"Walter is a very sad film. Directed by Stephen Frears, who quietly made about ten features before My Beautiful Laundrette...Walter has a suggestion of Laundrette's wild lyricism in the face of imminent disaster but is much bleaker. (Ian McKellen portrays) a mentally handicapped man who can barely articulate a sentence... (McKellen's) is a face you want to look at because even in repose it never completely fits together; (he has) the ability to listen and respond in silence and to imply that understanding outstrips action.... Walter lives with his parents. His only joy is helping his retired father care for his racing pigeons. His father dies and shortly afterward his mother... Walter is removed to an institution where, as one of the more competent residents, he (cares) for people in far worse shape... Walter is less sentimental than Laundrette. It unsparingly demonstrates that the handicapped and the mad are treated at best carelessly but more often viciously... But what makes Laundrette surprisingly attractive to audiences is crucial to Walter as well-the suggestion that love is to a large extent about nurture (a far cry from the power/conquest routine that Hollywood lives by) and that it is supported by idiosyncratic and far from nuclear families." -Amy Taubin, Village Voice