Mark Schilling of The Japan Times rated it 4/5, praising Morita's acting, and spoke of "the film’s central theme: Human beings are capable of both good and evil, and crossing the line from the former to the latter can be more a matter of fate than choice [...] And Okada’s sin? Silence, in the name of survival." Andrew Mack of Screen Anarchy praised the film for its anti-bullying message: "While a lot of western films want to show or capture the shattering effects of bullying at the teen level, few have ever ventured into adulthood like Himeanole has to show how long lasting those effects are." Italian critic Massimo Volpe of LinkInMovies rated the film 3.5/5, describing it as "among the best seen at this year's Far East Film Festival" and that "the figure of Morita arouses some compassionate gaze, if not solidarity" following his "chronic bullying suffered at school of which Okada was a guilty Pilatian observer."
