Enter a Rotten Tomatoes movie slug to inspect the stored movie, batches, snapshots, and reviews.
Movie ID: 1470
RT slug: never_let_me_go_2010
RT URL: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/never_let_me_go_2010
Release year: 2010
Runtime: 104 mins
Wide release date: —
Limited release date: 2010-09-15
Festival premiere date: —
Streaming release date: 2013-02-26
Tomatometer final: 71%
Audience score final: 70%
Genres: Drama, Sci-Fi
Directors: Mark Romanek
Writers: Alex Garland
Producers: Allon Reich, Andrew Macdonald
MPAA rating: R
Executive Producers: —
Created: 2026-10-13 20:02:33
Updated: 2026-10-13 20:02:33
Friends Kathy (Carey Mulligan), Tommy (Andrew Garfield) and Ruth (Keira Knightley) grow up together at a seemingly idyllic boarding school in the English countryside. When they leave the school and the horrible truth of their true purpose is revealed to them, they must simultaneously confront deep-seated feelings of love, jealousy and betrayal that threaten to tear their friendship asunder.
With Never Let Me Go, Mark Romanek has delivered a graceful adaptation that captures the spirit of the Ishiguro novel -- which will be precisely the problem for some viewers.
Canonical reviews: 186
Canonical fresh: 132
Canonical rotten: 54
Canonical calculated Tomatometer: 186 (132/54), 71% (70.968% raw)
Latest snapshot UTC: 2026-10-12 22:19:57
Snapshot Tomatometer: 71%
Snapshot review count: 186
Snapshot fresh count: 132
Snapshot rotten count: 54
Source note: Imported from manual review paste batch #4532 (full_snapshot)
| Company | Role |
|---|---|
| Fox | distributor |
| DNA Films | production |
| Film 4 | production |
| Fox Searchlight | production |
| Billing | Name | Character |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Carey Mulligan | Kathy |
| 2 | Andrew Garfield | Tommy |
| 3 | Keira Knightley | Ruth |
| 4 | Izzy Meikle-Small | Young Kathy |
| 5 | Ella Purnell | Young Ruth |
| Batch ID | Status | Mode | Created | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1488 | processed | — | 2026-10-13 20:02:33 | Processed successfully into movie_id=1470 using update_mode=merge_non_empty. |
| Batch ID | Local Snapshot | UTC Snapshot | Entered % | Entered Count | Status | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4532 | 2026-10-12 17:19:00 (America/Panama) | 2026-10-12 22:19:57 | 71% | 186 | processed | Mode=full_snapshot. Processed 186 row(s); 0 row error(s). Parsed unique reviews in this batch=186, fresh=132, rotten=54, tomatometer=71%. Net new reviews added=186, fresh=132, rotten=54. Current canonical totals=186 reviews, 132 fresh, 54 rotten, tomatometer=71% (70.968%). Entered review count matched parsed batch count (186). Entered tomatometer matched parsed batch value (71%). |
| ID | Critic | Outlet | Fresh? | Score | RT Time Raw | Approx Published UTC | Quote |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 288781 | Stephen A. Russell | Orion's Shoulder (Substack) | Fresh | — | 2025-03-06T05:04:59.000Z | 2025-03-06 05:04:59 | The psychological damage the reality of cloning unleashes in this acting tour de force of inexorable fate is as yuck-making as it’s possible to be. |
| 288782 | Michael Leader | Den of Geek | Fresh | 4/5 | 2024-05-07T20:46:36.000Z | 2024-05-07 20:46:36 | Ishiguro's gentle science fiction concept is rendered with melancholy subtlety by Romanek. |
