit is remarkable."
		Time Out	"This is a powerful and honourable attempt to wrest an unusual book into the populist Hollywood mainstream."
		Sheila Benson Los Angeles Times	"[It] has arrived as a film, its story still distinctive and deeply moving. For the film's existence alone we can be grateful (...) [Spielberg's] almost every decision has been disastrous"
		Noel Murray AV Club	"Spielberg's decision to understand her plight as one of 'yearning for escape' cheapens the character (...) Spielberg's crowd-pleasing sense of rhythm and eye-catching visual style (...) makes 'Purple' engaging"
		Chris Cabin Slant	"It’s nothing but well-meaning, hopeful, and legitimately sympathetic to the hardships of its characters, which is exactly what makes the end result so frustrating and disappointing (…) Rating: ★★★ (out of 5)"

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