L'avocat de la terreur 2007

Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times: Schroeder's film, which combines interviews with many of the key figures in Verges' career with grainy historical footage, lets its subject speak for itself but leaves little doubt of where the filmmaker stands. Read more

David Edelstein, New York Magazine/Vulture: A brilliant study in the link between moral corruption and narcissism. Read more

Noel Murray, AV Club: If nothing else, Terror's Advocate offers a useful summary of the last half-century of global politics, and how changing public perceptions can make goats out of heroes. Read more

Mark Feeney, Boston Globe: For just a moment, ignore politics. Consider Jacques Verges simply as star. The radical French lawyer is an absolutely compelling figure onscreen: exotic, resolute, beguilingly smug. Read more

Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times: Jacques Verges is such a compelling, complex and contradictory character that if he didn't exist someone would be obliged to invent him. It is the gift of Terror's Advocate to simply present Verges as is. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: The title Terror's Advocate is both a statement of fact and a worrisome understatement in a documentary as slippery as its subject. Read more

John Anderson, Newsday: Jacques Verges had defended a lot of people, and it's his Zelig-like journey through the politics of the postwar 20th century that is the contentious subject of Barbet Schroeder's unwieldy, unforgettable film. Read more

Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: Talk about a hard sell. Read more

Tamara Straus, San Francisco Chronicle: Jacques Verges makes for compelling documentary film fodder: He is arrogant, cosmopolitan, politically unpredictable and enmeshed in the roots of modern international terrorism. Read more

Jason McBride, Globe and Mail: The lawyer's intense isolation, his solitary, perverse rage against the world, against France, against conventional opinion, is felt most deeply. Read more

Geoff Pevere, Toronto Star: The movie functions crackingly well as a non-fiction international thriller. Read more

Dave Calhoun, Time Out: That [director] Schroeder doesn't offer simple explanations gives his tale honesty and fascination. Read more

Lisa Nesselson, Variety: Sure to inspire debate in France and Germany and of obvious interest to anyone who follows the roots of modern international terrorism, doc probes gray areas in the colorful life of its controversial, limelight-courting subject. Read more

J. Hoberman, Village Voice: Engrossing. Read more

Stephen Hunter, Washington Post: A panorama of European radicalism. Read more