| 288783 | Brian Eggert | Deep Focus Review | Fresh | 3.5/4 | 2023-08-03T03:00:46.000Z | 2023-08-03 03:00:46 | This disturbing narrative about believable characters in their fatalistic world offers an affecting drama that stays with the viewer long after the film has ended. |
| 288784 | Rene Jordan | El Nuevo Herald (Miami) | Fresh | — | 2022-08-04T23:21:04.000Z | 2022-08-04 23:21:04 | It's anxiously moving. But also the most morbid film human eyes have ever seen. [Full review in Spanish] |
| 288785 | Jason Adams | My New Plaid Pants | Fresh | — | 2022-01-10T20:30:59.000Z | 2022-01-10 20:30:59 | It steeps us in this haunted world with great delicacy, great beauty, and lets the harsh corners seep in slow |
| 288786 | James McMahon | NME (New Musical Express) | Fresh | 4.5/5 | 2021-05-25T20:30:52.000Z | 2021-05-25 20:30:52 | Awe inspiring filmmaking... |
| 288787 | Dustin Chang | Floating World | Fresh | — | 2021-03-21T19:40:35.000Z | 2021-03-21 19:40:35 | It was Kazuo Ishiguro's appropriation of this hope with young love that really spoke to me when I read the book. And it's carried out beautifully here by Mulligan, Keira Knightley and Andrew Garfield. |
| 288788 | James Croot | The Post NZ | Fresh | 3.5/5 | 2021-03-01T20:11:17.000Z | 2021-03-01 20:11:17 | Flawed but fascinating, the lasting impression of Never Let Me Go is perhaps best summed up by Kathy: "None of us really understand what we've lived through, or feel we've had enough time." |
| 288789 | Richard Propes | TheIndependentCritic.com | Fresh | 4.0/4.0 | 2020-09-18T10:01:26.000Z | 2020-09-18 10:01:26 | Romanek remains faithful to Ishiguro's literary vision. |
| 288790 | Nathanael Hood | Unseen Films | Fresh | 8/10 | 2020-06-07T16:20:12.000Z | 2020-06-07 16:20:12 | Garland brilliantly maintains the book's tone and the elusiveness of its setting. |
| 288791 | Kathi Maio | The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction | Fresh | — | 2020-03-06T21:11:58.000Z | 2020-03-06 21:11:58 | The performances are all first-rate. The film's look-washed out gray and windswept-is Brontësque and quite beautiful. |
| 288792 | Felicia Feaster | Charleston City Paper | Fresh | — | 2020-01-22T21:02:08.000Z | 2020-01-22 21:02:08 | It is a poem of a film. |
| 288793 | Brian D. Johnson | Maclean's Magazine | Fresh | — | 2019-08-20T20:21:27.000Z | 2019-08-20 20:21:27 | Mark Romanek conjures visions of mortality via elegiac images of England's cozy landscape and haunting architecture. He lets the film unfold as a delicate mood piece, sustaining a tone of aching beauty with remarkable control. |
| 288794 | Matthew Groizard | CineVue | Rotten | 2/5 | 2018-11-06T22:42:28.000Z | 2018-11-06 22:42:28 | In struggling to meet the profound levels of its literary forbearer, the film finds itself in that unfortunate no-man's land between light entertainment and high-end art - satisfying neither the movie aficionado nor the casual cinema-goer. |
| 288795 | Natasha Hodgson | CineVue | Fresh | 4/5 | 2018-11-06T18:56:09.000Z | 2018-11-06 18:56:09 | Tragic, beautiful and simultaneously strange and familiar, Never Let Me Go serves a unique slant on the universal human condition. |
| 288796 | Deborah Ross | The Spectator | Rotten | — | 2018-08-30T21:18:26.000Z | 2018-08-30 21:18:26 | Perhaps such passive solemnity is true to the book, but on screen, along with the sad tinkling piano and the sad violins that just won't quit, the overall effect is so enervating that you simply don't feel a damned thing. |
