Skyfall
Columbia Pictures | Release Date: November 9, 2012 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
81
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 49 Critic Reviews
Positive:
42
Mixed:
7
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
HitfixDrew McWeenyNov 5, 2015
Despite the very real threat and the personal stakes and the grim weight given to things, director Sam Mendes manages to pay sophisticated, sincere homage to the conventions that define the Bond series while remembering that one of the things that makes the series such an enduring presence is fun. Read full review
100
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertNov 7, 2012
Skyfall triumphantly reinvents 007 in one of the best Bonds ever. This is a full-blooded, joyous, intelligent celebration of a beloved cultural icon, with Daniel Craig taking full possession of a role he previously played unconvincingly. I don't know what I expected in Bond No. 23, but certainly not an experience this invigorating. Read full review
100
Tampa Bay TimesSteve PersallNov 7, 2012
The movie's assured direction by Sam Mendes can't be underestimated. Read full review
100
Entertainment WeeklyLisa SchwarzbaumOct 31, 2012
The third starring the totally captivating cool cucumber Daniel Craig as Agent 007 - is both an elegy and a mission statement. It's also a great, long-lasting jolt of pleasure. Read full review
100
Total FilmNeil SmithOct 17, 2012
The Daniel Craig era comes of age with a ballsy Bond that takes brave chances and bold risks. Guess what? Turns out you can teach an old dog new tricks. Read full review
100
VarietyPeter DebrugeOct 14, 2012
Putting the "intelligence" in MI6, Skyfall reps a smart, savvy and incredibly satisfying addition to the 007 oeuvre, one that places Judi Dench's M at the center of the action. Read full review
91
Christian Science MonitorPeter RainerNov 9, 2012
He's 9Mendes) discovered his stride here, a blend of thrills and sabotage and deep-dish emotionalism. The powerful performances by Craig and Dench surely owe a great deal to his indulgences. Read full review
91
The A.V. ClubKeith PhippsNov 7, 2012
Skyfall doesn't forget it has to be an exciting spy film above all, but from its first scene, it ratchets up the drama in ways that have little to do with action. Read full review
90
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzNov 8, 2012
The great success for Mendes and Craig, however, is that while Skyfall obviously has a great fondness for the past, it's not trapped there. It also anticipates Bond's future. In this immensely satisfying movie, so do we. Read full review
90
SalonAndrew O'HehirNov 8, 2012
Skyfall is a push-pull between the past and the present, an effort to drag a symbol of maleness as iconic as the Union Jack bulldog on M's desk into a world of approximate gender equality and approximate acceptance of sexual difference. I'm not sure how sustainable that is over the long term; this is a smashing entertainment, but also one that feels over-engineered and constrained by its origins. Read full review
90
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternNov 8, 2012
We need 007, even after half a century of his ups and downs in various incarnations, to remind us how deeply pleasurable an action thriller can be. The latest addition to the Bond canon goes beyond thrilling into chilling and enthralling, plus a kind of stirring that has nothing to do with martinis. Read full review
90
NPRBob MondelloNov 8, 2012
The stars and the explosions are backed up by plenty of class - Ralph Fiennes as M's new boss, Naomie Harris and Berenice Marlohe as a couple of the requisite Bond beauties, and Judi Dench finally given the space to turn M into a full-bodied character. Read full review
90
The Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthyOct 14, 2012
Dramatically gripping while still brandishing a droll undercurrent of humor, this beautifully made film will certainly be embraced as one of the best Bonds by loyal fans worldwide and leaves you wanting the next one to turn up sooner than four years from now. Read full review
88
Movie NationRoger MooreNov 5, 2015
Skyfall is far and away the best, and the most British of the Daniel Craig-James Bond movies. Read full review
88
Miami HeraldRene RodriguezNov 9, 2012
Mendes' approach to action is classical and elegant - no manic editing and blurry unintelligible images here - but what makes the movie truly special is the attention he gives his actors. Read full review
