Mick LaSalle of the "San Francisco Chronicle" called the film "a completely boring, counterfeit movie" and added, "Because everyone in "Winter Solstice" is miserable, because everyone is sensitive, because nothing happens, because people smile through tears and tear through smiles, and because there isn't a single explosion or car chase, there will be people who'll insist that this film is a searing examination of the human soul. In fact, it's dreadful, but it's a special kind of dreadful - the kind designed to appeal to intelligent people on principle . . . The film's depiction of middle-aged grief is antiseptic and uninformed, and its depiction of middle-aged bonding is trite and unreal."