Neil Genzlinger

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The New York Times
For 551 reviews, this critic has graded:
  • 50% higher than the average critic
  • 4% same as the average critic
  • 46% lower than the average critic
On average, this critic grades 11.9 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)

Neil Genzlinger's Scores

  • Movies
  • TV
Average review score: 54
Highest review score: 100 Newtown
Lowest review score: 0 Is That a Gun in Your Pocket?
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 176 out of 551
  2. Mixed: 274 out of 551
  3. Negative: 101 out of 551
551 movie reviews
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    • 45 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Fanboys
    There are enough good jokes in Fanboys, a road comedy about geeks on a "Star Wars"-related quest, to satisfy hard-core fans of that George Lucas franchise. But the film doesn't have the boosters, or thrusters, or whatever, to elevate it to more ambitious heights; it's weighed down by tired conventions and a general sense of having missed its moment.
    • 30 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    Live at the Foxes Den
    A slight movie that could have been significantly better with a little story doctoring.
    • 50 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Hood to Coast
    Christoph Baaden, the director, loses sight of the fact that, for people who don't run, the cult of running is kind of boring.
    • 29 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    AVPR: Aliens vs Predator - Requiem
    It may not be classic sci-fi like the original “Alien,” which it has in its DNA, but it’s a perfectly respectable next step in the series.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    TransFatty Lives
    Refreshingly unpredictable but also frustrating.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Madea's Witness Protection
    A comedy that's too late to the Ponzi-scheme party to be topical, and not outrageous enough to take advantage of its own setups.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    Eddie the Eagle
    This film doesn’t seem to trust the inherent likability of his story. The director, Dexter Fletcher, and the writers, Sean Macaulay and Simon Kelton, load it up with tropes that actually make it less endearing.
    • 46 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    The Houses October Built
    If you’re relatively easily scared or are in a theater full of people who are, the film might be good for a few screams. But only if you’re the patient sort. It takes almost an hour to get to the good stuff.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Ordinary World
    Billie Joe Armstrong of Green Day is usually pretty appealing when he dabbles in acting, and he’s appealing again in Ordinary World. But after a promising start the script lets him down, and the film turns into a predictable midlife-crisis yarn.
    • 34 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Beyond the Reach
    Any wilderness ordeal has to help some character clarify something, and for Ben it’s his relationship with his girlfriend (Hanna Mangan-Lawrence), which gives the film a modest side interest. But mostly this one is for fans of desert scenery and of Mr. Douglas in cranky, crazy mode.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Louder Than a Bomb
    The efforts to document the teams' creative processes aren't particularly successful - no camera can capture something that elusive - but the filmmakers do a fine job with the back stories of the featured poets.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Kid-Thing
    The film is, if nothing else, an interesting meditation on how a child who grows up without guidance might react to a situation that requires judgment.
    • 46 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Reversion
    The film does a pretty good job of conveying the bleakness and pointlessness Eva and her fellow mutants feel, but it's as if Ms. Trachinger were reluctant to take the premise any deeper for fear of being accused of imitating "Memento" or "Groundhog Day" or any number of other trapped-in-time films.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Loveless
    An aimless film about an aimless fellow, but it's not without its charms. It may be without a point, but hey, you can't have everything in a no-budget film like this.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Harry Benson: Shoot First
    The film, by Justin Bare and Matthew Miele, would be better if it spent less time gushing about how great Mr. Benson is and more time confronting some of the questions his approach raises.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Blood on the Mountain
    The film may be one-sided, but if nothing else, it is a reminder that the “coal equals jobs” equation is a serious oversimplification.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    The Island of St. Matthews
    It’s a stretch to call Mr. Everson’s film a documentary.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    One Week and a Day
    It meanders from start to finish, searching for a tone that it never quite finds.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    Monkey Kingdom
    It’s hard to imagine what message children will take away from this film other than that monkeys are just like characters in a fictional Disney movie, which they are not.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Eagles of Death Metal: Nos Amis (Our Friends)
    The vivid recollections of the attack by survivors, including Mr. Hughes, take over the film midway through, and the friendship story line never quite re-establishes itself.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    Call for Help
    If the point of Call for Help is to glorify a handful of off-the-grid heroes, it fails. If the point is to follow some young people who took their aimless wanderlust to a trouble spot and perhaps created more problems than they solved, it succeeds.