88
USA TodayClaudia PuigNov 8, 2012
With a powerful jolt, 007 feels relevant again, with serious questions about espionage vs. cyber hacking amid the fun. Read full review
88
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe WilliamsNov 8, 2012
Ultimately Skyfall is rooted in tradition - and in British soil. A pastoral drive to Bond's boyhood home (in a kind of car that will delight purists) opens the gates to some psychological background, and given the true-love subtext of "Casino Royale," it's not surprising that there's an emotional payoff here. Read full review
88
Charlotte ObserverLawrence ToppmanNov 8, 2012
Best of all, we finally learn something about Bond's origins: The movie takes its title from his ancestral home in Scotland. (A nod to Connery, perhaps?) Read full review
88
Rolling StonePeter TraversNov 8, 2012
This is Bond like you've never seen him, almost Freudian in his vulnerability. And a dynamite Daniel Craig, never better in the role, nails Bond's ferocity and feeling. Read full review
88
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsNov 7, 2012
While the protracted third act doesn't kill the two-hour, 23-minute picture, "Casino Royale" remains the best of the recent Bonds, with Skyfall just a notch below it. Read full review
88
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliNov 6, 2012
Skyfall can take its place alongside "From Russia with Love," "Goldfinger," and "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" as the best Bond can offer. Read full review
88
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)James AdamsOct 26, 2012
Skyfall is one of the best Bonds in the 50-year history of moviedom's most successful franchise. Read full review
88
Slant MagazineJohn SemleyOct 26, 2012
Bond's latest is a remarkable high watermark for the series: at once solemn and deeply funny, sexy and sad, self-conscious without all the rib-bruising elbowing. Read full review
85
MovielineAlison WillmoreNov 7, 2012
Working with the great cinematographer Roger Deakins, Mendes also presents some stunning sequences of beauty in a film where you might not expect such a thing. Read full review
83
The PlaylistOliver LytteltonOct 14, 2012
Best of all is the bad guy. Javier Bardem was always a tantalizing choice to play a Bond villain, and his Silva is a terrific creation, and certainly the most memorable villain in the series in decades. Read full review
80
The TelegraphRobbie CollinNov 5, 2015
Mendes...lets the quieter moments breathe.... But Mendes is rather good at being loud, too, and his nine times Oscar-nominated cinematographer Roger Deakins makes the wildly ambitious action sequences the most beautiful in Bond’s 50-year career. Read full review
80
Time Out LondonDave CalhounNov 5, 2015
Skyfall is a highly distinctive Bond movie. It has some stunning visual touches.... Also, it mostly manages to convince us that there’s something at stake by giving a hint of Bond’s emotional life beyond this story. Read full review
80
CineVueJoe WalshNov 5, 2015
Skyfall drips in the legacy of Bond, standing tall as an action-packed swansong to Britain's best loved hero of recent years, whilst also showing a great deal of affection for the decades of movies that have come before. Read full review
80
Los Angeles TimesBetsy SharkeyNov 7, 2012
In Skyfall, Mendes has given us a thrilling new chapter in a franchise that by all rights should have been gasping for air - which really makes him the hero of this saga. Read full review
80
The New York TimesManohla DargisNov 7, 2012
As Bond sprints from peril to pleasure, Mr. Craig and the other players - including an exceptional, wittily venal Javier Bardem, a sleek Ralph Fiennes and a likable Ben Whishaw - turn out to be the most spectacular of Mr. Mendes's special effects. Read full review
80
Time OutKeith UhlichNov 6, 2012
Skyfall has the feel of both a ceremonial commemoration and a franchise-rebooting celebration, especially in the ways it attempts to too cutely sync up the '60s-era Bond mythos (casual misogyny and all) with the more complicatedly "Bourne"-inflected recent episodes. Read full review
80
New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinNov 5, 2012
It's an unusually funny, literate, worked-out script, and Mendes seems hell-bent on making the best Bond since "Goldfinger" - or the best, period, given that he exhumes Bond's old Aston Martin only to shoot it cheekily to pieces. Read full review
80
