Name : Mick LaSalle / Alias : San Francisco Chronicle
"The Gift" stretches things a little too much for it to be a first-rate thriller. Still, among second-rate thrillers, it's one of the best.

Name : Michael Phillips / Alias : Chicago Tribune
At heart this is a three-character chamber piece. And Bateman, Hall and Edgerton are three very interesting actors showcased in a confident directorial debut.

Name : Richard Roeper / Alias : Chicago Sun-Times
Just when we think we know where The Gift is going, we're surprised. And then surprised again.

Name : Katharine Pushkar / Alias : New York Daily News
Edgerton seems to have pulled "The Gift" right out of a time capsule from 1992.

Name : Bilge Ebiri / Alias : New York Magazine/Vulture
The Gift starts out like so many other thrillers before it - with an attractive, well-to-do couple purchasing a big new house - and then beats its own, uniquely tense and twisted path from there.

Name : Stephen Holden / Alias : New York Times
Underneath it all, "The Gift" is a merciless critique of an amoral corporate culture in which the ends justify the means, and lying and cheating are O.K., as long as they're not found out.

Name : Gary Goldstein / Alias : Los Angeles Times
A disturbing drama that twists its outsider-from-hell story into something more unique and unexpected than its marketing campaign might imply.

Name : Sandy Cohen / Alias : Associated Press
A satisfying directorial debut from writer, producer and actor Joel Edgerton.

Name : James Rocchi / Alias : TheWrap
Nothing here feels cheap or hasty, which is why the horror, when it comes, is all the more chilling and grim. Slick, sharp and terrifying, "The Gift" is a truly brilliant thriller - and, one hopes, the first of many features from Edgerton to come.

Name : Brad Wheeler / Alias : Globe and Mail
Edgerton's touch as a director and writer is fluid - he eerily holds our attention, like Hitchcock holds a door for Tippi Hedren.

Name : Kevin P. Sullivan / Alias : Entertainment Weekly
More than anything, Edgerton's script and direction demonstrate a keen understanding of tension and what puts an audience on edge.

Name : Joe Morgenstern / Alias : Wall Street Journal
One of the many gifts conferred by The Gift is the unaccustomed pleasure of feeling like putty in the hands of a first-rate storyteller.

Name : Adam Graham / Alias : Detroit News
It touches on notions of trust, the male ego and forgiveness, but Edgerton doesn't overturn any new stones.

Name : Peter Howell / Alias : Toronto Star
This indie pulse-raiser is more of a stealth shocker than an overt one, even if the twisted payoff is telegraphed to anyone paying attention.

Name : Wesley Morris / Alias : Grantland
Officially, this is a blank-from-hell movie. But Edgerton has remixed the formula.

Name : Peter Keough / Alias : Boston Globe
[An] expertly crafted exercise in guilt, ambiguity and revenge.

Name : A.A. Dowd / Alias : AV Club
Edgerton isn't above a hoary jump scare or two, but he otherwise tackles his Cape Fear premise with a degree of technical and dramatic intelligence.

Name : James Berardinelli / Alias : ReelViews
Clever and atmospheric, the film has enough twists to keep the average viewer guessing.

Name : Sara Stewart / Alias : New York Post
A dark and ultimately quite nasty psychological thriller from actor/writer/debut director Joel Edgerton, who manages to yank the carpet out from under his audience a couple of times.

Name : Scott Foundas / Alias : Variety
A coolly unsettling thriller that begins as an unironic homage to late-'80s/early-'90s yuppies-in-peril dramas. before taking a turn toward the moral and existential minefield of Michael Haneke's Cache.

Name : Barbara VanDenburgh / Alias : Arizona Republic
It's a confident thriller suffused with dread that builds suspense without breaking until it's too late to turn back - with a few jump scares thrown in for good measure.

Name : J. R. Jones / Alias : Chicago Reader
Edgerton - who also wrote The Square and the story for The Rover - exploits Bateman's smarty-pants persona to chilling effect; he's the rare triple threat who's more valuable behind the camera than in front of it.

Name : Jon Frosch / Alias : Hollywood Reporter
Joel Edgerton's feature-length directorial debut is a pleasant - or pleasantly unpleasant - surprise, hitting its genre marks in brisk, unfussy fashion and raising a few hairs on the back of your neck along the way.

Name : Daisy Bowie-Sell / Alias : Time Out
A darkly unnerving psychological thriller.