In 1970, a few days before Christmas, Elvis Presley showed up on the White House lawn seeking to be deputized into the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs by the President himself.
The spectacle of Presley visiting Nixon's buttoned-down White House in his jeweled sunglasses, silk scarf, open shirt, and giant gold belt is inherently farcical, but Elvis & Nixon might have delivered more than dumb laughs.
– J. R. Jones,
Chicago Reader,
28 Apr 2016
fresh:
The dialogue sparkles with gems of historical allusion and perceptive asides, and the actors virtually sing it; the film plays like a whirling sociopolitical operetta.
– Richard Brody,
New Yorker,
25 Apr 2016
fresh:
As a surreal slice of history served up nearly half a century later, it feels oddly satisfying: A reminder not just of simpler times, but of all the other wild untold stories we may never know, just because no camera was there to capture them.
– Leah Greenblatt,
Entertainment Weekly,
22 Apr 2016
fresh:
What the movie, directed by Liza Johnson, lacks in factual material it replaces with whimsy and quirky humour, helped greatly by the casting of Michael Shannon as Presley and Kevin Spacey as Nixon.
– Jocelyn Noveck,
Associated Press,
22 Apr 2016
fresh:
A sharper movie would have pushed this bizarre incident into psychological rawness, revealing a shared sense of paranoia. Breezy, comic and disposable, Elvis & Nixon is not that film.