Lola received moderate reviews from critics.
Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum wrote it was "among the most neglected major works of the French New Wave" and "in some ways [Demy's] best feature."
Variety noted that "the mixture of melodrama, satire and poetics does not entirely jell. It is offbeat, with shafts of tender feeling and truth. But trying to touch on too many subjects makes the film uneven. Anouk Aimee has a pathetic quality as the mythomaniacal dancer who finally finds happiness, while Marc Michel is properly aimless as the boy. Lensing has the proper gray quality for this pleasant, unusual pic." Travis Hooper of
Film Freak Central gave it three-and-a-half out of four stars, stating that he believed that it "doesn't have the intellectual rigour of those other films". He went on to write that it "is stronger for feeling, showing that we need more than the confirmation of the worst if we intend to make it through our lives intact."
Not Just Movies gave
Lola an A rating, mostly for Demy's "New Wave-cum-classical style", which "creates a self-contained world that gives a softly lit haze to reality as characters constantly aim for each other and miss, sometimes passing within mere inches of each other before carrying on or being redirected."
Wong Kar-Wai cited
Lola as a primary influence on his film
Chungking Express (1994), in inspiring that film's second half. ==Awards and nominations==