Most critics are warm, and the praise goes almost entirely to the musicians rather than to the filmmaker. Review after review dwells on the same things: the veteran players’ ease and skill, their good humour in interview, the pleasure of the songs, and Havana’s crumbling streets as a backdrop. The consensus is that the film works because Wenders stands back and lets the music and the personalities carry it, and that the Carnegie Hall concert arrives as the reward it is meant to be.
The reservations, where they exist, are about Wenders. Roger Ebert likes the music but complains that the camera circles endlessly and the editing cuts songs up before they can finish. Sight and Sound finds the direction clumsy and intrusive. Slant Magazine thinks it little more than concert footage, made by an outsider who keeps clear of politics. The spread is narrow: eleven of thirteen are positive, none negative, and even the mixed notices concede the music is worth hearing.