20 Must-See Billion Dollar Movies

3. Skyfall

skyfall daniel craig
MGM

Gross: $1,108,561,013 (#28 of All Time)

There are quite a few great movies in the storied James Bond franchise, but Skyfall is arguably the greatest of them all (apologies to Goldfinger, From Russia with Love, Goldeneye, The Spy Who Loved Me and Casino Royale) and it's hard to imagine any Bond film as good as this ever coming along again.

Skyfall is just a near-perfect action thriller and it combines everything we love about Bond - amazing action, exotic locations, stunning visuals, a joyous sense of escapism - with heartfelt, thoroughly moving drama that really gets under the skin of one of cinema's most enduring and popular characters.

As good as it is as an action film, it's an even better character study. Skyfall also has brilliant performances from Daniel Craig, Judi Dench and Javier Bardem (as maybe the finest Bond villain of them all), gorgeous cinematography from Roger Deakins and many wonderful callbacks to the previous films.

Skyfall was intended to mark the 50th anniversary of the franchise and it did that absolutely perfectly; let's call this movie the finest anniversary present of all time. It more than deserves that title.

Contributor

Film Studies graduate, aspiring screenwriter and all-around nerd who, despite being a pretentious cinephile who loves art-house movies, also loves modern blockbusters and would rather watch superhero movies than classic Hollywood films. Once met Tommy Wiseau.