50
Metascore
12 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 75Slant MagazineChuck BowenSlant MagazineChuck BowenWatching Lifeforce now is to be reminded that even big-budget films were once allowed to be adventurous and idiosyncratic, even in the 1980s, and that American horror movies were once capable of being fun, sexy, and subversively empathetic.
- 75Chicago TribuneGene SiskelChicago TribuneGene SiskelIn film circles there's a name for pictures like Lifeforce. Film Comment magazine has dubbed them guilty pleasures, movies you're embarrassed to admit you like. Maybe somebody spiked my popcorn, but I can't deny that I liked Lifeforce.
- 60Time OutTom HuddlestonTime OutTom HuddlestonLifeforce is a near-impossible film to review, at once indescribably awful and hugely, brilliantly entertaining.
- 50Chicago ReaderDave KehrChicago ReaderDave KehrDirector Tobe Hooper seriously overplays his hand, losing the shape of this 1985 film in a barrage of overblown special effects and screaming Dolby stereo.
- 40The New York TimesJanet MaslinThe New York TimesJanet MaslinLifeforce shows off Mr. Hooper's way with a whirling mass of protoplasm, just as Poltergeist did. But its style is shrill and fragmented enough to turn Lifeforce into hysterical vampire porn.
- 40Washington PostPaul AttanasioWashington PostPaul AttanasioThe screenplay, by Dan O'Bannon and Don Jakoby, is just one long passage of exposition: someone blows up or dries up or whatever, you wonder why that's happening, and then someone explains it. This they call suspense. [25 June 1985, p.C8]
- 25TV Guide MagazineTV Guide MagazineThe film is a mess from start to finish with several main characters who appear and disappear throughout. No character development, no thematic development, no narrative development. No life. No force. No dice.