Hell and Back Again 2011

Neil Genzlinger, New York Times: You can feel just how jarring and stressful it must be for a soldier to go from the life-and-death adrenaline rush of war to the maddeningly slow world of rehabilitation and forced inactivity. Read more

Keith Uhlich, Time Out: The visuals are consistently bleak, but the film's engagement with Harris and the often-harsh world around him is clear-eyed and empathetic. Read more

Alison Willmore, AV Club: Dennis, a photojournalist, has produced a verite work of almost distracting beauty-a haunting quality in a film that operates in the apolitical mode of choice for recent combat docs, but is nevertheless inarguably about the cost of war. Read more

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: Dennis's film attempts something few documentaries have: to inhabit the psyche of its subject. Read more

Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News: As vital as the best war chronicles to come out in recent years, this is one every American ought to see. Read more

V.A. Musetto, New York Post: Dennis refuses to push a political agenda down viewers' throats. But the message of his film -- a breathlessly paced look at the realities of war -- is clear: War and its aftermath are indeed hell. Read more

Tirdad Derakhshani, Philadelphia Inquirer: Lays bare the truth of war - its hellish quality - with such power, you're not likely to look at this, or any other conflict, the same way again. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: In its closing scenes, "Hell and Back Again" builds to an emotional and stylistic power that we didn't see coming. Read more

Walter V. Addiego, San Francisco Chronicle: The director has no intention of making a prefab antiwar statement. He simply wants to show us an experience, just as it happened, and let the chips fall where they may. Read more

Linda Barnard, Toronto Star: We're left to decide which wounds go the deepest, those from Afghanistan or those caused by the confusion and emotional barrages he continues to suffer in America. Read more

Michelle Orange, Village Voice: Working alone with a camera and his ingenuity, Dennis captured the surreality of firefights with an invisible enemy and the frustration of displaced civilians. Read more

Michael O'Sullivan, Washington Post: The film suggests that it doesn't really matter whether Harris ever gets back in uniform. He's forever carrying around a piece of unexploded ordnance in his head. Read more