[The film "The Harder They Come"] is a mess, but the music is redeeming, and Jimmy Cliff's joy in music, along with the whole culture's, stays with you. (The title song goes on playing in your head.) (p. 121)

Pauline Kael, "The Riddles of Pop," in The New Yorker (© 1973 by The New Yorker Magazine, Inc.), Vol. XLIX, No. 1, February 24, 1973, pp. 119-22.∗