Its three leads certainly deserve consideration for their artfulness in being able to infuse it with intimations of quality.
- Sandra Hall, Sydney Morning Herald, October 26, 2011
Dotted with emotional honesty and strong storytelling that you only find in truly special movies.
- Erin Free, FILMINK (Australia), October 26, 2011
Grainy, hand-held cinematography can't lend authenticity to the forced emotion.
- Jim Schembri, The Age (Australia), October 25, 2011
As fight films go, Warrior is as gutsy as they get, with not just a big cash prize at stake but a whole family
- Andrew L. Urban, Urban Cinefile, October 22, 2011
A towering, punchy film in which redemption is the key theme ...a career-making role for Edgerton
- Louise Keller, Urban Cinefile, October 22, 2011
Has to conform to the lunkhead straitjacket of the tournament format: one dufus pounding another in extreme close-up for what seems like an eternity.
- Andrew Pulver, Guardian [UK], September 22, 2011
Hardy's physicality here is something to behold: you wonder how many personal trainers he worked his way through to get those neck muscles.
- Tim Robey, Daily Telegraph, September 22, 2011
This doesn't pack a punch like 'The Fighter' - but it's still a must for grapple fans.
- Anna Smith, Time Out, September 21, 2011
The movie is so skillfully made, and the performances are so convincingly real (Hardy is sensational), that, as it reaches its cathartic, winning finish, it achieves a surprising compassion and honesty.
- Bruce Diones, New Yorker, September 19, 2011
Warrior ends up feeling a lot bigger than you expect it to.
- Bob Mondello, NPR, September 16, 2011
It's too corny to live. But the picture is a slam dunk. I mean a ground-and-pound double-leg takedown. It's really gripping.
- David Edelstein, New York Magazine, September 11, 2011
Warrior's three principle characterizations are compelling - Nolte in particular gives a tempered performance as the shambling, sad-eyed wreck of a dad - but not enough to mask the film's lesser elements.
- Mary F. Pols, TIME Magazine, September 10, 2011
O'Connor films the fight scenes, and the fight training scenes leading up to them, with the requisite oomph.
- Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor, September 09, 2011
The film's great achievement is not in the way it manages to drop us suitably wimpy audience members right into a good ol' fashioned no-holds-barred fight, but that it can be ... touching, heartbreaking and emotionally satisfying at the same time.
- Simon Miraudo, Quickflix, October 24, 2011
The beats are familiar, the stakes are high, the fights are brutal, and the rewards are just.
- William Goss, Film.com, September 09, 2011
For all the contemporary references, it's essentially a spin on the story of Cain and Abel, which may be the reason it feels timeless.
- Andrea Gronvall, Chicago Reader, September 09, 2011
It's also a fight movie that knows all the fight movie cliches and doesn't shy away from embracing them wholeheartedly. But it hits its marks and hits them well, and feels fresh even as it traffics so deeply in the familiar.
- Adam Graham, Detroit News, September 09, 2011
Warrior is a weirdly affecting hybrid, a 100-proof melodrama that's two-thirds Sylvester Stallone and one-third Eugene O'Neill. Think Rocky's Long Day's Journey into Night.
- Stephen Cole, Globe and Mail, September 09, 2011
Director Gavin O'Connor comes out swinging in this flawed but fiercely moving family drama...Strong stuff.
- Peter Travers, Rolling Stone, September 09, 2011
Sickly sentimental, but the barnstorming fight scenes will leave you counting stars.
- Adam Woodward, Little White Lies, September 22, 2011
