Box office
In its opening weekend, Natural Born Killers grossed a total of $11.2 million in 1,510 theaters, finishing first at the US box office. It finished its theatrical run in the United States and Canada with a total gross of $50.3 million.[35] It grossed an estimated $60 million internationally for a worldwide total of $110 million[3] against its $34 million budget.[36]
Critical response
On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 50% based on 50 reviews, with an average rating of 5.8/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Natural Born Killers explodes off the screen with style, but its satire is too blunt to offer any fresh insight into celebrity or crime – pummeling the audience with depravity until the effect becomes deadening."[37] On Metacritic, the film has an average weighted score of 74 out of 100, based on 20 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale.[38]
Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film four stars out of four and wrote, "Seeing this movie once is not enough. The first time is for the visceral experience, the second time is for the meaning."[39] On his television show, his partner Gene Siskel agreed with him, adding extra praise to the scene featuring Rodney Dangerfield.[40]
Criticism
Other critics found the film unsuccessful in its aims. Much of the criticism centered around the perception that the film was not effective as a satire and its message was muddled. Janet Maslin of the New York Times wrote, "While 'Natural Born Killers' affects occasional disgust at the lurid world of Mickey and Mallory, it more often seems enamored of their exhilarating freedom. If there is a juncture at which these caricatures start looking like nihilist heroes, then the film passes that point many times."[41] Hal Hinson of The Washington Post voiced a similar concern, saying "'Killers' is intended as a gonzo critique of the mass media and, by extension, of the bloodthirsty legions of couch potatoes whose prurient taste guarantees that the garbage rises to the top of the charts. But the film doesn't make it as a piece of social criticism. Primarily this is because the movie's jittery, psychedelic style is so obviously a kick for Stone to orchestrate. Bloody, pulpy excess is his thing; it's what he does best.”[42] Hinson noted the film also loses its "symbolic footing" when it transitions into a prison film.[42]
Some critics felt the film's focus on the mass media as the main culprit of society's ills rang hollow or that the film did not adequately hold the characters of Mickey and Mallory accountable for their actions. Maslin continued, "for all its surface passions, Natural Born Killers never digs deep enough to touch the madness of such events, or even to send them up in any surprising way. Mr. Stone's vision is impassioned, alarming, visually inventive, characteristically overpowering. But it's no match for the awful truth."[41]
James Berardinelli gave the film a negative review but his criticism was different from many other such pans, which generally said that Oliver Stone was a hypocrite for making an ultra-violent film in the guise of a critique of American attitudes. Berardinelli noted that the movie "hits the bullseye" as a satire of America's lust for bloodshed, but repeated Stone's main point so often and so loudly that it became unbearable.[43]
Stone got in trouble with the Native American community for the use of Russell Means.[44]
Accolades
At the 1994 Stinkers Bad Movie Awards, Harrelson was nominated for Worst Actor but lost to Bruce Willis for Color of Night and North. The film was nominated for Worst Picture but lost to North.[45]
Year-end lists
- 2nd – David Stupich, The Milwaukee Journal[46]
- 8th – Roger Ebert, The Chicago Sun-Times[47]
- 8th – Michael Mills, The Palm Beach Post[48]
- 8th – Christopher Sheid, The Munster Times[49]
- Top 10 (not ranked) – Bob Carlton, The Birmingham News[50]
- Honorable mention – Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times[51]
- Honorable mention – Dennis King, Tulsa World[52]
- Honorable mention – Howie Movshovitz, The Denver Post[53]
- Honorable mention – Dan Webster, The Spokesman-Review[54]
- Best-worst movie – Todd Anthony, Miami New Times[55]
- 1st worst – Peter Travers, Rolling Stone[56]
- 1st worst – Dan Craft, The Pantagraph[57]
- 2nd worst – John Hurley, Staten Island Advance[58]
- 10th worst – Glenn Lovell, San Jose Mercury News[59]
- 10th worst – Sean P. Means, The Salt Lake Tribune[60]
- Worst films (not ranked) – Jeff Simon, The Buffalo News[61]
- Top 4 worst (not ranked) – Stephen Hunter, The Baltimore Sun[62]
Retrospective
For the film's 25th anniversary in 2019, critics wrote about the film's impact in popular culture and its relevance today. Writing for The Guardian, Charles Bramesco argued the film's rebuke of the media as responsible for violence does not hold up to current times. Bramesco wrote, "With every public bloodbath [in the news today], discourse inches closer to accepting their root cause as a combination of lax gun laws and an undercurrent of psychosis endemic to those feeling marginalized from society. Stone’s inquest may have been a shock to the system at the time, but his tracing of that psychosis back to the evils of television scans as borderline reactionary to present-day sensibilities."[32] Bramesco also noted the film's inclusion of Native American mysticism into its plot felt like a "white understanding of native culture."[32]
In contrast, critic Owen Gleiberman said the film still "captures how our parasitical relationship to pop culture can magnify the cycle of violence...'Natural Born Killers' was the movie that glimpsed the looking glass we were passing through, the new psycho-metaphysical space we were living inside — the roller-coaster of images and advertisements, of entertainment and illusion, of demons that come up through fantasy and morph into daydreams, of vicarious violence that bleeds into real violence.”[10]
Home media
Natural Born Killers was released on VHS in 1995 by Warner Home Video.[63] A director's cut version of the film was released the following year on VHS by Vidmark/Lionsgate, who also released a non-anamorphic DVD of the director's cut in 2000.[64] Distribution rights to Stone's director's cut reverted from Lionsgate to Warner Bros. in 2009, after which Warner issued an anamorphic DVD edition[64] as well as a Blu-ray.[65] Shout Factory licensed the title for a 4K UHD release and released it on September 26, 2023.[66]
