Critics reviews

Half visual essay, half verbal investigation, “Silence” is thoughtful and informative as well as contemplative and restorative. It both tells you why you perhaps yearn for silence and shows you what it would look like if you could find it.

"In Pursuit of Silence" doesn’t really tell you much that you didn’t already instinctively know — silence is good, loud noise is bad — but it does provide a sporadically interesting overview that could well have you rethinking your next vacation plans.

The film works best as pure cinema. It's one thing to talk about noise and solitude, but much more powerful for Shen to cut from the "soul-crushing din" of cable-news arguments to the tea ceremony in Kyoto, where no voices compete against each other for attention... Fitting for a documentary about the value of quiet, "In Pursuit of Silence" is better when it shows than tells.

“In Pursuit of Silence” isn’t what you would call a well-rounded or intellectually rigorous documentary — it’s too messianic for that — but it is an interesting one... The movie has a quirky lightness that prevents it from slipping into lecture. Its arguments range wide without going deep, but its factoids about the medical benefits of hanging out in a forest — and the cognitive costs of a noisy school or hospital — are fascinating and persuasive.

There is scope here for an interesting experimental film, but Shen has taken a more conventional route... The film loses its nerve about halfway through and, unable to fill up the space with convincing nothingness, sets to a conversation about noise... [It] also defies its own arguments by filling up much empty space with plinky-plonky piano music... A pleasant diversion all the same.

The film sabotages its own logic by slapping on an undistinguished new age-y score, and overusing the verbal punditry, when images and silent space should do the work. Still, an elegant piece that will give you plenty to think about, if you ever get a quiet moment.

["In Pursuit of Silence"] is calling for a nothing less than a global audio detox; it’s about reclaiming the lost virtue of silence. The film occasionally hits a rather loud note of passive-aggressive piety, but it is very persuasive.

Once beyond the babble of the Mindfulness merchants, the latter half of the documentary, however, is far more interesting and compelling as Shen has his experts round on the noise pollution that so disrupts our lives.

Shen’s "In Pursuit of Silence" incessantly inspires and sometimes takes the breath away and can even accomplish both at once.

Looking inward, listening to the world around you, mindfulness in general: These are important issues, but they’re also complicated ones, and Shen doesn’t shy away from that. This is a truly unique piece of filmmaking.