| 288797 | Charlie Jane Anders | io9.com | Rotten | — | 2018-05-21T21:36:26.000Z | 2018-05-21 21:36:26 | Never Let Me Go is an unrelentingly bleak film in which you watch these three characters grow up and march towards their doom. |
| 288798 | Kaleem Aftab | Independent (UK) | Rotten | — | 2018-05-15T00:36:58.000Z | 2018-05-15 00:36:58 | The lack of dramatic tension means it's difficult to emotionally connect with the central characters and their dilemma. |
| 288799 | Lynden Barber | Limelight | Fresh | — | 2018-01-03T23:18:11.000Z | 2018-01-03 23:18:11 | Only when the girls team up does the film start to fulfill its promise. |
| 288800 | Candice Frederick | Reel Talk Online | Rotten | C+ | 2017-09-08T23:54:36.000Z | 2017-09-08 23:54:36 | The script could have done better to translate the concept. It works as a big picture concept, but doesn't get the treatment it deserves here. |
| 288801 | Lindy West | The Stranger (Seattle, WA) | Fresh | — | 2017-08-29T23:46:47.000Z | 2017-08-29 23:46:47 | It is gorgeous and sad. |
| 288802 | Peg Aloi | Cinefantastique | Fresh | — | 2017-08-08T17:51:27.000Z | 2017-08-08 17:51:27 | What makes this film so haunting is not simply its frightening take on our near future (treating as if it's the recent past): it's also in the film's gorgeous photography and dreamy music. |
| 288803 | Blake Griffin | We Got This Covered | Rotten | 7/10 | 2013-11-11T11:35:51.000Z | 2013-11-11 11:35:51 | Emotionally stunted at times, Never Let Me Go gets lost in its own melancholy and fails to live up to its potential. |
| 288804 | Kevin Carr | 7M Pictures | Fresh | 3.5/5 | 2013-11-05T09:30:29.000Z | 2013-11-05 09:30:29 | a beautifully acted and heartbreaking story of young love, but it opens up more thoughts that just from that angle of storytelling |
| 288805 | Leonard Maltin | leonardmaltin.com | Fresh | — | 2011-08-19T11:45:53.000Z | 2011-08-19 11:45:53 | I came to this film knowing nothing about it, except that it was based on the highly-acclaimed novel by Kazuo Ishiguru. I had no foreknowledge of its story or premise-and I'm glad... |
| 288806 | Wesley Lovell | Cinema Sight | Fresh | 4/4 | 2011-08-15T12:53:11.000Z | 2011-08-15 12:53:11 | Melancholy and futility define this subtle future-set drama about three children who grow up knowing that they'll never own themselves or their own bodies. |
| 288807 | Simon Miraudo | Quickflix | Fresh | 4/5 | 2011-04-04T22:07:22.000Z | 2011-04-04 22:07:22 | Although [the] film adaptation does indeed fall short of the brilliance of the source material (and will likely distance viewers even more than the book ever did), it manages to convey the novel's most important themes, and most affecting moments. |
| 288808 | Dave White | Movies.com | Fresh | 3.5/5 | 2011-04-04T13:32:55.000Z | 2011-04-04 13:32:55 | Mark Romanek manages to make that very real(ish) world look and feel totally alien and hermetically sealed, a gray/blue/green/brown tragedy terrarium that both perfectly colorless and incredibly, inescapably sad. |
| 288809 | Julie Rigg | MovieTime, ABC Radio National | Fresh | — | 2011-04-01T13:34:24.000Z | 2011-04-01 13:34:24 | It's also a film which affirms what is valuable about life. I think this film is a must-see. |
| 288810 | Leigh Paatsch | Herald Sun (Australia) | Fresh | 3/5 | 2011-04-01T13:33:30.000Z | 2011-04-01 13:33:30 | Though often moving at a glacial pace, this mood piece -- aptly described as a refined romantic drama with a cerebral sci-fi twist -- rarely stays in the same place for long. |