    • 45 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Preggoland
    The movie’s flaw is that it mixes tones. Ruth, her relatives and her fellow workers are realistically played, but her gal-pal buddies are caricatures.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Remote Area Medical
    Remote Area Medical, a documentary about the nonprofit organization of that name, certainly shows you what they look like, in blunt, tooth-decaying detail. But beyond that, it maddeningly refuses to take a stand or explore the questions it raises.
    • 44 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    The Bronze
    Ms. Rauch (who wrote the film with her husband, Winston Rauch) nails the portrayal admirably under Bryan Buckley’s direction. But that doesn’t mean Hope is anyone you want to spend almost two hours with.
    • 39 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul
    Unfortunately, the fresh blood has been saddled with a tired story, the family road trip that goes outlandishly awry, and the result is another forgettable film.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Arthur Christmas
    The plot may be a little too cluttered for the toddler crowd to follow, but the next age group up should be amused, and the script by Peter Baynham and Sarah Smith has plenty of sly jokes for grown-ups.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie
    The best animated movies for children are sublime. This one generally settles for noisy, though it throws in a positive message at the end.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Do Not Resist
    The film doesn’t unearth anything that hasn’t already been voiced, and it could use more details on the scope of the phenomenon. But with more police shootings in the headlines just in the past few days, it’s nothing if not timely.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Aquí y Allá (Here and There)
    If the intent was to keep the characters here just as anonymous as most migrant workers are to prosperous people in the United States, it succeeds: Pedro and his family remain mere sketches. If, however, the aim was a more meaningful portrait of hardship and aspiration, the film is merely underdone. It's no secret that life in many places is hard.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    The Phenom
    The director and writer, Noah Buschel, has no fresh insights to add to the well-worn dynamic and doesn’t give the actors or the audience much to work with.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Shin Godzilla (Godzilla Resurgence)
    The film is at its best when it’s in parody mode, though it keeps that card too close to the vest for much of its two-hour length. The humor, not the monster, is what you’re left wanting more of.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    Afterschool
    In truth there isn’t much story here, or much insight either; the kind of alienated teenagers wandering through this film exist in movies far out of proportion to their number in real life.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Argentina
    For the non-Argentine audience, though, more context would have helped these wonderful songs and dances tell the nation’s story.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Storks
    This film, directed by Nicholas Stoller and Doug Sweetland, is a harmless enough way to occupy a youngster for an hour and a half. It’s just not especially rich in extraordinary characters or moments.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    Pitch Perfect
    Only occasionally funny and not at all illuminating about the rich world of a cappella singing.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Dzi Croquettes
    If the film doesn't measure up as a piece of historical scholarship, it does manage to be a rather touching exploration of the troupe's life cycle: achieving notoriety, then being torn apart by fame, then being destroyed by forces beyond its control.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    The Invisible Front
    This film, somewhat clumsy yet full of illuminating interviews, seems mostly like an exercise in building national pride, but it holds lessons for anyone trying to resist an overwhelming force.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Ivory Tower
    Ivory Tower, a documentary about soaring costs and other problems confronting higher education, can’t seem to decide what points it wants to make and ends up making none.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Sweet Micky for President
    One of the decade’s odder political stories is revisited, without much illumination, in Sweet Micky for President.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Folk Hero & Funny Guy
    Things meander along to the inevitable blowup scene and a too-easy ending in which all is forgiven and personal growth has occurred, though not for the viewing audience.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Teenage
    A lot of intriguing ideas are floated in Teenage... But the film takes a point of view that leaves all of them underdeveloped.
    • 33 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Code Name: The Cleaner
    Cedric the Entertainer's artless performance deadens what could have been a much funnier comedy.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Justice
    Over all, though, the hands-off approach leaves the viewer to draw his own conclusions, but without providing enough information.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    In Country
    Are these re-enactors really as clueless as they seem, or is the portrait just incomplete? It’s impossible to tell from this too-sparse film.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Steve McQueen: The Man & Le Mans
    It doesn’t really succeed in conveying McQueen’s great passion for auto racing. In truth, it mostly makes him seem like a jerk — but cinephiles might enjoy it as a case study of moviemaking gone wrong.
    • 40 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    The Slammin' Salmon
    Has its share of funny moments. But it also has its share of tired ones, like the subplot involving the inadvertent swallowing of a ring.
