Metacritic reviews

The best-loved Hollywood Dickens, with a cast that might have been pulled right out of the Cruikshank illustrations. [28 Nov 2008, p.C7]

This MGM classic remains the most faithful and powerful adaptation of the great Dickens novel.

The most profoundly satisfying screen manipulation of a great novel that the camera has ever given us.

Directed with restraint and impeccable taste by Cukor, produced by Selznick, David Copperfield is diverse and satisfying intellectually and emotionally, capturing the unparalleled beauty of Dickens's melancholic truths about life's hardships and human survival.

The movie suffers a bit from the sentimental, violin-underscored valentine approach favored in Selznick movies, but the characterizations, particularly in delivering Dickens' cartoon grotesqueries, are plum. None is better than W. C. Fields, who might be faulted for bringing his own legendary screen persona to Mr. Micawber, but he does so superbly, without sacrificing Dickens' own creation. [13 Aug 1989, p.20C]

This 1935 adaptation flourishes because of a tasty, idiosyncratic cast (W.C. Fields, Basil Rathbone, Lionel Barrymore) that nicely matches up with Dickens' characterizations, and because of the assured production and direction of David O. Selznick and George Cukor, both at the top of their respective games. [02 Feb 1992, p.G1]

Lovely, lavish 1935 adaptation of Charles Dickens' beloved story about a plucky young lad living in 19th century England. [15 Oct 2006, p.E10]

It was almost an adventure to try to bring to the screen the expansively optimistic Micawber, but he lives again in W.C. Fields, who only once yields to his penchant for horseplay.