| 288811 | Evan Williams | The Australian | Fresh | 3.5/5 | 2011-04-01T13:32:32.000Z | 2011-04-01 13:32:32 | We are rewarded with many scenes of poignant beauty and touching performances in the central roles. |
| 288812 | Jim Schembri | The Age (Australia) | Fresh | 3/5 | 2011-03-31T15:05:03.000Z | 2011-03-31 15:05:03 | Director Mark Romanek (One Hour Photo) gives the slow-burning adult drama a nostalgic, almost lyrical glow where hope and acceptance override any impulse to rebel or even question. |
| 288813 | Matthew Toomey | ABC Radio (Australia) | Rotten | B- | 2011-03-30T18:28:15.000Z | 2011-03-30 18:28:15 | Whilst I was intrigued by certain elements, I left the theatre with a feeling of disappointment. It was like I hadn't seen the whole story. |
| 288814 | David Stratton | At the Movies (Australia) | Rotten | 3/5 | 2011-03-30T12:51:07.000Z | 2011-03-30 12:51:07 | As a triangular love story, this doesn't really soar either, despite good performances from a hip young cast, and the end result is that a story that should have been terribly affecting, isn't. |
| 288815 | Paul Byrnes | Sydney Morning Herald | Fresh | 4.5/5 | 2011-03-30T12:50:14.000Z | 2011-03-30 12:50:14 | Real men will see this and weep, as I did. It is one of the most moving and profound films in a long time. |
| 288816 | CJ Johnson | Film Mafia | Fresh | 3/5 | 2011-03-30T12:49:24.000Z | 2011-03-30 12:49:24 | It is a downer -- a heavy downer -- there's absolutely no denying that. I recommend it highly, but not if you're looking at something light to cheer you up. |
| 288817 | Annette Basile | FILMINK (Australia) | Fresh | — | 2011-03-30T12:48:18.000Z | 2011-03-30 12:48:18 | Driven by terrific lead performances, this achingly beautiful work challenges audiences emotionally and intellectually. |
| 288818 | Nick Dent | Sunday Mail (Australia) | Fresh | 3.5/5 | 2011-03-30T12:47:42.000Z | 2011-03-30 12:47:42 | While it's not exactly uplifting, this touching tale effectively tackles confronting questions for mankind with nothing but grace. |
| 288819 | Clem Bastow | The Vine | Fresh | 4/5 | 2011-03-30T12:46:56.000Z | 2011-03-30 12:46:56 | Never Let Me Go offers an awful, enduring insight into what it must be like to have your entire being dismissed as well. |
| 288820 | Glenn Dunks | Trespass | Rotten | — | 2011-03-30T12:46:08.000Z | 2011-03-30 12:46:08 | Never Let Me Go is such a curiously muted viewing experience. Everything is there for a three-tissue weepie, but it never quite comes together. |
| 288821 | Andrew L. Urban | Urban Cinefile | Fresh | — | 2011-03-25T23:23:12.000Z | 2011-03-25 23:23:12 | It's a subtle film of nuances, played out as an emotional journey of three people in not a future setting but the reinvented recent past. |
| 288822 | Louise Keller | Urban Cinefile | Fresh | — | 2011-03-25T23:22:27.000Z | 2011-03-25 23:22:27 | A sobering film |
| 288823 | Thomas Caldwell | Cinema Autopsy | Fresh | 4.5/5 | 2011-03-20T16:28:48.000Z | 2011-03-20 16:28:48 | Never Let Me Go is a beautiful and satisfyingly melancholic story of mortality, destiny, love and loss. |
| 288824 | Pablo Villaça | Cinema em Cena | Fresh | 4/5 | 2011-03-19T12:22:29.000Z | 2011-03-19 12:22:29 | Poderia ser perfeitamente descrito como uma combinao curiosa entre Vestgios do Dia e o clssico 1984. |
