The Aeronauts
Entertainment One | Release Date: December 6, 2019 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
60
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 37 Critic Reviews
Positive:
22
Mixed:
12
Negative:
3
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
Screen DailyFionnuala HalliganSep 9, 2019
A thrilling, action-packed, wide-vista yarn from the sharp quills of Jack Thorne and co-writer and director Tom Harper, this Amazon-backed project is deceptively simple yet surprisingly deft. Read full review
80
The New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisDec 5, 2019
Gorgeous and goofy, fanciful and unrepentantly old-fashioned, this Victorian adventure (it’s set in 1862) delights much more when its head is in the clouds than when its feet are on the ground. Read full review
80
The Observer (UK)Simran HansNov 5, 2019
Inspired by real events, the film is at its best when it leans into the action-adventure genre; director Tom Harper smartly uses camera-shake and closeups to immerse the audience in the weather’s volatility. Read full review
80
EmpireIan FreerNov 2, 2019
The title might sound like something from Marvel Phase Six, but The Aeronauts is an exhilarating period flight of fancy, occasionally weighed down by backstory, but buoyed by Redmayne and especially Jones. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthySep 4, 2019
The Aeronauts achieves impressive elevation as a bracing and sympathetic account of two early and very different aviators who together reached literal new heights in a perilous field of endeavor. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperDec 5, 2019
We’re not buying ALL the hype and hokum sugarcoating this fact-based fairy tale, but we’re happy to come along for this particular ride. Read full review
75
ObserverRex ReedDec 5, 2019
The dialogue is dull as dried glue, but the acting is fine, although the boundless range and skill of Redmayne is wasted, which might account for the reason he doesn’t appear to enjoy the ride as much as he could. Unfortunately, we’ve seen it all before with motorcycles, submarines, airplanes and ships at sea in peril instead of hot-air balloons. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleDec 4, 2019
If you have any fear of heights, The Aeronauts is one of the most excruciating movie experiences since “The Walk” (2015), which replicated Philippe Petit’s high-wire stunt between the World Trade Center towers in 1974. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliDec 4, 2019
Overall, this is a well-acted peek back in history to an era when scientific and engineering techniques currently taken for granted were in their pioneering stages, impelled forward by humanity’s insatiable desire to explore and conquer new vistas. Read full review
75
The PlaylistGregory EllwoodSep 4, 2019
A hodgepodge of a story that only really works when Glaisher and Wren are in the sky. And when they are it’s absolutely gorgeous. Read full review
75
TheWrapSasha StoneSep 4, 2019
The Aeronauts serves an important purpose as an aspirational film for young girls who either love science, or whose parents hope they see the movie and understand that women can be just as excited about taking a hero’s journey as any man. Read full review
70
The New YorkerAnthony LaneDec 2, 2019
Here’s the paradox: the closer The Aeronauts gets to peak silliness, the more beautiful it becomes. Read full review
70
VarietyTomris LafflySep 4, 2019
The duo [of Redmayne and Jones] hand-in-hand elevates [The Aeronauts] ... from a flimsy action-adventure to something worth watching on the biggest possible screen, even if it operates on a handful of clichés with little character-based substance to speak of. Read full review
67
Entertainment WeeklyLeah GreenblattDec 6, 2019
Jones reportedly did nearly all the stunts herself in a real balloon, and she makes the stakes feel fretfully real despite the dreamy, almost painterly quality of George Steel’s cinematography. By the time the story comes back to earth, though, that urgency is largely gone with the wind, and the film returns to what it was: a whimsical, oddly airless curiosity. Read full review
67
IndieWireEric KohnSep 4, 2019
There’s enough potential with the balloon’s feats to justify an entire feature-length experience set within its basket, but The Aeronauts constantly interrupts the journey to shoehorn random tangents on the ground, and busies up the drama with underdeveloped side characters. Read full review
65
Paste MagazineOktay Ege Kozak Dec 5, 2019
There’s a terrific 50-minute fan edit somewhere in The Aeronauts, but as far as the theatrical experience goes, half of it is more than worth your time, if you’re willing to tolerate the other half. Read full review
65
TheWrapTodd GilchristDec 4, 2019
Harper’s is that rare movie that works much better when the characters are finding solutions and working together rather than falling into conflict and creating problems. Read full review
