Metacritic reviews

A long but powerful true-life drama of 1970s German terrorists features masterful storytelling and bravura performances.

A taut, unnerving, forcefully unromantic fictional film.

Fascinating history, very good movie -- but demanding, and its lack of easy answers will frustrate some. Lessons about 21st century terrorism are implicit, but not overly stressed.

Edel's clear-eyed and exhaustively researched account is unique in its refusal to either romanticize or villainize the terrorists. It's a study in the seductive appeal, and inevitable failure, of the attempt to bomb one's way to a better world.

I have seen The Baader Meinhof Complex three or four times now, and, despite exasperation with its fissile form, I find it impossible not to be plunged afresh into this engulfing age of European anxiety.

A fascinating hybrid of a film. Even though its purpose couldn't be more serious, its style could hardly be more pulp.

The movie is a sweeping, hectic docudrama that would have been immeasurably helped by the use of informational intertitles.

This is no art film, but Edel and Eichinger supply an action-packed, reasonably coherent account of youthful rock 'n' roll idealism run amok, and how it produced the craziest phenomenon of the crazy European far left.

An explosive performance by Johanna Wokalek gives some relief to an otherwise long and humdrum series of characters.

This isn’t revisionist history; it’s a key moment in political radicalism reduced to an empty pop-cultural posture.