| 288825 | Matt Glasby | Flicks (AU, NZ, UK) | Fresh | 3/5 | 2011-03-15T15:55:05.000Z | 2011-03-15 15:55:05 | A film that wants to cry, but can't remember how. |
| 288826 | Mark Pfeiffer | Reel Times: Reflections on Cinema | Fresh | A | 2011-03-09T09:36:55.000Z | 2011-03-09 09:36:55 | Director Mark Romanek and cinematographer Adam Kimmel employ a nostalgic and otherworldly visual sensibility to evoke the golden years of innocence and ignorance. |
| 288827 | Michael Bonner | Uncut Magazine [UK] | Fresh | — | 2011-02-23T05:35:32.000Z | 2011-02-23 05:35:32 | Despite the grinding bleakness, it's a tremendous film. |
| 288828 | Alistair Harkness | Scotsman | Fresh | 4/5 | 2011-02-14T09:22:37.000Z | 2011-02-14 09:22:37 | Romanek deploys an elegant, deceptively simple visual style here which helps keep the subtle performances front and centre. The end result is a low-key sci-fi film that's strange and sad. |
| 288829 | Henry Fitzherbert | Daily Express (UK) | Rotten | 2/5 | 2011-02-14T09:15:30.000Z | 2011-02-14 09:15:30 | Daft and dull. |
| 288830 | Anne Wollenberg | SFX Magazine | Fresh | 4/5 | 2011-02-11T10:00:43.000Z | 2011-02-11 10:00:43 | Achingly sad at times, with outstanding performances, it avoids tedious dissection of the issues it raises, making for a careful, delicate meditation on the value and fleeting nature of time and human life. |
| 288831 | Unknown Critic | Independent (UK) | Fresh | 3/5 | 2011-02-11T05:15:26.000Z | 2011-02-11 05:15:26 | — |
| 288832 | Christopher Tookey | Daily Mail (UK) | Rotten | 2/5 | 2011-02-10T17:03:18.000Z | 2011-02-10 17:03:18 | The piece comes across as uneventful, devoid of tension and disappointingly superficial in its view of a parallel dystopia. |
| 288833 | Shaun Munro | What Culture | Fresh | 3.5/5 | 2011-02-10T09:59:16.000Z | 2011-02-10 09:59:16 | It is a film almost unremittingly hopeless in its cruel finality, packing a crucial emotional punch, ending with a chilling monologue that reminds us of the tale's universality. |
| 288834 | Matt Bochenski | Little White Lies | Fresh | 4/5 | 2011-02-10T07:42:46.000Z | 2011-02-10 07:42:46 | Deeply moving. |
| 288835 | Brian Pendreigh | Radio Times | Fresh | 3/5 | 2011-02-10T07:24:35.000Z | 2011-02-10 07:24:35 | While the film has powerful individual scenes and the performances of Mulligan and Garfield convey the anguish of their plight, the work as a whole remains curiously uninvolving. |
| 288836 | Nigel Andrews | Financial Times | Fresh | 3/5 | 2011-02-09T14:15:53.000Z | 2011-02-09 14:15:53 | I am told by Ishiguro fans that only stone-hearted people fail to weep at the tale's outcome on the page. The film, by its form's nature, puts too much reality before us. |
| 288837 | Tom Huddleston | Time Out | Rotten | 2/5 | 2011-02-09T06:41:59.000Z | 2011-02-09 06:41:59 | Pretty, empty, and immediately forgettable. |
| 288838 | Lisa Giles-Keddie | Real.com | Fresh | 3/5 | 2011-02-09T06:38:54.000Z | 2011-02-09 06:38:54 | Understated, ethereal British elegance in its style and cinematography ... churlish and unforgiving in love and life, and one of the most discreetly disturbing films you will see. |
| 288839 | Roz Laws | Birmingham Post | Fresh | 4/5 | 2011-02-09T06:34:16.000Z | 2011-02-09 06:34:16 | A compelling film which lingers in the memory after viewing. |
| 288840 | Rob Daniel | Sky Cinema | Fresh | 5/5 | 2011-02-09T06:24:45.000Z | 2011-02-09 06:24:45 | Pragmatic and bound by grim duty drilled into her and her friends, Mulligan's Kathy is a masterclass in contained sadness and nothing less than remarkable. |
