--- title: "Romper Stomper: the reviews" canonical: "https://film.one/film/romper-stomper/reviews" title_page: "https://film.one/film/romper-stomper" critics_score: 45 critics_reviews: 7 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." --- # Romper Stomper (1992): what the critics said Critics' score 45 from 7 reviews: 2 positive, 0 mixed, 5 negative. Most critics find Romper Stomper a hard film to admire. The reviews agree that Geoffrey Wright’s portrait of Melbourne skinheads has real force: the violence is staged with speed and conviction, and Russell Crowe’s Hando is singled out again and again as the reason to watch, a performance of flat, unreflective menace that at least one reviewer ranks as his most frightening. Where the film earns praise, it is for energy and for Crowe, not for thought. The reservations cluster around exactly that energy. Most critics feel the film gets carried along by the mayhem it means to condemn, leaving its moral position unclear and its closing message thin. Variety calls it a Clockwork Orange without the intellect; the Los Angeles Times finds the violence numbing and without a point. The spread is wide: the Guardian and, much later, Collider defend it as uncompromising, but five of the seven reviews land negative. ## The Guardian Rating ***. 19 May 2000. The critic finds the film provocative and uncompromising, praising its adrenalin rush and Russell Crowe's menacing performance as the neo-Nazi leader. It is described as powerful and disturbing, though less thought-provoking than comparable films like La Haine. [Read the review](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2000/may/19/dvdreviews.culture) ## Empire — Mark Dinning Fi1m's normalised score 40/100 (inferred from the text). 1 January 2000. The film offers a savage portrayal of suburban racism that remains prescient, but its brutally visceral power is undermined by a lack of class and an overly ambivalent treatment of the perpetrators. [Read the review](https://www.empireonline.com/movies/reviews/romper-stomper-review/) ## The New York Times Fi1m's normalised score 40/100 (inferred from the text). 9 June 1993. The viscerally supercharged film runs on the adrenaline of hate and exults in savagely violent action sequences involving neo-Nazi skinheads terrorizing Vietnamese immigrants and facing retaliation. Its perspective is disturbingly ambivalent, presenting a delirious energy that stirs the emotions while pretending to critique a malignant social phenomenon. [Read the review](https://www.nytimes.com/1993/06/09/movies/review-film-of-skinheads-high-on-hate-and-violence.html) ## Time Out — GA Fi1m's normalised score 40/100 (inferred from the text). 10 September 2012. The critic questions the wisdom of the film's visceral, high-adrenaline style despite its anti-racist intent in portraying Melbourne skinhead life. The raw narrative and souped-up visuals result in a lack of moral perspective, with a cheap ending message failing to salvage the misguided effort. [Read the review](https://www.timeout.com/movies/romper-stomper) ## Los Angeles Times — Peter Rainer Fi1m's normalised score 30/100 (inferred from the text). 16 June 1993. The film offers numbing violence without a point as writer-director Geoffrey Wright gets taken in by all the mayhem and clobbering among Melbourne skinheads. A great movie could be pulled from this horror of dispossessed white kids working up racist rage, but the execution focuses too much on the clobbering. [Read the review](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-06-16-ca-3583-story.html) ## Variety Rating **. 31 December 1991. The film is a Clockwork Orange without the intellect and is in many ways genuinely appalling, centering on a gang of moronic neo-Nazi skinheads battling Melbourne's Vietnamese community. It is well acted and directed with a certain slickness, with strong performances from Russell Crowe and Daniel Pollock. [Read the review](https://variety.com/1991/film/reviews/romper-stomper-1200429267/) ## Collider — Liam Gaughan Fi1m's normalised score 75/100 (inferred from the text). 17 April 2023. The critic highlights Russell Crowe's early performance as the psychopathic neo-Nazi Hando as his most terrifying and un-sympathetic role, praising the film's unflinching look at fascist movements and self-destructive hatred. They note that while the film is imperfect and has drawn debate over its violence and depiction of non-white characters, Crowe's portrayal of banal evil stands out. [Read the review](https://collider.com/russell-crowe-romper-stomper/) --- © 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/romper-stomper.md