12 Strong
Warner Bros. | Release Date: January 19, 2018 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
54
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 43 Critic Reviews
Positive:
18
Mixed:
22
Negative:
3
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
75
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliJan 19, 2018
12 Strong represents a recent war as depicted on screen in an old-fashioned way. Read full review
75
The Seattle TimesSoren AndersenJan 18, 2018
It’s a remarkable true tale of great heroism. It’s also an account of a clash of cultures. Read full review
75
Philadelphia Daily NewsGary ThompsonJan 18, 2018
In essence, it shows that what the “horse soldiers” did was pretty remarkable — efficient, daring, effective. Read full review
70
New York Daily NewsEthan SacksJan 17, 2018
Battle sequences on horseback are executed perfectly for maximum pulse quickening. It helps to have a few good men — with apologies to Army vets disgusted with the Marine reference — cast in the supporting roles. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthyJan 17, 2018
It's virtually all Hemsworth's show and he's entirely up to the task of carrying the film on his broad shoulders: He's charismatic, fearless, confident, jokey and a good old Kentucky boy who just wants to get the job done and return home to his wife and daughter. Read full review
70
TheWrapInkoo KangJan 17, 2018
The Chris Hemsworth vehicle is is often hammy, but also wryly funny, breath-stoppingly tense, and uncommonly intelligent. Its January dump is a disservice to a promising debut feature. Read full review
67
The Film StageJared MobarakJan 19, 2018
Fuglsig’s job was to document, commemorate, and inspire. He does all three. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleRichard WhittakerJan 17, 2018
There's a reason why Afghanistan is called the graveyard of empires – a phrase repeated throughout 12 Strong, a depiction of one of the first and most unequivocal victories of the U.S. war against the Taliban and al Qaeda. Read full review
67
Entertainment WeeklyChris NashawatyJan 17, 2018
For a movie produced by red-meat action maestro Jerry Bruckheimer and starring Thor himself as the face of camo-clad vengeance, 12 Strong somewhat surprisingly manages to fall (just barely) on the nuanced side of the scale. Even if you can feel the film’s director, Nicolai Fuglsig, battling with himself to get it there. Read full review
63
RogerEbert.comChristy LemireJan 19, 2018
The cumulative effect is draining; you’ll walk out of the theater with the feeling that you, too, have gone to war – and an appreciation for those who are brave enough to do so themselves. Read full review
63
St. Louis Post-DispatchCalvin WilsonJan 18, 2018
Director Nicolai Fuglsig delivers an action drama that gets the job done without ever catching fire. But the well-chosen, charismatic cast makes the most out of the material. Read full review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Kate TaylorJan 18, 2018
That is what makes the movie highly watchable – along with Hemsworth's affable presence, backed by the always reliable Shannon and with Michael Pena and Trevante Rhodes as two of the soldiers, providing wry commentary from the sidelines. Read full review
63
USA TodayBrian TruittJan 18, 2018
Hemsworth’s machismo is all real, though, and for two war-torn hours, you’ll forget about that iconic hammer of his. Read full review
63
Rolling StonePeter TraversJan 18, 2018
What 12 Strong does deliver, however, is a rousing tribute to the bravery of soldiers whose contributions went unheralded for years. That impact cannot be denied. Read full review
63
The Associated PressLindsey BahrJan 18, 2018
What separates “12 Strong” from the pack...is its ability to introduce and stay with a band of brothers worth caring about. Read full review
63
Boston GlobeTom RussoJan 17, 2018
Danish photojournalist-turned-director Nicolai Fuglsig channels his experience into a credibly stark snapshot of war, one that helps audiences further grasp why the region has been so hellishly problematic for American troops. Read full review
63
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperJan 17, 2018
12 Strong winds up being an almost-good film about some great American soldiers. Read full review
63
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsJan 17, 2018
12 Strong sticks to the basics, without much interest in the differentiating specifics of the men involved, or anything on a geopolitical scale beyond the impulse these Special Forces veterans shared in the wake of 9/11. It seems to me a qualified, limited success. Read full review
60
EmpireJimi FamurewaJan 29, 2018
More The Magnificent Seven than American Sniper, this flag-waving true story is an effective — if overly simplistic — neo-Western that's eventually carried over the line by a sparky ensemble cast. Read full review
60
TimeStephanie ZacharekJan 20, 2018
It’s hard to shake the feeling that 12 Strong–based on Doug Stanton’s 2009 book Horse Soldiers, about U.S. Special Forces troops who traveled to Afghanistan shortly after 9/11 to confront Taliban forces–should add up to more than it does. Read full review
60
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternJan 19, 2018
Unconcerned with context or tonal nuance, it frames itself as an action thriller with a signature moment that could have been lifted from an old western. Read full review
60
Time OutJoshua RothkopfJan 18, 2018
If you want to feel good about a war with no end, this one’s for you. Read full review
60
The New York TimesManohla DargisJan 18, 2018