New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierOct 22, 2012
Though a notch below "Royale," Skyfall follows that reboot's lead, making a now 50-year-old icon as cool as when he began. Read full review
80
EmpireKim NewmanOct 17, 2012
Skyfall is pretty much all you could want from a 21st Century Bond: cool but not camp, respectful of tradition but up to the moment, serious in its thrills and relatively complex in its characters but with the sense of fun that hasn't always been evident lately. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleNov 8, 2012
Skyfall is a different kind of Bond movie, one that works just fine on its own terms, but a steady diet of this might kill the franchise. One Skyfall is enough. Read full review
75
Washington PostAnn HornadayNov 8, 2012
From the first smoky notes of a theme song sung by Adele, it's clear that Skyfall will be both classic and of-the-moment. Read full review
75
Portland OregonianMarc MohanNov 8, 2012
With gadgets, girls and globe-trotting held to a minimum, Skyfall, could, for long stretches, be mistaken for just another 21st-century thriller, albeit a well-made and intelligent one. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaNov 8, 2012
Skyfall is certainly the most cultured Bond film to come along in some time. It's also the first of the three Craig endeavors to seriously (and wittily) acknowledge its pedigree. Read full review
75
ObserverRex ReedNov 6, 2012
Bond is back, and so is high-octane entertainment. Read full review
70
TimeRichard CorlissNov 5, 2015
While trading on viewers’ familiarity with the series’ venerable fetishes (a cheer rises at the sight of Bond’s old Aston Martin and the sound of Monty Norman’s guitar theme from Dr. No), Skyfall has the life, grandeur and gravity of a satisfying, stand-alone entertainment. Read full review
70
Village VoiceKarina LongworthNov 7, 2012
As much as it's open about its paranoia of the new, Skyfall's fatal misstep is its slavish hewing to event-movie trends. Like this summer's Spider-Man, Batman, and Avengers movies, Skyfall seems to exist primarily to set up the events of subsequent films. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleKimberley JonesNov 7, 2012
What's in a name? Lately, less and less. With Daniel Craig's third go at 007, I'm not sure there's much left that distinguishes Bond from Bourne from Batman. They're all slurping from the same soup – think: death-haunted, self-righteous, tight-lipped and -quipped, parkour enthusiast. Read full review
60
SlateDana StevensNov 9, 2012
Skyfall leaves you wondering whether this incarnation of the character has anywhere left to go. It's the portrait of a spy at the end of his rope by an actor who seems close to his. Read full review
60
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike ScottNov 9, 2012
The sky is far from falling on the Bond franchise. In fact, it is as good as it has ever been. What's more, Craig is reportedly on board for at least two more outings, so Q had better get to work on those bifocals because 007 is no where near ready for retirement. Read full review
60
The New YorkerDavid DenbyNov 7, 2012
It would be lovely to announce that the new Bond movie is scintillating, or at least rambunctiously exciting, but Skyfall, in the recent mode of Christopher Nolan's "Batman" films, is a gloomy, dark action thriller, and almost completely without the cynical playfulness that drew us to the series in the first place. [12 Nov. 2012, p.94]
60
Boxoffice MagazineJames RocchiOct 23, 2012
While director Sam Mendes, aided and abetted by a crack technical team, delivers big-screen action with panache and style, something about this Bond feels a little off. Read full review
60
The GuardianXan BrooksOct 14, 2012
All of which works terrifically well up to a point. Read full review
50
Boston GlobeWesley MorrisNov 7, 2012
These are truly tedious stakes for an action movie. The franchise isn't worried about world safety. It's fretting over whether to start wearing Depends. Read full review
50
New York PostKyle SmithNov 7, 2012
In the utterly routine effort Skyfall, we're actually expected to cheer each chord we've heard so many times (here's a martini shaker! Look, it's a Walther PPK! And there's an Aston Martin!) We've been turned into wretched Pavlovian dogs, salivating at the bell instead of the snack. The highlight, by far, is a classic animated credit sequence: Adele, you are the new Shirley Bassey. Read full review
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