| 288841 | Robbie Collin | News of the World | Fresh | 4/5 | 2011-02-07T05:36:29.000Z | 2011-02-07 05:36:29 | Why the hell is this film not on the awards shortlists? Were voters THAT turned off when the cast turned up bongoed on Moet on Film 2010? Or did they just need to make sure there was room on the best actress roster for Annette Ruddy Bening? |
| 288842 | Dan Jolin | Empire Magazine | Fresh | 4/5 | 2011-02-07T04:38:47.000Z | 2011-02-07 04:38:47 | A beautifully realised adaptation of a profoundly affecting novel. |
| 288843 | James O'Ehley | iAfrica.com | Fresh | — | 2011-02-01T01:02:36.000Z | 2011-02-01 01:02:36 | The movie may be too understated for its own good ultimately . . . |
| 288844 | Ellen E Jones | Total Film | Rotten | 2/5 | 2011-01-31T08:00:43.000Z | 2011-01-31 08:00:43 | The pupils' failure to question their fate plays more like lethargy than tragically repressed emotion. |
| 288845 | John Esther | UR Chicago Magazine | Rotten | — | 2011-01-03T16:22:19.000Z | 2011-01-03 16:22:19 | Rather than create a haunting nightmarish history from which we may be unable to awake from today, the use of [the] anachronistic trope in 'Never Let Me Go' only de-empathizes the audience from the film's bigger and brighter ideas. |
| 288846 | Gabe Leibowitz | Film and Felt | Rotten | 40/100 | 2010-12-28T15:56:48.000Z | 2010-12-28 15:56:48 | Structurally and emotionally, Never Let Me Go is a mess, a sci-fi love triangle that left me completely cold. |
| 288847 | Bruce Bennett | Spectrum (St. George, Utah) | Rotten | B- | 2010-12-27T20:59:15.000Z | 2010-12-27 20:59:15 | Mulligan is brilliant again but this chilly, sci-fi love story gets mired in tedium and frustrates with lots of unanswered questions-probably by design. |
| 288848 | Kimberly Gadette | Indie Movies Online | Fresh | 9/10 | 2010-12-20T08:10:33.000Z | 2010-12-20 08:10:33 | Nothing about this movie is casual. Perhaps the most impeccably-shot film of the year, every quiet word, every move, every unspoken desire leads us, if we so choose, to reflect on our own paths. |
| 288849 | Jeffrey Chen | ReelTalk Movie Reviews | Fresh | 7/10 | 2010-12-13T19:25:34.000Z | 2010-12-13 19:25:34 | Revels in a simplicity that appears to be reaching for the profound, though it can't quite make it. |
| 288850 | Robert Roten | Laramie Movie Scope | Fresh | B+ | 2010-12-09T15:03:40.000Z | 2010-12-09 15:03:40 | This is not the way human beings behave. But, suspending disbelief on this, the rest of the film is very well made and it does allow some important perspectives on thorny moral issues. |
| 288851 | Dennis Schwartz | Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews | Fresh | B | 2010-12-08T07:10:17.000Z | 2010-12-08 07:10:17 | An uneven effort. |
| 288852 | Nick Deigman | Fan The Fire | Fresh | 4/5 | 2010-12-07T14:05:26.000Z | 2010-12-07 14:05:26 | Mulligan is the lynchpin of this film; her doe-eyed softness and melancholy smile perfectly encapsulating our heroine. |
| 288853 | Marcy Dermansky | About.com | Fresh | 3/5 | 2010-11-21T08:49:38.000Z | 2010-11-21 08:49:38 | An impeccably told story that failed to break my heart |
| 288854 | Charlie Lyne | Ultra Culture | Fresh | — | 2010-11-14T16:01:11.000Z | 2010-11-14 16:01:11 | The performances ... are uniformly great and Romanek's direction holds the whole thing together right up until the last act, where it begins to fall apart a bit. |
