Sure, Afire's message of the inevitability of death and the absolute need to embrace life can be a little on the nose. Still, Petzold puts his own spin on the old message, by inviting the audience to laugh and cry as four lives get intertwined in a very honest and human way.

Petzold’s latest, Afire, unfurls with all the page-turning seduction of a gripping novella.

Rory O'Connor

The Film Stage

In the end I felt that the film fully achieves neither the ostensible comedy of the opening, nor the supposed sadness of its denouement.

Peter Bradshaw

The Guardian