Adrian Horton

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The Guardian
For 156 reviews, this critic has graded:
  • 37% higher than the average critic
  • 4% same as the average critic
  • 59% lower than the average critic
On average, this critic grades 7.3 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)

Adrian Horton's Scores

  • Movies
  • TV
Average review score: 58
Highest review score: 100 No Other Land
Lowest review score: 20 The Glorias
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 43 out of 156
  2. Mixed: 107 out of 156
  3. Negative: 6 out of 156
156 movie reviews
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    • 87 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt
    It may not always land and gets lost in itself on the way there, but Jackson has crafted a beautiful experiment indicative of ambitious vision, one whose magic outweighs its weaknesses.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    The Disappearance of Shere Hite
    It persuasively makes the case that Hite, who argued that most women cannot orgasm from penetrative intercourse alone, deserves renewed recognition as a feminist trailblazer, particularly in the still-fraught arena of sexual politics, self-knowledge and liberation.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    Theater Camp
    For all the grand gestures of musical theater, there’s an odd flatness to Theater Camp, a half-hearted and lackluster comedy from a group of Hollywood friends set at a summer performing arts community.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    A Thousand and One
    There are many things working well in Rockwell’s debut, Taylor’s performance chief among them, but the end result doesn’t match her character’s formidable strength.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Polite Society
    The first half is so energetically surefooted as to establish trust in Manzoor’s instincts and hopes for a second feature. But like The Fury’s would-be signature kick that Ria struggles to nail, Polite Society banks on one big swing it just isn’t able to pull off.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    The Starling Girl
    The Starling Girl, anchored by a bristling performance from the always solid Scanlen, is at its best when it hews to the combustible suspense of a teenage girl glimpsing her own instincts – for honesty, for autonomy, and most threateningly for pleasure.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Sick
    Williamson knows how to write a horror script – Sick offers moderate to intense thrills delivered in a compact frame whose Covid 2020 specificity adds more to the tension than it distracts.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Selena Gomez: My Mind & Me
    Keshishian, as in Truth or Dare, works in moments which complicates Gomez’s angelic image: being short with a too-glib interviewer, refusing to listen to a friend, reacting poorly to genuine concern. My Mind & Me is strongest, and bravest, in moments like this, illustrating Gomez’s humanity through universal capacities we don’t want recorded.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    She Said
    She Said delivers on the dopamine hits of a journalism movie: proficient pace (the film runs just over two hours but feels shorter), tactile work, the thrill of pavement pounded into revelation.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    Rosaline
    Rosaline . . . understands what makes a good adaptation: a sense of humor at least on par with if not exceeding the original, lighthearted lines with serious delivery, crackling romantic chemistry. And in the case of Rosaline, an unmissable lead in Kaitlyn Dever as a lovelorn medieval schemer left on read.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    Luckiest Girl Alive
    There are pieces of Luckiest Girl Alive that seem interested in a life splintered by trauma, in the relief of unburdening, the hunger for certainty over what happened, the thrill of playing on cultural expectations for women. But the story it ultimately tells is an empty, self-serving fantasy.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Deadstream
    Although the whole concept is quite daft, Winter’s energetic and committed performance adds a bit of heft without ever forfeiting the comedy entirely.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Till
    It is as noble an execution of tragic historical record as one could hope for within the limits of a biopic – neither confirmation of doubters nor enough justification to relive it.
    • 50 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    Meet Cute
    As hard as Cuoco and Davidson try at chemistry – and Cuoco, at least, seems to be really trying – this umpteenth spin on the Groundhog Day time loop is more irksome than endearing, cutesy than actually cute, a downward spiral of uncomfortably performed neuroticism that devolves into a borderline indefensible ending.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    Do Revenge
    Its outsized mean girl ruthlessness with a candy-coated shell, led by Mendes and Hawke’s commanding performances, is a biting, if overlong, good time.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    Catherine Called Birdy
    In Dunham’s hands, the throughline of enduring and discovering one’s worth, however historically imagined, is at once a comfort and a lark.
    • 38 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Pinocchio
    The film is competently crafted, dutifully acted, clearly labored over with soul, and yet, like its star, lacks a beating heart.
