55
Metascore
16 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 80If your sole image of Playboy founder Hugh Hefner is that of a lanky, silk-jammied sybarite strolling the grounds of his mansion with a jiggling blond on either arm, Hugh Hefner: Playboy, Activist and Rebel will knock your socks off.
- 70The Hollywood ReporterMichael RechtshaffenThe Hollywood ReporterMichael RechtshaffenThe film is at its most potent delineating Hefner's role in the American civil rights movement, going beyond the pages of his magazine.
- 70The New York TimesStephen HoldenThe New York TimesStephen HoldenAs for the man who invented it all, he remains a mystery in the film, living out his days in sybaritic bliss.
- 70Los Angeles TimesGary GoldsteinLos Angeles TimesGary GoldsteinUnfortunately, Berman skips past the darker implications of Hefner's sexual universe and omits discussion of how the periodical business -- and access to erotic imagery -- has changed in the Internet age. Still, the movie remains an involving look at an American icon as well as an adept snapshot of our national zeitgeist from the McCarthy era through the Reagan years.
- 50VarietyRob NelsonVarietyRob NelsonThis fawning docu goes to lengths to portray the octogenarian Playboy magazine founder as among the greatest figures of 20th-century American popular culture, while only cursorily acknowledging his status as a pioneering softcore pornographer.
- 50Village VoiceNick PinkertonVillage VoiceNick PinkertonPlayboy "gave us some of the best literature of our time," opines noted literary critic Tony Bennett, among a cast of mostly ridiculous and redundant talking heads.
- 50MovielineMichelle OrangeMovielineMichelle OrangeAt 84 he describes himself as being kept alive by young women's laughter and infernal baby-talk, marking off perhaps his final, groaning aspirational standard. Almost makes me feel sorry for those men still trying to keep up.
- 50SalonAndrew O'HehirSalonAndrew O'HehirA very mixed bag. Despite some faint gestures in the direction of journalistic balance, it plays a lot like a two-hour infomercial for the Playboy publisher's historical importance, philosophical depth and personal greatness.
- 40Time OutJoshua RothkopfTime OutJoshua RothkopfA proper profile of Hefner would start and end with sex, and not merely glance on casualties like Dorothy Stratten (and even the loveless Hef himself). The movie can't seem to get it up.
- 40New York Daily NewsElizabeth WeitzmanNew York Daily NewsElizabeth WeitzmanIf any life story should make for a compelling biography, it's certainly Hugh Hefner's. Unfortunately, this love letter is so lacking in any edge, the end result is not just unsexy but unforgivably staid.