| 288855 | Mike Scott | Times-Picayune | Fresh | 3/4 | 2010-10-27T08:16:50.000Z | 2010-10-27 08:16:50 | It is a period piece, it is a sci-fi drama, it is a romance. There even is a dash of horror in there. It's an unlikely melange, but it combines for something both refreshingly original and quietly affecting. |
| 288856 | Corey Hall | Metro Times (Detroit, MI) | Fresh | C+ | 2010-10-22T10:28:15.000Z | 2010-10-22 10:28:15 | Occasionally moments of heartbreaking emotionally honesty bring this science fiction clone film to life |
| 288857 | Lori Hoffman | Atlantic City Weekly | Rotten | 2/4 | 2010-10-21T07:31:16.000Z | 2010-10-21 07:31:16 | ... I suspect for anyone who was not enchanted by the novel, it is a tale that remains unsatisfying and empty ... |
| 288858 | Ken Hanke | Mountain Xpress (Asheville, NC) | Fresh | 4.5/5 | 2010-10-20T05:23:12.000Z | 2010-10-20 05:23:12 | Hands-down the best film I saw this week. It's also one of the most depressing. |
| 288859 | John Beifuss | Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN) | Fresh | 3/4 | 2010-10-15T09:12:26.000Z | 2010-10-15 09:12:26 | Can be viewed as a sort of update of the Frankenstein myth, moved to the more clinical and less pious miracles-of-science era of the late 20th century; as in Mary Shelley's novel, the definition of humanity -- the soul, even -- is a primary concern. |
| 288860 | Peter Bradshaw | Guardian | Fresh | 3/5 | 2010-10-14T17:13:56.000Z | 2010-10-14 17:13:56 | The film withholds the explicit fear and passion that another kind of treatment might have aimed for, but it works as a cogent, subdued parable of mortality. |
| 288862 | Matthew Turner | ViewLondon | Fresh | 4/5 | 2010-10-14T05:20:22.000Z | 2010-10-14 05:20:22 | Beautifully shot, superbly written and powerfully emotional, this is a haunting, sci-fi tinged drama with terrific performances from both the three leads and the child actors playing their younger selves. |
| 288861 | Rich Cline | Shadows on the Wall | Fresh | 4/5 | 2010-10-14T05:20:22.000Z | 2010-10-14 05:20:22 | Based on the Kazuo Ishiguro novel, this haunting drama may be set in a parallel reality, but what it has to say about human hopes and societal ambition is deeply relevant. It's also beautifully directed and acted. |
| 288863 | Tim Robey | Daily Telegraph (UK) | Fresh | 3/5 | 2010-10-13T19:16:28.000Z | 2010-10-13 19:16:28 | Fashioning the book's secrets into thriller-ish twists would have been the absolute worst decision Alex Garland's screenplay might have made, and it's much too smart and controlled for that. Still, it's possible to wish it were a little more radical. |
| 288864 | Stella Papamichael | Digital Spy | Rotten | 2/5 | 2010-10-13T18:32:59.000Z | 2010-10-13 18:32:59 | It's all so lamely poetic. |
| 288865 | Nick Curtis | London Evening Standard | Fresh | 3/5 | 2010-10-13T18:28:41.000Z | 2010-10-13 18:28:41 | Like all the best sci-fi, it's about how we live now, rather than the future. |
| 288866 | Susan Granger | www.susangranger.com | Rotten | 5/10 | 2010-10-13T12:34:53.000Z | 2010-10-13 12:34:53 | Subtle, solemn and strangely ponderous, it's exquisitely mounted but filled with chilling despair. |
| 288867 | Matt Brunson | Creative Loafing | Fresh | 2.5/4 | 2010-10-09T11:53:34.000Z | 2010-10-09 11:53:34 | A fairly good movie that had greatness within its grasp. |
