The New York Times
"TEST, set in San Francisco in 1985, captures with extraordinary precision and sensitivity the moment when an H.I.V. test became available."
"As Frankie, Mr. Marlowe delivers a quiet, moving performance of such subtlety and truthfulness that you almost feel that you are living his life."
Film Comment
"[Test] eschews both radical-chic hagiography and after-the-fact moralizing in its richly stylized take on the era’s physical and emotional dislocation."
"Johnson and DP Daniel Marks film the dance performances (brilliantly choreographed by Sidra Bell) with a thrilling combination of cinematic vivacity and restraint. They know when the camera should be the dancer’s partner, and when it should be a rapturous spectator."
"A film of rare electricity and intelligence... If there was ever a contemporary film that illuminates why queer cinema still matters, this is it."
R E V I E W S
The Daily Californian 6/15/2014
"The dance sequences are beautiful, and the repetition throughout the film of the primary choreography by different dancers reincarnates the dance into something intriguing and new each time."
Reverse Shot 6/13/2014
"This gem of a movie offered me a gift... For a time, anyway, it made me a little more connected, and a little less alone."
The New York Times 6/13/2014
"Extraordinary precision and sensitivity..." "Here is San Francisco as it was in its bohemian twilight,
on the eve of catastrophe."
The Village Voice/LA Weekly 6/11/2014
"The dance sequences are riveting. The final sequence, featuring Matthew Risch as Frankie's acerbic fellow dancer, is terrific."
Slant Magazine 6/08/2014
"Adept as both timely character study and epochal drama, TEST the film wonderfully manages fully formed humanism without sentimentality."
OUT 6/06/2014
"Dance becomes the unexpected, yet surprisingly effective, backdrop in the new film, TEST."
SF Chronicle 6/06/2014
"Writer-director Chris Mason Johnson has created a visually compelling film about an important subject that until now had pretty much defied cinematic expression."
Next Magazine 6/06/2014
"Touching, funny, and beautiful."
The Wrap 6/05/2014
"This lovely and contemplative film examines the impact of the then-new HIV test on dancers in San Francisco in the mid-1980s."
NPR 6/05/2014
"There's a performance scene at its midway point — Frankie's first opportunity to perform with the company — that stands out as one of the best from any film this year."
SF Bay Guardian 6/04/2014
"A quiet, thoughtful study of a person, and a community, trying to reorient and find footing amid a cataclysm."
North Bay Bohemian 6/04/2014
"A memorable movie about the city's edge-of-doom days, the quiet fear and the remorseless beauty. TEST does a startlingly good job of evoking San Francisco in 1985."