Richard Lawson

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IndieWire, The Guardian, The Hollywood Reporter, Vanity Fair
For 512 reviews, this critic has graded:
  • 50% higher than the average critic
  • 2% same as the average critic
  • 48% lower than the average critic
On average, this critic grades 0.6 points higher than other critics. (0-100 point scale)

Richard Lawson's Scores

  • Movies
  • TV
Average review score: 66
Highest review score: 100 Roma
Lowest review score: 10 The Woman in the Window
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 313 out of 512
  2. Mixed: 159 out of 512
  3. Negative: 40 out of 512
512 movie reviews
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    • 58 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    The High Note
    The High Note isn’t an ecstatic, tenuously held burst; instead, it’s a mellow pleasure, sleekly directed by Ganatra, who turns Flora Greeson’s occasionally programmatic script into something of smooth, sensual warmth. It is, above all else, an inviting opportunity for two likable actors, Dakota Johnson and Tracee Ellis Ross, to simply exist on screen together, fluid in their casual appeal and gracefully bringing a sappy, aspirational story to mostly credible life.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Decision to Leave
    Decision to Leave no doubt deserves a repeat viewing. Even if the finale is still a slightly hard to parse bummer, there is all the other meticulous craftwork to appreciate and discover anew. In this instance, maybe there is no getting too close to the case.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    All the Money in the World
    The film shows—and says plainly, at one point—that people with extreme wealth are so divorced from reality that they become almost another species. Yet it doesn’t fully explore the weirdness of that, the chilling tragedy of it. Instead, Scott has made simply a competent thriller that dazzles only in the ingeniousness of its lightning-quick and proficient re-staging.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    The Map of Tiny Perfect Things
    The Map of Tiny Perfect Things knows its limits. It’s careful about when to be twee, when to strive for profundity, and when to hold back. The film has an agreeably modest scale, despite its lofty considerations of physics and the makeup of existence.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Godzilla vs. Kong
    Godzilla vs. Kong competently, efficiently does its job, which is really all you can ask of the fourth movie in a rickety franchise.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
    The film somehow gets more interesting as it goes, swirling up into a climax that is mordant and corny and monster-movie fantastical.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Crazy Rich Asians
    Jon M. Chu’s film certainly delivers on the lavish trappings of the former interpretation, but if the latter is meant to be the mood of the film, it falls a little short. I wanted things to be a little crazier, I guess, wild high-society intrigue staged with the satisfying bite of mean, wicked satire.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Dark Waters
    We’re served both the galvanization and the despair, the victories eked out bit by painful bit and the looming defeat, as an implacable monolith dismisses puny mortal concerns like so many gnats. It’s tough stuff, but it’s worthy stuff too.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Downton Abbey: A New Era
    A New Era really, really should be the end of Downton Abbey, but I’d happily watch these freaks stumbling through the 1930s if they were so inclined to let me.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Hearts Beat Loud
    But the real star of this thing is Clemons, so natural and expressive, whether speaking or singing.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    The Many Saints of Newark
    The film has a sneaky momentum.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Nobody
    The film is a winning reminder of the pleasures of the midrange movie, one stylish enough to feel distinct but not too caught up in an effort to sell some startling, singular vision. It’s proudly genre and fills its allotted space with humor and detail.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    It Ends with Us
    It Ends With Us is a tearjerker that indulges in its red-meat drama, but then gives it the grace of shading and complexity—and rare humanity.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Raya and the Last Dragon
    It’s a fun movie, packed with escapades and just-shy-of-cloying cutesy humor, but there is a resonant depth, too.
    • 50 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga
    Eurovision has its clunky stretches—Ferrell’s script, written with Andrew Steele, could be a little tighter, a little sharper, and still keep its rambling appeal—but the film is routinely rescued by a deftly staged music number or an invigoratingly off-color joke.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Boy Erased
    Joel Edgerton’s earnest, solidly made film will be most effective on, and maybe necessary for, those immediately suffering under the crush of anti-gay bigotry, and those perpetrating it.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    The Bikeriders
    As is, The Bikeriders plays as if a longer, more robust version disappeared somewhere in the editing room. But a spell is lightly cast nonetheless, enough to make it sting when things start to go sour for Johnny and Benny and the rest.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Luca
    Luca does, despite its vagueness, successfully pull off some of the usual Pixar tricks, provoking warm tears and weary sighs as one considers the familiar trajectories of life.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Avengers: Infinity War
    There are moments of high drama in Infinity War—between father and daughter, brother and brother, mentor and protégé, lover and lover—that these actors, as deep in this series as we are, deliver on with teary intensity. And there’s a haunting final sequence that is as grave and, I daresay, almost poetic as anything the film series has done.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    King Richard
    What keeps us invested is the cast’s invigorating performances.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood
    This curious fairy tale may not be the truth, and it may prattle on too long. But when its stars align, and they let loose with their unmistakable shine, Hollywood movies do seem truly special again. And, sure, maybe TV does too.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Captain Marvel
    Captain Marvel feels as substantial as any of the other standalone Marvel Cinematic Universe films, even if it does things at a more relaxed pitch. The movie’s pioneer status is gestured toward some in the film, but mostly Boden and Fleck are focused on competently telling a tale that fits into the larger machine. It does, just fine.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    1917
    1917 is a rattling wonder of form, an audacious undertaking that nonetheless bobbles or cheats on a few occasions.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    Belfast
    What works best about Belfast is what Branagh doesn’t do.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 75 Richard Lawson
    She Said
    If that storytelling decision was made so there was more room for the intimate human factor, then it was an understandable one. She Said has a calmly insistent moral clarity, earned through its patient empathy, its quiet awe not at the insidiousness of what Weinstein did, but at the mettle and courage of the women who endured it—and then spoke out about it.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 70 Richard Lawson
    Just Mercy
    It’s a rousing and moving enough film that one is compelled to excuse the limits of its artistry.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Richard Lawson
    Society of the Snow
    No film could fully capture the awfulness of this experience. But despite some of Bayona’s irksome flair, Society of the Snow does a sturdy enough job getting the point across.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 70 Richard Lawson
    Book Club
    Bergen is consistently the best part of Book Club: natural, dryly funny, and, in a non-pitying way, quietly heartbreaking.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 70 Richard Lawson
    Road House
    Much of the movie’s charm rests on its lead. Gyllenhaal doesn’t have the same warm twinkle in his eye that Swayze always used to such lovely effect, but he makes do with the rest of his elastic face.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 70 Richard Lawson
    Leave the World Behind
    Adapted from Rumaan Alam’s bestselling novel, Sam Esmail’s film is a dreary, harrowing sit—and all the more invigorating for it.
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