For devotees of cinematic blowouts and dedicated students of screen masculinity (like me), 12 Strong is premium, Grade A catnip. Directed by the newcomer Nicolai Fuglsig, it is generally watchable, if unsurprisingly easier on the eyes than on the ears or brain. Read full review
60
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzJan 18, 2018
Nicolai Fuglsig’s film does a nice job of capturing the fish-out-of-water nature of the American combatants. Chris Hemsworth is suitably heroic and Michael Shannon suitably intense. But if this movie was the only context you had for the U.S. response to the 9/11 attacks, you’d walk out of the theater thinking that we won a quick war without suffering any casualties, that American gusto and bravery saved the day. Read full review
60
IGNSimon ThompsonJan 17, 2018
When it works, it's engaging and there’s just enough to keep you entertained but you can’t help feel the heroes deserve something meatier. Read full review
60
Screen DailyTim GriersonJan 17, 2018
12 Strong wants to be triumphant but also mournful, rousing but also thoughtful in its chronicling of America’s place in a changing, complicated world. That tonal nuance is commendable...but the results are more muddled than thematically intricate. Read full review
58
IndieWireMichael NordineJan 20, 2018
Fuglsig’s feature debut is ultimately less an action movie and more a procedural, one in which incremental gains and minimal casualties are as much as can be hoped for. Read full review
58
The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyJan 17, 2018
Surprisingly stolid and barren for a Bruckheimer production, 12 Strong skates by on the virtues of an old-fashioned programmer: technical competence, an above-average cast, and well-written dialogue, the latter courtesy of screenwriters Ted Tally (The Silence Of The Lambs) and Peter Craig (Blood Father). Read full review
50
Movie NationRoger MooreJan 26, 2018
Most of us are a little too jaded or at least sober-minded to swallow this at face value. Carefully limiting the “history” you tell gives the impression of competence, quick victory and a short war. Read full review
50
Village VoiceAlan ScherstuhlJan 20, 2018
Fuglsig is adept at showing choppers and peaks, caves and campfires, at suggesting the great silence at the roof of the world. He’s also a sure hand with the geography of battle, with ensuring we understand why the bullets fly in the direction they’re flying — and both where they come from and where they hit. That said, the firefights do wear on. Read full review
50
New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinJan 20, 2018
The movie, based on the terrific book Horse Soldiers by Doug Stanton, is only so-so, but it moves at a fair clip and fills in a lot of details about the early successes of the Afghanistan war. Read full review
50
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanJan 19, 2018
While it’s gratifying — and occasionally gripping — to see that story told in 12 Strong, the Jerry Bruckheimer-produced film contains few genuine surprises, at least from a cinematic standpoint. Read full review
50
Tampa Bay TimesSteve PersallJan 18, 2018
Extraordinary heroism deserves a less ordinary movie. Read full review
50
ConsequenceAllison ShoemakerJan 18, 2018
There’s a good movie hidden somewhere inside 12 Strong, probably tucked between the many explosions and the endless exposition. Unfussily directed by Nicolai Fuglsig, this is a film that’s all business. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleJan 17, 2018
It might be enough that 12 Strong makes you feel good that the United States still produces guys like this. Too bad we didn’t get to know about the real guys and their actual story. Read full review
50
VarietyOwen GleibermanJan 17, 2018
On its own terms, the film is watchable enough, but it’s blunt and stolid and under-characterized, and at 130 minutes it plods. Read full review
49
Paste MagazineWill LeitchJan 17, 2018
The movie has its moments. But Thor wrestling with the Hulk is more realistic and, frankly, more relevant to the current facts on the ground. Read full review
42
The PlaylistWill AshtonJan 18, 2018
The real-life heroes who bravely risked their lives deserve something better than the forgettable mediocrity that is 12 Strong, and truth be told, audiences deserve more too. Read full review
40
The GuardianPeter BradshawJan 26, 2018
It’s all very easy: a feelgood war tale from what feels like a distant age. Read full review
40
Los Angeles TimesJustin ChangJan 18, 2018
What makes 12 Strong objectionable — and what will also make it appealing to some — is its attempt to induce a kind of amnesia in the audience, to ask that we forget about the subsequent moral and strategic failures of America’s “war on terror” or the limits of military retaliation when it comes to the pursuit of justice. Read full review
38
New York PostSara StewartJan 19, 2018
It’s macho eye-candy of the cheapest kind, endless scenes of gunfire and explosions and rugged, handsome actors running while shooting and yelling. Read full review
30
UproxxVince ManciniJan 17, 2018
Historical analysis aside, even if you’d parachuted into the theater from the early aughts and knew nothing of politics or the future, 12 Strong still wouldn’t be very good. In fact, the closest thing it has to a redeeming quality is that you can hate it irrespective of politics; it’s objectively bad. Read full review
25
Slant MagazineKeith WatsonJan 18, 2018
As Nicolai Fuglsig doesn't allow any complicated thoughts about war, colonization, and mortality to hover around his characters, 12 Strong inevitably proceeds as a jaunty imperial adventure through the wilds of northern Afghanistan. Read full review
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