    • 41 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    Where Hope Grows
    Once the proselytizing takes over, so does the predictability.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Before the Flood
    The film wants to spur individual changes in behavior, but there’s a fair amount in it that might discourage you from even trying.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Wretches & Jabberers
    The film is maddeningly vague about how the two men made their initial breakthroughs, but it certainly is proof that even those who are written off as children can find a voice.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Shelley
    Maybe expecting a horror film to have a point is expecting too much. In any case, the two actresses give committed performances on the way to a veiled ending.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
    Of course, while your brain is fritzing out, you're trying to figure out how the cinematic trick was done and what the implications might be for other old films. Scary, disturbing, intriguing, all at once.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    I'm Dangerous with Love
    The film, though, might have been more powerful with a little less grit. A few minutes of dispassionate discussion by experts about ibogaine and the obstacles to its legalization in the United States would have enhanced the film without damaging its street cred.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Keith Richards: Under the Influence
    You certainly feel as if you were getting to know the man as he really is, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you’re gaining much insight.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    He Named Me Malala
    It only occasionally delivers the kind of unguarded moment that makes you feel as if you’re getting beneath the media image, and it is not at all interested in discussing broader issues raised by Ms. Yousafzai’s fame.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Honor Flight
    The film might have made a decent end-of-broadcast segment on a newscast. But inflated to feature length and devoid of nuance or fresh insights, it just seems self-congratulatory - aren't we great for having done this for these old guys? - and exploitive.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    Pad Yatra: A Green Odyssey
    The purpose was no doubt more spiritual than the film conveys; if so, the execution doesn’t do the effort justice.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Thank You for Playing
    If nothing else, it’s evidence that the digital age has opened up new ways to work through grief.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Muppets Most Wanted
    The whole film seems to have a vague heaviness to it. The best Muppet movies have been great because they had charm. There’s no charm here, really; just self-referential jokes, decent but not memorable songs, and lots and lots of cameos.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Hair High
    The terrain is so familiar that it has a slightly stifling effect, even in Mr. Plympton’s demented hands. We long ago loved these characters to death.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    In Search of Israeli Cuisine
    When it’s not being overly promotional, it can be interesting.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    These Final Hours
    The lesson may not be particularly original, but the film has some striking moments as it follows him to his destiny.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Question One
    Some viewers will be frustrated by the film's determination to be evenhanded, but with this same battle likely to be fought repeatedly in the coming years (the issue is again on the 2012 Maine ballot), Question One stands as a pretty good primer in how referendums are won and lost.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    American Teacher
    American Teacher doesn't come close to doing what it sets out to do, but it does end up as a heartfelt, bittersweet portrait of several teachers.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Rolling Papers
    It’s full of discussion points but lets them go by undiscussed.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Tap World
    It would be better if it had a bit less proclaiming and a bit more nuts-and-bolts information, but still, it’s refreshing to see people bubbling over with enthusiasm for an art that is somewhat out of the mainstream.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Champs
    Now and then this documentary by Bert Marcus rises above mere promotion, leaving you wishing it had tackled the sport’s difficult questions in more depth.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Beyond the Gates
    Getting retro right is harder than it seems.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    I Have Never Forgotten You: The Life & Legacy of Simon Wiesenthal
    Dismayingly, bad filmmaking isn't really to blame for the lack of punch in Ever Again. Perhaps it's the familiarity of it all.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Who Bombed Judi Bari?
    Relies too much on rehash and preaching to the choir to kindle a broad-based outrage, but it does make you wonder what really happened on May 24, 1990.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    The Dead
    Its scenes frequently feature Africans machine-gunning other Africans or hacking them to death with machetes. This is a disturbing sight indeed. Maybe it was intended as a metaphor, but this movie isn't nearly sophisticated enough to pull off that kind of commentary. It's not really even sophisticated enough to be an absorbing zombie movie
    • 59 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Danielson: A Family Movie (or, Make a Joyful Noise Here)
    This being a film review, the relevant question is whether J L Aronson's documentary about Danielson is worth watching. The answer, for about two-thirds of it, is yes. Though ultimately, alas, the movie has a little too much Danielson in it.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Follow Me: The Yoni Netanyahu Story
    Serves up its material with an excess of treacly music and an overabundance of glowing reminiscences. This has the odd effect of making his story less powerful than it actually is.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    The Model
    Mr. Matthiesen seems as if he might have been trying to make an indictment of sexism and exploitation in the fashion world, but if so he doesn’t hit the theme nearly hard enough.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    Defamation
