Metacritic reviews

Every frame is dense with life, with children and animals running in and out, yet it's not messy. Instead it's highly focused--and something of a small masterpiece.

For better or worse, the filmmaker says nothing directly political about the cruel fate suffered by her people, but the dark poetry of her allusions is powerful.

Martel's sharp observations of the foibles of human nature are expressed perfectly in the telling images of cinematographer Hugo Colace and tight editing of Santiago Ricci.

Argentinean filmmaker Lucrecia Martel takes fundamental risks with form and style, and it pays off brilliantly.

Martel can barely contain her disgust, and like Bunuel before her, she knows just when to cut the laughs and go straight for the throat.

There's a new sensibility at work here, wry yet lushly disaffected, and it will be worth watching what Martel does next.

The triumph of La Cienaga lies in Martel's way of fashioning the kind of ensemble performance that draws us in by convincing us we're watching behavior, not acting.

It's better to know going in that you're not expected to be able to fit everything together, that you may lose track of some members of the large cast, that it's like attending a family reunion when it's not your family and your hosts are too drunk to introduce you around.

Doesn't necessarily make for a crowdpleasing experience, though it is a provocative and uncomfortably authentic one.

The title means "The Swamp," and you may feel you're in one after 103 minutes with such a generally unlikable gang.