--- title: "Hope and Glory: the reviews" canonical: "https://film.one/film/hope-and-glory/reviews" title_page: "https://film.one/film/hope-and-glory" critics_score: 84 critics_reviews: 8 licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Hope and Glory (1987): what the critics said Critics' score 84 from 8 reviews: 8 positive, 0 mixed, 0 negative. The reviews are unanimous in the film’s favour, and the praise gathers around the same thing: Boorman’s decision to show the Blitz through a small boy’s eyes, so that the bombing becomes fireworks and the rubble an adventure playground. Most critics call it warm and funny rather than solemn, a comedy of family life with the blood and sacrifice kept to one side. The period streets are found convincing, the young performers are singled out, and Los Angeles Times reads it as a salute to the strength of its women as much as to the boy. Where critics part is on how much is lost by keeping the horror off screen. Empire finds it an idealised remembrance with twee leanings rather than a historical snapshot, and Variety treats it as a string of sweet anecdotes, best when the boy is at the centre. Radio Times notes an episodic quality. The spread is narrow, though: from admiring to devoted, with nobody dissenting from the affection. ## Radio Times — Peter Freedman Rating 5/5. War is a wheeze for a nine-year-old boy in suburban London during the Blitz in Boorman's whimsical, funny, nostalgic semi-autobiographical memoir. Strong performances, especially from the young leads, make it a delightful movie despite some episodic qualities and minor quibbles with eccentric portrayals. [Read the review](https://www.radiotimes.com/movie-guide/b-0mx1im/hope-and-glory/) ## Los Angeles Times — Sheila Benson Fi1m's normalised score 90/100 (inferred from the text). 30 October 1987. The critic calls the film brilliantly evocative and warmly comic, shifting the point of view to a 7-year-old boy for whom the war is liberation in its most glorious and frightening form. Boorman captures every contradictory nuance of the experience with an irresistible salute to women's strength and England's resilience. [Read the review](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1987-10-30-ca-11489-story.html) ## Sight and Sound — Charles Barr Fi1m's normalised score 90/100 (inferred from the text). Boorman has written a childhood autobiography on film that confirms him as the great risk-taking romantic of British cinema. The child's-eye view of family life during the Blitz paints an unexpectedly warm picture, blending domestic drama with surreal flashes. [Read the review](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/e01438e9-f60d-5679-b3ba-7b79c4880ab3/hope-and-glory) ## The New York Times — Janet Maslin Fi1m's normalised score 90/100 (inferred from the text). 9 October 1987. Festival review. The critic finds John Boorman's autobiographical film a radiant remembrance of World War II as seen through the eyes of a young boy who savors its adventure. It has an invitingly nostalgic spirit with a fine eye for magical details a child might notice. [Read the review](https://www.nytimes.com/1987/10/09/movies/film-festival-boorman-s-hope-and-glory.html) ## The New Yorker — Pauline Kael Fi1m's normalised score 85/100 (inferred from the text). 28 September 1987. The critic praises Boorman for crafting a great comedy from the Blitz, depicting WWII through an eight-year-old boy's eyes as an exciting party rather than a sentimental tragedy. She highlights the film's lighthearted desentimentalization of wartime England and its focus on family dynamics and the child's adventures. [Read the review](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1987/10/05/8-19-17-12) ## Time Out — BC Fi1m's normalised score 80/100 (inferred from the text). 22 February 2012. Boorman's autobiographical film about family life during the Blitz is subversively light on the blood, sweat, tears and sacrifice, and a joy throughout. It communicates the affectionate poetry of a long-lost England through the eyes of a nine-year-old seeing the war as a wonderland of fireworks and adventure playgrounds. [Read the review](https://www.timeout.com/movies/hope-and-glory) ## Empire — William Thomas Fi1m's normalised score 70/100 (inferred from the text). 1 January 2011. John Boorman's semi-autobiographical story of a young boy growing up in wartime Britain is more of an idealised remembrance than a historical snapshot. The streets are convincingly evocative of the period but there is little to none of the regular horrors that citizens had to face, with the film showing twee leanings aside from its warmth. [Read the review](https://www.empireonline.com/movies/reviews/hope-glory-review/) ## Variety — Variety Staff Fi1m's normalised score 70/100 (inferred from the text). 1 January 1987. The review describes the film as a collection of sweetly autobiographical anecdotes of English family life during World War II, narrated from a child's perspective. Best scenes center on the boy and show the unthinking callousness kids can display amid others' misfortune. [Read the review](https://variety.com/1986/film/reviews/hope-and-glory-2-1200427230/) --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Our review: https://film.one/film/hope-and-glory.md