    • 50 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    Love in the Villa
    Love in the Villa is feel-good, not try-hard. Nothing ever rises to the level of unwatchable, but nothing has any distinctive staying power, either – you may catch the whiff of romance here and there, like passing by a bakery storefront, which constitute the most alluring shots of the movie.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Look Both Ways
    Its affect is warm and reassuring, its methods for affirming that everything’s gonna be all right are cozy and tame, especially in regards to young motherhood.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Wedding Season
    There will always be room for a good, breezy romcom, and the set-up of an Indian wedding is ripe for one. As churn-able Netflix content goes, Wedding Season is on the better end of the spectrum.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    Honor Society
    The ending chorus of conclusions wraps up a bit too neatly, though that doesn’t invalidate the enjoyably deranged ride before.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Not Okay
    Not Okay is like many “internet movies” before it – approaching uncanny valley, somewhat obvious, just a little off — but this unsettling darkness makes it a solid entry into the canon of just-okay social media films.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    DC League of Super-Pets
    True to its animated predecessors, Super-Pets pulls off what other superhero entries have struggled to summon from the CGI universe: lighthearted fun and self-aware humor woven with real evergreen themes – the fear of change, learning to love friends through transitions, trusting that love will remain through the seasons.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Anything's Possible
    Anything’s Possible is another needed step in the right direction – a just-fine high school romantic comedy about an unapologetic, bold trans teenager on a major streaming platform.
    • 43 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    Where the Crawdads Sing
    Where the Crawdads Sing never really had an interest in complications, or hardship, or racism as anything beyond wallpaper for its central nature girl fantasy of self-reliance. It would rather stay above the fray, gliding prettily along the marsh without actually getting dirty.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    Hello, Goodbye and Everything in Between
    It accomplished what few of its peers have been able to do: make me believe in a teenage romance, actually remember the confusion of growing up and feel satisfied with an ending that points to an open-book future.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    Beauty
    Dosunmu, an established music video director, assembles beautiful shots of longing, pain, yearning, closeness and jealousy between Beauty and girlfriend Jazz (Aleyse Shannon). But strung together by Waithe’s too-spare script, they feel isolated and go nowhere.
    • 34 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    The Man from Toronto
    Nothing is really offensive or incompetent, but it never rises to the level of funny or interesting, either.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    Along for the Ride
    There are moments in Along for the Ride . . . where the magic that cements a teen film seems within reach. For a few seconds here or there, you can feel it. The rest of it just passes by like the tide.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Cheaper by the Dozen
    Braff and Union have passable chemistry, but Union’s charisma and confidence is magnetic in any context including this one. It’s all breezy – there are no bad actors or malicious intent (other than that one Calabasas woman), so the drama is light and the messes are quickly cleaned up.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    The Adam Project
    It’s spectacle coasting on the evergreen draw of time travel paced with beats of occasionally effective human emotion – grief, regret, self-loathing and acceptance in sometimes moving, very manageable amounts.
    • 51 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    The Weekend Away
    It’s a thriller by name but less edge-of-your-seat than lounging on the couch, absorbing beats of plot like the ocean tide. A little provocation with slight commitment – that’s not a bad night in by any means.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    The Sky Is Everywhere
    Decker infuses Nelson’s screenplay with a potent dose of whimsical fantasy, morphing Lennie’s tortuous bereavement into a lonely house, a romantic musical journey and a garden where other complicated, confusing emotions grow.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    Navalny
    If you’re coming in with a blank slate, then Navalny is a feast of evermore unbelievable details and a window into a movement against a state of increasingly boldfaced, demeaning lies.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    Palm Trees and Power Lines
    It’s trite to say a debut performance is a revelation, but the whole film simply does not work without McInerny, who is fully convincing as a girl on an emotional precipice. It’s an astoundingly calibrated turn, one of barely lidded emotions that eventually skitter about
    • 72 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Am I OK?
    Am I OK? is strongest when embedded in the two friends’ well-worn, effusive bond, in sickness or in health – when the fight comes the barbs are believably lacerating, the kind only best friends can wield.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Call Jane
    Call Jane never quite rises to the level of a rousing battle cry, but does offer a studious examination of a past that could, terrifyingly, become our future.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    Sharp Stick
    This awkward, misjudged, occasionally sexy film has seeds of a radical, fresh story and flashes of directorial brilliance but is hobbled throughout by the confounding decision to write her 26-year-old main character as either insensitively neuro-divergent or more sheltered child than adult.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    Emergency
    A ride somehow both warm and stressful, and an inviting mashup of familiar beats made fresh by a trio of grounded, endearing performances.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Birds of Paradise
    Birds of Paradise, then, settles into a weird, slightly unsettling middle-ground – beautiful yet hollow, intriguing yet distanced, skillfully performed without much of a beating heart. Like its principal dancers, its a portrait of contrasts, though the friction here doesn’t generate much heat.
