My Brilliant Career 1979

John Skow, TIME Magazine: This is a modest, clear sighted film, and it profits considerably from a lack of the bravura landscape photography that most directors would have used to puff up a movie set in Australia. Read more

Janet Maslin, New York Times: My Brilliant Career marks the beginning of exactly that for both the film's daring, assured, high-spirited Australian director, Gillian Armstrong, and its rambunctious young star. Read more

Dave Kehr, Chicago Reader: The action and sentiments are familiar to the point of cliche, and there isn't much life in Gillian Armstrong's academic direction. Read more

Tom Milne, Time Out: The period atmosphere is evoked with careful delicacy, but the characters rarely become more than stereotypes with performances (Judy Davis excepted) to match. Read more

Variety Staff, Variety: This Australian film is a charming look at 19th-century rural days in general and the stirrings of self-realization and feminine liberation in the persona of a headstrong young girl who wants to go her own way. Read more