Quartile rating: 8/10 · 1 rating
On Quartile, Wild Tales scores 8/10 across five categories — strongest on Plot (Well Above Average), weakest on Acting (Above Average).
Ranked among Quartile’s Top Plot.
Injustice and the demands of the world can cause stress for many people. Some of them, however, explode. This includes a waitress serving a grouchy loan shark, an altercation between two motorists, an ill-fated wedding reception, and a wealthy businessman who tries to buy his family out of trouble.
Wild Tales is a masterfully constructed anthology of six darkly comic revenge fables from Argentine director Damián Szifrón. Each segment escalates brilliantly from a plausible grievance into anarchic, cathartic extremity — the plotting is sharp, propulsive, and consistently surprising. The acting ensemble is exceptional throughout, particularly Ricardo Darín in the road-rage segment and Érica Rivas in the extraordinary wedding finale. Cinematography is competent and occasionally stylish but largely in service of the storytelling rather than a visual showcase in its own right. Novelty is high: while anthology films exist, this one has a singular voice — audacious, pitch-black, and distinctly Argentine in its social satire — making it genuinely one-of-a-kind. Endings vary by segment; the wedding sequence closes spectacularly but some earlier segments feel slightly abrupt, averaging out to a solid but not exceptional overall resolution score.