| 288868 | Robert W. Butler | Kansas City Star | Rotten | 2.5/4 | 2010-10-08T16:36:26.000Z | 2010-10-08 16:36:26 | Never Let Me Go offers a potent blend of intriguing premise, fine acting and quiet poignancy. Usually this would leave me an emotional wreck. Yet it didn't. |
| 288869 | Amy Biancolli | Houston Chronicle | Fresh | 2.5/4 | 2010-10-08T15:47:30.000Z | 2010-10-08 15:47:30 | Never Let Me Go is gorgeous. And depressing. It's exquisitely acted. And depressing. It's romantic, profound and superbly crafted, shot with the self-contained radiance of a snow globe. And it's depressing. |
| 288870 | Tom Long | Detroit News | Rotten | C+ | 2010-10-08T14:32:37.000Z | 2010-10-08 14:32:37 | Oddly cold and detached, as if director Mark Romanek and screenwriter Alex Garland couldn't decide precisely how to interpret Kazuo Ishiguro's popular novel and so they just laid it out flat. And flat it feels. |
| 288871 | Eric Melin | Scene-Stealers.com | Fresh | 3.5/4 | 2010-10-08T11:51:50.000Z | 2010-10-08 11:51:50 | Like great science fiction should, it serves as an allegory and inspires some deep thinking about the world we live in now. |
| 288872 | Lawrence Toppman | Charlotte Observer | Fresh | 3.5/4 | 2010-10-08T11:00:39.000Z | 2010-10-08 11:00:39 | Anyone who saw the Oscar-nominated Mulligan in An Education knows what she can do. If you didn't, you're in for the kind of quietly revelatory acting that portends a brilliant career. |
| 288873 | Kimberley Jones | Austin Chronicle | Fresh | 3/5 | 2010-10-08T10:36:15.000Z | 2010-10-08 10:36:15 | It's Knightley, with her slow waking to bitterness, who stuns in a secondary role. |
| 288874 | Bill Gibron | PopMatters | Fresh | 4.5/5 | 2010-10-08T06:03:43.000Z | 2010-10-08 06:03:43 | As a genius work of art, as an experience that will leave some cold and others clamoring for the right level of praise, Never Let Me Go surpasses expectation. |
| 288875 | Steve Persall | Tampa Bay Times | Rotten | C | 2010-10-08T05:05:05.000Z | 2010-10-08 05:05:05 | The movie is 90 minutes of stiff-upper-lip longing followed by 10 minutes of abruptly interesting resolution, then end credits that the film didn't compel me to stick around for. |
| 288876 | Marc Mohan | Oregonian | Fresh | B- | 2010-10-07T14:50:28.000Z | 2010-10-07 14:50:28 | The world depicted in Mark Romanek's Never Let Me Go is among the more beautiful dystopias in film history. |
| 288877 | Duane Dudek | Milwaukee Journal Sentinel | Fresh | 2.5/4 | 2010-10-07T14:15:26.000Z | 2010-10-07 14:15:26 | Romanek creates a claustrophobic, emotionally complex and potentially profound portrait of humanity reshaped by what has become scientifically possible. |
| 288878 | Clint O'Connor | Cleveland Plain Dealer | Fresh | B | 2010-10-07T07:58:11.000Z | 2010-10-07 07:58:11 | For all of its hot-button medical-ethical issues, Never Let Me Go avoids sci-fi cliches. Young Izzy Meikle-Small almost steals the whole movie. |
| 288879 | Rene Rodriguez | Miami Herald | Fresh | 3/4 | 2010-10-07T05:05:20.000Z | 2010-10-07 05:05:20 | Never Let Me Go, director Mark Romanek's introspective adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro's novel, is a work of subtle beauty -- a melancholy meditation on the finality of life and the choices we make as our time shortens. |
| 288880 | Josh Bell | Las Vegas Weekly | Fresh | 3/5 | 2010-10-07T03:28:08.000Z | 2010-10-07 03:28:08 | An intriguing and mostly successful combination of science fiction and chamber drama. |
Showing the latest 100 canonical reviews for this movie.