Desson Thomson

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Washington Post
For 1,968 reviews, this critic has graded:
  • 48% higher than the average critic
  • 2% same as the average critic
  • 50% lower than the average critic
On average, this critic grades 5.8 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)

Desson Thomson's Scores

  • Movies
  • TV
Average review score: 60
Highest review score: 100 Vertigo
Lowest review score: 0 The Devil's Own
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 984 out of 1968
  2. Mixed: 544 out of 1968
  3. Negative: 440 out of 1968
1968 movie reviews
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    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Desson Thomson
    Chungking Express
    Despite its fragmentary, seat-of-the-pants plot, Chungking Express abounds with staccato style and frenetic charm. It's the cinematic equivalent of popcorn on a hot stove. There are "jump-cut" shots, freeze frames, stirring (and often beautiful) images and a general sense of boundless energy, all of which capture perfectly the Zeitgeist of Hong Kong society. [15 Mar 1996, p.N43]
    • Washington Post
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Desson Thomson
    The Princess Bride
    A percolating comedy. The laughs may not tear your belly up, but they're constant and they dovetail with the story.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 70 Desson Thomson
    Hustle & Flow
    It's more of an urban fairy tale, a surprisingly charming story that -- in certain sections -- almost crystallizes into the sweetness of a Mickey Rooney-Judy Garland musical.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Desson Thomson
    After the Wedding
    Wedding has enough coincidences, screamfests, drunken rants and shock revelations to fill a season of "Desperate Housewives," but it comes across as finely textured drama, thanks to the performers, who make their characters so persuasive and three-dimensional, we're too mesmerized to care about the story's more overwrought or histrionic passages.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 90 Desson Thomson
    Devil in a Blue Dress
    Franklin's picture is effortlessly wise beneath its entertaining surface.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Desson Thomson
    Oldboy
    You will surely leave this movie shocked, shaken and surprisingly moved. And definitely stuck on that poor octopus.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 90 Desson Thomson
    Morvern Callar
    As Morvern, Morton is disconcertingly enigmatic, often bordering on catatonic. But she carries the movie effortlessly. And even though we're on the outside looking in, she carries us along, too.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 70 Desson Thomson
    Jungle Fever
    The most obvious problem occurs between Snipes and Sciorra. Lee's so interested in the ripple effect they cause, he almost forgets the affair itself. We see anger all over Harlem and Bensonhurst, but we're barely allowed into the main bedroom, where the real hell must be taking place.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 70 Desson Thomson
    Apres Vous (After You)
    There isn't much to the movie, and you can see where it's going from kilometers away. But [Daniel] Auteuil gives the silliness a surprising heft.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 70 Desson Thomson
    Best in Show
    More amiable than hysterical.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 50 Desson Thomson
    House of Games
    The wacky incongruity works when debuting director Mamet has tongue in cheek. But all too often he's rechewing film noir, Hitchcock twists and MacGuffins, as well as the Freudian mumbo-jumbo already masticated tasteless by so many cine-kids.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 40 Desson Thomson
    Speed
    The plot becomes so overextended, as Reeves and Hopper wage their endless public transportation battle, even the hardest Die-Harders will consider leaping off way before the final stop.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 90 Desson Thomson
    Eve's Bayou
    Eve's Bayou is a movie unto itself, a rousing, original yarn about family life that includes everyone, whether they're from Louisiana or miles away. [07Nov1997 Pg N.48]
    • Washington Post
    • 78 Metascore
    • 75 Desson Thomson
    Mississippi Masala
    It may be longwinded here and there, but Mississippi Masala jumps with life. There's an ebullient, lusty mood to it. The characters have a crazy, eccentric rhythm of their own. It's fun to watch them be.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 100 Desson Thomson
    Enchanted April
    Delightful...a subtle and moving drama.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 60 Desson Thomson
    The Saddest Music in the World
    You're left, as with certain vivid dreams, filled with memorable images but not completely able to account for what you just experienced.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Desson Thomson
    Beautiful Girls
    The movie is wry, touching and fun to sit through, thanks to Rosenberg's amusing script, Ted Demme's vital direction and zesty performances from everyone.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Desson Thomson
    Midnight Run
    Robert De Niro is one extended pleasure in Midnight Run -- a real actor putting his considerable talent to work in a well-scripted comedy. And he's more than complemented by Charles Grodin, a brilliant comic performer who has been wasted up to now in small roles or lousy movies. [22 July 1988]
    • 50 Metascore
    • 50 Desson Thomson
    The Island
    The best thing about The Island is this: Ewan McGregor and Scarlett Johansson, buffed and dressed in sparkling white, wondering how and when to kiss each other.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Desson Thomson
    Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr.
    Extraordinary documentary.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 90 Desson Thomson
    Last Orders
    The movie's pace is unhurried by Hollywood standards, but it's all the richer in character detail.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 90 Desson Thomson
    James and the Giant Peach
    Imaginative, slightly creepy, but tremendously appealing to all ages. It's ripe to bursting with visual effects a heady combination of stop-motion and computer-generated imagery. And it has a delightful cast of personable bugs and larvae, all bound for New York City via floating fruit.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Desson Thomson
    Kung Fu Hustle
    It won't be long before you feel the compulsion to watch again. There is too much to appreciate in one sitting.
    • 45 Metascore
    • 20 Desson Thomson
    Proof of Life
    Proof of Life isn't a movie. It's an overpriced scrapbook.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 90 Desson Thomson
    Panic
    Inspired, sublime fun.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 100 Desson Thomson
    My Own Private Idaho
    It gets you below the emotional belt in a searing, delicate way. No movie this year approaches such magnificent imagery, such delectable poetry.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 60 Desson Thomson
    The Aviator
    We may enjoy watching the spectacles, but we don't much care for, or even have a feeling for, the guy in the cockpit.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 100 Desson Thomson
    Hukkle
    An extraordinary and brilliant (and almost wordless) film that takes us above ground and below it, up in the air and deep below water, to follow its conundrum of a story.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 70 Desson Thomson
    Hitch
    Sometimes big-time studio entertainment is done so well, you simply have to salute its corporate effectiveness.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Desson Thomson
    Climates
    We realize that this romance, like the beautiful land, is doomed almost inevitably to earthquake fissures, to irreversible change. But rather than making us despondent, Climates leaves us peacefully philosophical.
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