Critic Reviews
58
Metascore
Mixed or Average
positive
13(52%)
mixed
8(32%)
negative
4(16%)
Showing 25 Critic Reviews
90
The James Bond production team has found its second wind with Licence to Kill, a cocktail of high-octane action, spectacle and drama...The thrills-and-spills chases are superbly orchestrated as pic spins at breakneck speed through its South Florida and Central American locations.
88
On the basis of this second performance as Bond, Dalton can have the role as long as he enjoys it. He makes an effective Bond - lacking Sean Connery's grace and humor, and Roger Moore's suave self-mockery, but with a lean tension and a toughness that is possibly more contemporary.
88
If Licence to Kill has one of Bond`s best heavies, it also has one of his best heroines in Carey Lowell, a strapping brunet who plays an ex-Army pilot reluctantly enrolled on Bond`s side. Lowell`s line readings may be only adequate, but she moves with the grace and vigor an action movie needs.
80
The series has been with us since 1962 and, like many another old timer, tends to repeat itself. Yet, every once in a while, it pulls in its stomach, pops the gun from its cummerbund, arches its eyebrow and gets off another bull's-eye. The newest, Licence to Kill, is probably one of the five or six best of Bond.
75
Not since Dr. No has 007 been so cool and ruthless, and never has a plot been this close to realistic plausibility.
75
One of the best of the 16 Bond films, thanks to Dalton's athletic, tough and deadly new 007.
70
If Licence to Kill added more than just scenes with Q to lighten the load, if it provided a love interest as compelling as Vesper and more engaging than Lowell's whiny Pam Bouvier, this Bond could have been one of the instant greats, instead of one that is better appreciated with age. The movie is not perfect, but a lot of what works now in the series got its start in Dalton's last mission as James Bond.
70
Despite some shaky narrative continuity and muddled motivations, this manages to move pretty briskly, and the action sequences are generally well handled, especially at the climax.
70
A pure, rousingly entertaining action movie which makes it clear that "binary oppositions" are good guys vs. bad guys and "ideological meanings" are us vs. them[17 July 1989, p.52]
63
Licence to Kill continues the salvage operation begun in The Living Daylights and rescues a series that was in danger of shooting itself in the foot.
