In Secret 2013

Chris Nashawaty, Entertainment Weekly: [A] wicked, The Postman Always Rings Twice-style riff on the 19th-century bodice ripper Therese Raquin. Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: "In Secret" is likely to remain safe from prying eyes. Read more

Rex Reed, New York Observer: The generic title In Secret is as uninspired as the movie itself. Read more

Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal: Whatever possessed the people who made this film to believe its ponderous style would appeal to contemporary audiences? Read more

Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times: Though it's always a pleasure seeing Lange being theatrically anguished (you expect the skies to part with thunder), or Olsen's doleful beauty, "In Secret" never quite rings true. Read more

Ben Kenigsberg, AV Club: A surprisingly dull adultery drama that covers standard ground (loveless marriage; repression; transgression and guilt) without much flair or insight. Read more

Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic: The acting is good, the story of doomed lovers suitably tragic. But the film is never quite moving in the way one would hope. Read more

Jessica Herndon, Associated Press: Elizabeth Olsen, Oscar Isaacs, Tom Felton and Jessica Lange offer compelling performances in a provocative remake that's stirring until its withered end. Read more

Peter Keough, Boston Globe: Deviants pay a steep price in this tale of repression, desire, recrimination, vengeance, and remorse. Read more

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: It's most remarkable as a pairing of two inspired actresses with four decades separating them: 25-year-old Elizabeth Olsen, the bewitching star of Martha Marcy May Marlene, and 64-year-old Jessica Lange. Read more

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: Isaac's sly delineation of the charismatic Laurent provides the through-line. Olsen is pretty good, too ... Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: For those who want sweeping, "In Secret" offers all the essentials - unbridled passion, deceit, fate so unkind, a classically creepy mother and grand tragedy. Read more

Sheri Linden, Los Angeles Times: A film rich in atmosphere but emotionally as blunt as its title. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: Olsen and Isaac never really create the kind of amour fou that a story like this depends on, let alone the self-loathing guilt that their crime is supposed to engender. Read more

Mark Jenkins, NPR: Rather than revealing the brutish natures of Zola's characters, the movie's lovers seem simply to be following a yellowed script, more with duty than passion. Read more

Manohla Dargis, New York Times: Olsen widens her eyes and parts her lips prettily, but she's a wan, recessive presence and an increasingly problematic one as Therese and Laurent are engulfed by mud and blood. Read more

Michael Sragow, Orange County Register: Without Zola's churning narrative and analytical bite, the movie plays like an animatronic museum piece. Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: Despite its able cast and handsome period costumes, In Secret is, in fact, quite awful. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: An effective period piece thriller that incorporates love, lust, desperation, and madness into a stew thickened by a gothic atmosphere. Read more

Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: Olsen makes good use of her delicate looks by playing against them, and so some of the best moments of "In Secret" come when the mask of propriety drops and Therese, dead-eyed and fierce, reveals what lurks beneath. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: "In Secret" is a thumping good melodrama, a style of storytelling that's fallen into obscurity. Read more

Joe Williams, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: As cinema it is simply inept, with a talented cast rendered ugly and stiff as they speak in inexplicable British accents. Read more

Alonso Duralde, TheWrap: A dispassionate adaptation of Emile Zola's novel that shocked audiences in 1867 with its tale of lust and murder, but now that its let's-kill-my-husband plot has been redone in countless noir films, what was once fresh now plays very stale indeed. Read more

Joshua Rothkopf, Time Out: It's a moralistic story, one that doesn't quite suit the modern exuberance of Charlie Stratton's cast. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: The striking cinematography and rich production design, evoking the lower strata of 1860s Paris, are not enough to mitigate the fact that a suspenseful saga grows tedious and even occasionally ridiculous. Read more

Alan Scherstuhl, Village Voice: In Secret boasts vigor and thematic richness, that feeling of artists expressing something vital rather than just banging out that year's script from the drawer. Read more

Michael O'Sullivan, Washington Post: Though the more lurid aspects of Zola's story scandalized readers in his day, they will be well familiar to anyone who has studied Hollywood's pulpy black-and-white thrillers of the 1940s. Read more