Successful author Veronica Henley finds herself trapped in a horrifying reality and must uncover the mind-bending mystery before it's too late.... (Full plot summary below)
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Successful author Veronica Henley finds herself trapped in a horrifying reality and must uncover the mind-bending mystery before it's too late.
Leave your thoughts about Antebellum.
| VarietyPeter DebrugeWhile Antebellum is no zombie movie, it treats systemic racism as a kind of contagion that refuses to die, eating the brains of successive generations. There’s only one way to stop it, and that’s by blowing the minds of all those infected — which is precisely the impact Antebellum achieves. |
| Slant MagazineHenry StewartThis is a film that employs imaginative twists to illuminate the racism that’s entrenched in American history and society. |
| ReelViewsJames BerardinelliThe movie never loses sight of its twin objectives: maintain suspense and emphasize a message about the enduring, pernicious power of racism. |
| LarsenOnFilmJosh LarsenAntebellum—if you stick with it—reveals itself to be a sharp consideration of the lasting legacy of American slavery, right down to the present day. |
| New York PostJohnny OleksinskiA purely entertaining, scary flick will infuriate the culturati who like their movies like they like their Atlantic articles: long and academic. However, despite some issues, this Janelle Monáe film is a breathless watch. |
| USA TodayBrian TruittWhat makes the new psychological thriller Antebellum effective, however, is not just studying the past of America’s original sin but deftly showing how it still paints our present day. |
| Entertainment WeeklyLeah GreenblattThe star works valiantly to channel Eden/Veronica's pain and confusion, and the whole humanity of a life her captors so casually dismiss. As a performer, she commits utterly; if only the story could do the same. |
| TimeStephanie ZacharekBush and Renz keep careful control over the tone: this is a tense, thoughtful picture that seeks both to entertain and provoke, rather than to simply punish its audience. It’s also very clearly a work of cathartic fantasy-horror with an underpinning in history, not a historical document, and it leans hard into its pulp sensibilities. |
| The Irish TimesTara BradyThe big narrative rug-pull isn’t quite as smooth as it ought to be, but there’s plenty to admire here, including Monáe’s expressive eyes, Pedro Luque Briozzo’s unsettling camerawork, and a thrillingly vicious turn by Jena Malone. |
| IndieWireDavid EhrlichAntebellum might have been a movie that met this awful moment, but its confused attempt at seeing yesterday in today resolves as a throwback to a time when anyone could actually overlook it in good faith. |