    • 39 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    Dear Evan Hansen
    The movie asks the audience to not look at two elephants in the room, and unfortunately, no amount of soaring music can relieve that heavy a burden.
    • 36 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    He's All That
    It’s the same feeling, really, as watching a bunch of straight TikToks. While Rae offers flashes of promise, especially when she pops her genuinely winning smile, she doesn’t make the case for TikTok-to-film-stardom here. The chemistry between her and Buchanan is stilted, at best.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    Last Letter from Your Lover
    The central romance here is, on paper, a love for the ages, a story of all-consuming passion. It’s not quite so in practice.
    • 32 Metascore
    • 20 Adrian Horton
    A Week Away
    The low stakes of the camp drama and the soundtrack’s indistinguishably familiar pop (adaptations of contemporary Christian hits, plus four original songs) aim for easy, catchy, comfortable fun – a breezy intention which casts some of the script’s insensitive moments in even harsher light.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    Billie Eilish: The World's a Little Blurry
    Its strongest element, aside from Eilish herself, is the generosity and empathy afforded to the experience of fandom.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    To All the Boys: Always and Forever
    The final serving of this three-part confection rarely strays from enjoyable, even if it doesn’t match the seductive sweetness of the first bite.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    The Map of Tiny Perfect Things
    The Map of Tiny Perfect Things holds a contained, idealized world – a trove of romcom enjoyment and small treasures I had no problem looping through.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 60 Adrian Horton
    Pleasure
    It’s an often subtle (even in its many XXX-rated shots) and surreptitious study of an industry built on explicit, aggressive imagery, an arresting film which, though it doesn’t stick the landing, thankfully delineates between the legitimate work of adult film performers and the toxicity, misogyny and abuse the male-dominated industry allows to fester and lacerate.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    Wild Mountain Thyme
    It’s a visually verdant but emotionally flat film whose confusing friction between two miscast leads frustrates rather than engrosses.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    Godmothered
    Where Godmothered should coast, it stumbles – swerving between unwieldy earnestness to something edgier and settling on something duller than it should be.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 20 Adrian Horton
    The Glorias
    Another film might have mined Steinem’s remarkable life for its complications and contradictions, but The Glorias settles for slapdash iconography.
    • 50 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    The Hunt
    In making the worst stereotypes of America’s political poles as extreme as possible, and America’s divide as literal and violent as possible, The Hunt feigns a viewpoint rather than actually having one. It takes aim at everyone, redeeming no one. Which feels circular, and queasy, and right back where we started: some empty talk about a divided nation, and a film thats probably not worth this much conversation.
    • 92 Metascore
    • 80 Adrian Horton
    Never Rarely Sometimes Always
    The film’s spareness has lasting power – as Skylar and Autumn boarded the bus home, I realized I had been clenching my jaw the whole movie. It’s a testament to Hittman’s portrayal of fear and frustration in navigating American reproductive healthcare as a teen. I just wish her characters had more to say about it.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    The Photograph
    Issa Rae and Lakeith Stanfield can’t save this dreary Valentine’s drama that lacks fizzle and emotional stakes.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    Horse Girl
    The ambition of Horse Girl ultimately gets the better of it, turning what could be a dark but insightful depiction on signs missed in a mental health crisis into an agreement on one’s madness – a game of what’s real, and what’s not, that feels unsettling to play.
    • 33 Metascore
    • 40 Adrian Horton
    Like a Boss
    There are kernels of something interesting here: an interracial best friendship and business partnership in today’s America, or navigating best friendship on the cusp of middle age, or maintaining the ethics of your business and passion under the growth mandate of capitalism. It would take thought, and jokes constructed with a motivation other than how to include the word coochie. It would take an understanding that women want to see sex and their bodies talked about filthily on screen, but are smart enough to know that’s not always enough.
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