    Disorganized and somewhat annoying.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Dean
    If Mr. Martin’s take on grief is facile, the movie overall is a pleasant trip, and Dean’s doodles — by Mr. Martin himself — are a treat.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Somebody Up There Likes Me
    It’s all kind of cute. Maybe a little too cute, but it does have a nice circle-of-life ending. And along the way, Mr. Byington shows a knack for observational humor, slipping in sly jokes that force you to keep paying attention despite the slim plot. Droll and interesting; just not very substantial.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    The Lords of Salem
    Considerable care goes into establishing the premise, but the film eventually abandons psychological subtlety for hallucinatory garishness, which is too bad.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    One More Time
    This is a story full of people being miserable, humorless and selfish, despite having been given a lot in life, and they’re pretty much the same at the end of it as they were at the beginning.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Born in China
    The narrative, read by John Krasinski, is kid-friendly in a cloying sort of way, and unpleasant realities like China’s pollution are not mentioned. So as an introduction for children to exotic creatures in picturesque landscapes, the movie is harmless enough.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    The Amazing Truth About Queen Raquela
    It's like being trapped in a roomful of teenage girls for 80 minutes.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Money for Nothing: Inside the Federal Reserve
    The film doesn’t really live up to its subtitle. There is little sense of what kinds of debates take place at board meetings or how pressure is applied behind closed doors.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    The Sun Behind the Clouds: Tibet's Struggle for Freedom
    The filmmakers, chronicling the Dalai Lama’s somewhat muddled attempts to respond to the protesters’ calls while not antagonizing China, do a fair amount of muddling themselves. They lurch awkwardly between reverence for the Dalai Lama and hints that he has become, politically, irrelevant or an obstacle.
    • 47 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Hotel Transylvania
    For the first half of the film, amusing monster humor keeps things interesting; some monsters, it turns out, are better at party games than others.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Geography Club
    The film is at its strongest when Russell and Kevin face tests of their character brought on by their interactions with homophobic students.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Lowriders
    Cars could easily have been the stars of Lowriders, but the film makes them supporting players in a family drama that’s a mix of strong scenes and shopworn ones punctuated by clichés.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Right at Your Door
    The film, especially in its resolution, feels a bit like a “Twilight Zone” episode and might have been better at that length, but the acting’s pretty good, and the cinematography keeps things lively.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Take Me
    Parts of it work, but the overall package is never really suspenseful enough to have you on edge or overtly funny enough to be a lark.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Fanny, Annie & Danny
    Characters this nicely etched deserve a more complete conclusion.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    General Orders No. 9
    Yet the urban images he presents are missing the thing that makes any city come alive: human beings. You begin to suspect that Mr. Persons hates humanity. This makes General Orders No. 9, for all its sheen of sophistication, rather simplistic: people bad, nature good.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    I Can Do Bad All by Myself
    Mr. Perry has his moviemaking machine running smoothly, which is to say somewhat predictably.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    The Croods
    The movie is at its most interesting and amusing when riffing on how cavemen might have reacted to new experiences and ideas, like fire and shoes. Whether the kiddies will appreciate that is unclear, but they’ll certainly like the voice work done by Emma Stone as Eep.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    Forsaken
    A starry father-son pairing is largely squandered in Forsaken, an old-school western that is a little too old school for its own good.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    The Last Stand
    The South Korean director Kim Jee-woon fails to dazzle with the endless speeding-car sequences, but that 60-second flourish during a lengthy firefight is almost worth the tedium.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 40 Neil Genzlinger
    SiREN
    The film, directed by Gregg Bishop and released by the Chiller Films horror factory, has a few good special effects, but it’s too noisy and scattershot to be suspenseful.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Battle for Terra
    The movie's messages are delivered with a heavy hand, but some of the scenes are eye-popping, especially -- sorry, peace-loving Terrians -- the battle sequences.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Already Tomorrow in Hong Kong
    The two stars are attractive, and Emily Ting, who wrote and directed, makes the city look great, but during their endless strolling Ruby and Josh never get much beyond shallow banter.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    Kid Cannabis
    The film’s main distraction, oddly, is the voice-over through which Nate annotates the action. A voice-over is standard procedure for the wistful-look-back genre, but here it’s forced and unfunny. This wild story sells itself, no narration needed.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days
    The film is more a patched-together collection of anecdotes than a coherent story, and some of Greg's tribulations, like fear over a high dive and an amusement-park ride, don't seem age-appropriate for a boy who has just finished seventh grade.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Neil Genzlinger
    CSNY/Déjà Vu
    Has some delicious moments, but you never quite shake the feeling that it’s documenting a tempest in a teapot.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 60 Neil Genzlinger
    The Discovery
    The story stays intriguing for much of the way, but eventually things cease to make sense.
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