"The Guardian", describing "Maurice" as "undervalued in 1987 and underseen in 2017", lamented the relatively poor reception of the film compared to its lauded predecessor "A Room with a View", saying it was "...filed away as, if not a disappointment, a lesser diversion" because it was "put bluntly, too gay". "LA Weekly" likewise called "Maurice" "the Merchant-Ivory film the World Missed", stating that: "it seems like it’s only recently been celebrated for how groundbreaking it was, and for its importance in the development of gay cinema."