Critical Reception
Boxing Helena currently holds a 19% "rotten" rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 31 reviews.
The film was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize at the 1993 Sundance Film Festival. However, the media critically mauled it on its release. Boxing Helena won Worst Director for Jennifer Lynch at the 14th Golden Raspberry Awards in 1994.
The film performed poorly at the box office.
The exception was critic Gene Siskel who, on the TV show "Siskel & Ebert", admitted "I went to the theater to see it expecting the worst", and called it, "a brave little movie that explored the provocative issue of how some frustrated men channel their inability to love a woman into cruelty."
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