Vincent Misiano reviewed "Being There" in "Ares Magazine" #3 and commented that "The film's humor never flags and yet its delicately bitter irony is never far away. It satirizes politics and politicians, business and businessmen, and, finally, all the rest of us and what we imagine we see when we look at one another." In his 2005 book "The Great Movies II", Roger Ebert mentioned the reaction of his students to the final scene, stating that they once suggested that Chance may be walking on a submerged pier. But, Ebert writes "The movie presents us with an image, and while you may discuss the meaning of the image, it is not permitted to devise explanations for it. Since Ashby does not show a pier, there is no pier — a movie is exactly what it shows us, and nothing more."