96% The Kid with a Bike

All Critics (89) | Top Critics (25) | Fresh (84) | Rotten (4)

"The Kid With a Bike" vibrates with desperation, frustration and the simple unfairness of life, leavened with glimpses of hope.

Cyril is one of the most inspiringly resilient, self-aware young characters to arrive on-screen in recent memory...

"The Kid With A Bike'' is, remarkably, about hope - about the connections people forge when the ones they've been given desert them.

The Dardennes' quiet, naturalistic style strips this story of melodrama but not of emotion.

Without diminishing the boy's intensity or making him in any way ingratiating, the Dardennes take us into his mind, and we begin to appreciate not only his predicament but his resiliency.

The Dardennes' latest is one of their best, a memorable cinematic portrait of troubled youth and soul-saving charity.

Hunched over the handlebars, the boy's body seems to carve a hole in the wind. And we watch as this unhappy, rejected child makes some terrible choices, some of which make us want to look away.

One of the classic international works about juvenile delinquency.

If the film doesn't sizzle as heatedly as the Dardennes' more celebrated works, it's nevertheless infused with the compassion and care that they seem always to bring to bear on any subject.

Emotionally restrained yet compassionate, coming-of-age morality tale

The ending is somewhat contrived and forced, but not false, and there's a moving moment when Cyril and Samantha, riding beside a canal one sunny day, exchange bicycles.

[The Dardennes'] latest threads back to previous works in intriguing and satisfying ways...

To their credit, the Dardennes portray their subjects with a minimum of sentimentality.

It seems like a fairly minor movie, although one with major emotional pull.

Remains an effective picture with a genuine feel for human behavior, unearthing a direct sense of disturbance and a few select moments of stunning psychological clarity.

A film of rosy optimism it features a beguiling performance from screen newcomer doret who achieves a wonderfully natural, touching chemistry with de France.

Beyond Samantha's hard-to-fathom loyalty, many of the plot twists are predictable and contrived.

You wouldn't exactly call The Kid With a Bike a feel-good movie, but by the end it certainly invites the viewer to be hopeful about human nature. Another gem from the boys.

Dardenne heroes are crafty and restless, down but not out, and Cyril ought to be one of their best. For whatever reason, he isn't, quite.

Compassionate, humane but never sentimental.

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