"The trouble with The Touch is not in the situation, or in the ideas, but in the language. The English dialogue that Bergman has given his stars sounds like those early, grammatically perfect, and lifeless translations of Ibsen that Eva La Gallienne used to pump around the American stage. 'Go, now, Andreas,' Gould says to von Sydow in a crucial confrontation between the lover and the husband. 'You've humiliated both of us long enough with this ridiculous visit of yours!' The banality of the language has no visibly ill effect on the performances of Miss Andersson and von Sydow, who, when they are speaking English, must sound a little bit strange and self-conscious. It is, however, fatal to Gould, who doesn't help matters by giving his lines those slightly flat readings that were so funny in M*A*S*H and Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, but, in The Touch, suggest that the actor is in a different dimension of drama from those of his costars."


"The Touch is a remote and rather unsympathetic film that suffers from some language problems. One reason that Bergman is a great film maker is that he is an exceptional writer, but the dialogue here is ponderous, stagy and stiff. Bergman may be fluent in English, but he does not seem entirely comfortable with it....When a film of Bergman's does not measure up to the exacting standards he has set for himself, the disappointment may be slightly disproportionate. It is not any the less acute."


"The Touch is utterly ridiculous, the probable low point of Ingmar Bergman's often trying but independent and distinguished artistic career. However, if you don't mind the giggling-in-church aspect of the evening—and there are some real lulus to giggle about—The Touch can be more entertaining than a lot of better Bergman films. The audience, for example, seemed rather at a loss while the picture was unreeling, but afterward, talking about how awful it was, people became quite jolly and animated. Despite the credits and the presence of actors like Bibi Andersson and Max von Sydow, The Touch doesn't particularly look or feel like a Bergman picture....Bergman, instead of transforming the conventional middle-class adultery plot through superior insight and artistry, seems to be competing, rather awkwardly, at the level of the commercial hacks, manipulating an overly familiar premise for overly familiar responses."


"Whatever we want from Bergman at this stage of his career, it certainly isn't a brooding, Scandinavian version of Brief Encounter. And while it's obvious from the repetition of themes and characters in his movies that Bergman needs to strike out in fresh directions, I'm afraid that making a commercial soap-opera starring Elliott Gould really isn't the answer."