63
Movie NationRoger MooreDec 8, 2019
The script wastes far too much time on the whole “You don’t take me seriously, so I shan’t take YOU seriously!” Read full review
63
RogerEbert.comMonica CastilloDec 6, 2019
Although it’s stuffed with many cliches, The Aeronauts can feel like a rather enjoyable bit of historical fantasy. Read full review
63
The Associated PressJake CoyleDec 5, 2019
It’s Jones who dominates the film Read full review
63
The Seattle TimesMoira MacdonaldDec 5, 2019
It’s a pretty picture and a sweet adventure, and sometimes that’s enough. Read full review
63
Boston GlobeTy BurrDec 4, 2019
The best audiences for this thrilling confabulation may be younger ones: They’ll feel their minds expand with inspiration and be less inclined to deflate back to earth afterward. Somebody did something amazing back in 1862; The Aeronauts commemorates it with artifice, enthusiasm, and a smattering of the truth. Read full review
60
Rolling StonePeter TraversDec 3, 2019
The Aeronauts is hobbled time and again by the attempt to add the juice of fiction to a story that could and should have stood on its own. The truth, in Hollywood terms, is never enough. Read full review
60
The GuardianPeter BradshawSep 10, 2019
It is a film with charm and the chemistry between Jones and Redmayne has something rather platonic and even sibling-like, but that isn’t to say there isn’t a spark of sorts. Read full review
58
The A.V. ClubJesse HassengerNov 26, 2019
On the whole, The Aeronauts is a pretty good small-scale adventure movie. It’s also a pretty dull everything-else, the unceasing flashbacks providing multiple instances where telling might have been preferable to showing. Read full review
50
The AtlanticDavid SimsDec 10, 2019
The Aeronauts is as thin as the high-altitude air surrounding its heroes, a visually splendid thrill ride that somehow manages to feel entirely without dramatic stakes. But if it’s balloons you’re after, then this is the film to see. Read full review
50
TimeStephanie ZacharekDec 6, 2019
It’s all kind of fun. It’s also kind of dumb. Even though The Aeronauts is based on real people, none of this really happened, or at least not like this. Read full review
50
Los Angeles TimesKenneth TuranDec 5, 2019
The virtues of The Aeronauts are real but they are almost exclusively visual. Despite the hard work of acclaimed actors in what sounds on paper like a strong story, the drama presented is determinedly earth-bound. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleRichard WhittakerDec 4, 2019
Unfortunately, almost none of that astonishing true story makes it into The Aeronauts, a mangled retelling that cuts out Coxwell and replaces him with Amelia Wren (Jones), a gestalt character based on several women aerial explorers of the time. Read full review
50
Chicago TribuneTomris LaflyDec 3, 2019
Playing a pair of complementary trailblazers that start off on the wrong foot, the duo hand-in-hand elevates Harper’s 1862-set, based-on-a-true-story film, from a flimsy action-adventure to something worth watching on the biggest possible screen, even if it operates on a handful of clichés with little character-based substance to speak of. Read full review
48
IGNKristy PuchkoDec 5, 2019
The Aeronauts is a film flawed from its first concept. By blending fact and fiction so freely, Thorne and Harper turned a story of scientific discovery into a muddling romantic adventure that crashes and burns. Read full review
40
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike ScottJan 16, 2020
Frustratingly, whenever it begins to get going and pulses begin pounding, Harper brings things to a screeching halt by introducing flashback sequences to tell us the backstory of Jones’ invented character. Read full review
40
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternDec 5, 2019
A heavier-than-air adventure, set in Victorian England, that seldom rises above the level of elegant hokum. Read full review
40
The TelegraphHelen O'HaraOct 8, 2019
We know that this cast can produce magic together, and that this director can inject pace into unlikely topics. It’s just this one that seems to have feet of clay. Read full review
38
New York PostJohnny OleksinskiDec 4, 2019
For a film that takes place largely in a basket, Harper manages an epic mood. Nonetheless, you can’t help but feel swindled by Hollywood’s hot air. Read full review
38
Slant MagazineJake ColeDec 2, 2019
As a suspense film, it’s so sluggishly structured that it borders on the avant-garde. Read full review
37
Washington PostMark LiebermanDec 2, 2019
The Aeronauts is the second film this year by Harper to get a U.S. release, after “Wild Rose.” That film was excellent, with strong music and an effervescent star turn from newcomer Jessie Buckley. This one is, at moments, exhilarating — but not much else. Read full review
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