"The Guardian"s Peter Bradshaw interpreted the style as "a nightmare of social-realist suspense". "The Independent" critic Jonathan Romney characterized it as "claustrophobic" in parts and an "intense realist exercise". Despite this, he also believed that the hotel scenes communicate "a sense of almost supernatural horror", and asks of the noise heard after Mr. Bebe chastises his mother: "A backfire? A gunshot? Who can tell? But it lends the scene its bizarre, oppressive air of ill omen". Critic Peter Debruge declared the style "the antithesis of your well-lit, elegantly shot Hollywood movies – or the locally made films of Mungiu's childhood".