Todd James Vue Weekly (Edmonton, Alberta) Mar 29, 2024 3/5

A tough and thoughtful movie from Spike Lee.

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Sean Burns WBUR’s Arts & Culture Aug 20, 2023

Spike Lee’s most sorrowful film. It’s a devastating depiction of a community poisoning itself.

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Manohla Dargis Spin Dec 27, 2022

For all its flash and agitated rhythms, Clockers has the thoughtful down time that allows actors to act and the narrative to hold its course.

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M.N. Miller Ready Steady Cut Aug 16, 2022 5/5

Clockers was years ahead of its time. It’s a visceral crime film that gives us a powerful look at the urban drug trade and the bleak despair of escaping your circumstances while exploring race relations between the police and the community they serve.

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Alistair Lawrence Common Sense Media Dec 2, 2021 4/5

Clockers is of its time and now feels slightly dated because of it... But it remains a well-crafted crime drama and feels real and true enough to still hit close to home.

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Margaret A. McGurk Cincinnati Enquirer Aug 19, 2021 4/4

Clockers is a tremendous film -- and a major addition to the work of a vibrantly talented director.

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Juan M. Mendez New York Daily News Aug 18, 2021 4/4

With Clockers, director Spike Lee achieves his best work so far.

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Janet Maslin New York Times Apr 9, 2020

A story told with mournful, epic vision that rises high above its grim setting.

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David Sterritt Christian Science Monitor Apr 9, 2020

''Clockers'' remains a major work by a major film artist, but its cinematic achievements are diminished by its narrative and psychological shortcomings.

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Michael Wilmington Chicago Tribune Apr 9, 2020 4/4

In many ways, it's better than the book it's taken from: tighter, tauter, with a deeper vein of sadness opening underneath.

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Steve Persall Tampa Bay Times Apr 9, 2020 B+

Strong performances, edgy dialogue and Lee's success in luring an audience into his own tempo and urgent perspective make Clockers tough stuff, indeed.

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Rod Dreher South Florida Sun-Sentinel Apr 9, 2020

What all but sinks Clockers is its muddled script, an indulgent mess that is by turns dull and disorienting.

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Malcolm L. Johnson Hartford Courant Apr 9, 2020 3.5/4

This harrowing portrait of a young, ulcer- ridden, low-level drug dealer, or "clocker," adds up to the director's best film since "Do the Right Thing."

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Carol Buckland CNN.com Apr 9, 2020

"Clockers" is as grim as it is good. This is not an"entertaining" popcorn- type movie. It's timely. It's tragic in many ways. And it leaves a provocative and lasting impression.

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Matt Brunson Film Frenzy Feb 15, 2020 3.5/4

Lee and Price make sure the piece sufficiently addresses such issues as the devastating effect that criminals have on their own communities and the roles that both cops and crooks can play in tandem with each other.

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David Ansen Newsweek Feb 26, 2018

Clockers may be Lee's strongest film since Do the Right Thing, but he runs into trouble at the end when he tries to tie up all his threads in neat bows...the passion of this raw, mournful urban epic remains in spite of the false moves.

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Jason Bailey Flavorwire Aug 16, 2016

There's no denying the movie's greatness: the depth of the characters, the urgency of its narrative, the nightmarishness of its vision.

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Joe Leydon The Moving Picture Show Jul 18, 2014 4/4

Clockers leaves you with a sense of aching sadness, a regretful melancholy for the lives that have been blasted and the wrong decisions that have been made. Once again, Spike Lee has done the right thing.

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Owen Gleiberman Entertainment Weekly Sep 7, 2011 A

Lee has jettisoned most of his trademark technical razzmatazz; it's as if he were trying to burn straight through to the heart of his material.

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Richard Schickel TIME Magazine Sep 22, 2008

There is a force and focus in Lee's work, an absence of intellectual posturing and a willingness to let his material speak for itself that he has not achieved before.

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