Sheila O'Malley

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RogerEbert.com
For 606 reviews, this critic has graded:
  • 67% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 30% lower than the average critic
On average, this critic grades 5.2 points higher than other critics. (0-100 point scale)

Sheila O'Malley's Scores

  • Movies
  • TV
Average review score: 71
Highest review score: 100 Under the Shadow
Lowest review score: 0 The Haunting of Sharon Tate
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 466 out of 606
  2. Mixed: 69 out of 606
  3. Negative: 71 out of 606
606 movie reviews
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    • 87 Metascore
    • 63 Sheila O'Malley
    The Shape of Water
    The Shape of Water doesn't cohere into the fairy tale promised by the dreamy opening. It makes its points with a jackhammer, wielding symbols in blaring neon.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 100 Sheila O'Malley
    Good One
    Good One is intriguing in its disinterest in explanations. The film's refusal to "satisfy" an audience with easy explanations or even cathartic moments pulls you into its atmosphere, dragging you into the weird dynamic which grows more claustrophobic by the moment.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 88 Sheila O'Malley
    Dreamcatcher
    Despite the harrowing stories that fill the film from start to finish, Dreamcatcher is not hopeless.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 88 Sheila O'Malley
    Krisha
    Watching Krisha is a revelation: there are expected "rules" for such material (a former addict returns home for a holiday), but then director/writer Trey Edward Shults breaks every rule, making those rules seem tired and arbitrary in the process, and he does so with bravura, confidence, flash.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 88 Sheila O'Malley
    Little Men
    Little Men doesn't reach the humanist tragedy of "Love Is Strange," but that's an unfair comparison since very few films achieve what "Love Is Strange" does. Little Men is extremely powerful in its own right, with its devotion to its characters' differing perspectives so refreshing in an increasingly black-and-white world.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 75 Sheila O'Malley
    Showing Up
    There's something a little too neat about the structure of Showing Up, and the pigeon wears its symbolism on its broken wings. But the piercing specificity of Reichardt's vision, and her insights into the dynamics of an art scene like the one in Portland, are spot on.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 88 Sheila O'Malley
    EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert
    EPiC is so vivid it makes Elvis seem not like an entertainer from the past, but a figure who lives in the perpetual Right Now.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 100 Sheila O'Malley
    May December
    May December is one of Haynes' most unbalancing and provocative films.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 100 Sheila O'Malley
    The Lost Daughter
    Harrowing, unpredictable, painful, confrontational, this is a movie for grown-ups.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 88 Sheila O'Malley
    Strong Island
    It is that very lack of objectivity that makes Strong Island the experience that it is. It is a very tough film to shake.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 88 Sheila O'Malley
    Eighth Grade
    The extraordinarily assured feature film debut by writer-director and standup comedian Bo Burnham, starts out with one of these videos and it is so touchingly real, so embarrassingly true to life, you might swear it was improvised, or found footage. But it's not. This is Elsie Fisher, a 13-year-old actress herself, amazingly in touch with what it's like to be in the stage of life she's actually in.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 88 Sheila O'Malley
    Girlhood
    A powerful and entertaining film about a gang of girls, and what friendship means, the protection it provides.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 88 Sheila O'Malley
    The Taste of Things
    In "The Taste of Things," no distinction is made between cooking for someone and loving them. It's "all one."
    • 85 Metascore
    • 75 Sheila O'Malley
    Close to Vermeer
    Close to Vermeer is a gentle, thoughtful documentary, populated by knowledgeable individuals like Vandivere, experts at the top of their fields who have maintained their passion and love for the subject.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 88 Sheila O'Malley
    Everybody Wants Some!!
    When Linklater's style works (and it works in Everybody Wants Some!!), there is nobody quite like him.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 88 Sheila O'Malley
    All Is Forgiven (2007)
    It's one of those rare films where the title has real meaning, one that grows in power the moment the credits roll.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 100 Sheila O'Malley
    Watchers of the Sky
    Watchers of the Sky, an intricate and immensely powerful documentary, directed by Edet Belzberg, is both the story of Raphael Lemkin as well as a harrowing examination of genocide, past, recent, and ongoing.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 75 Sheila O'Malley
    Writing with Fire
    Writing with Fire is a powerful piece of work, although it moves at a mostly slow and steady pace.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 88 Sheila O'Malley
    Reality
    Reality is a brutal film, with a short run-time and a story arc so strong it obliterates the memory of self-important complex films, weighted down with a "message," straining for relevance. Satter's film doesn't need to push. Reality wears its relevance on its fluorescent-lit short sleeves.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 75 Sheila O'Malley
    On the Record
    On the Record does a lot of things very well, but what it does best of all is back up Mayo's eloquent and pained statement. Everybody loses when women go away.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 100 Sheila O'Malley
    The Vast of Night
    How on earth Patterson made a movie about a UFO hovering over a small town in the late 1950s without falling back on every cliche in the book is the fun and wonder of The Vast of Night. You already know the plot. You've seen it all before. But the way the story is told is new. With The Vast of Night, it really is about the how, not just the "what happens."
    • 84 Metascore
    • 100 Sheila O'Malley
    You Were Never Really Here
    Based on Jonathan Ames' novella of the same name, the film is rooted so firmly in Joe's point of view he sometimes is absent from the screen entirely. We're inside his head.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 100 Sheila O'Malley
    Under the Shadow
    Under the Shadow, a Farsi-language debut feature written and directed by Babak Anvari, creates a world where reality itself is suspect. In a year filled with great first features, add Under the Shadow to the list.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 75 Sheila O'Malley
    The Wind Rises
    Wind is both benign and ominous.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 75 Sheila O'Malley
    Rat Film
    Rat Film is an odd and captivating experience, and its fluid style is its most distinguishing characteristic.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 75 Sheila O'Malley
    Prayers for the Stolen
    Of all of the things Tatiana Huezo captures in Prayers for the Stolen, her first narrative feature, the terror of the night is most unnerving.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 88 Sheila O'Malley
    Rose Plays Julie
    Rose Plays Julie is very controlled in its style: this control reaps huge rewards.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 88 Sheila O'Malley
    Saint Frances
    It's truly refreshing to watch a film where nobody has anything figured out, where life proceeds messily and imperfectly. Saint Frances is unpredictable in a very human way.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 100 Sheila O'Malley
    20th Century Women
    The most pleasurable aspect of 20th Century Women (and it's pleasurable throughout) is that it allows itself to be messy.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 88 Sheila O'Malley
    Saint Maud
    Although the film has much in common with other religious-based horror films, and is often quite terrifying in its own right, Saint Maud is mostly interested in the experiential realities of its central character, and Clark is so deeply in touch with Maud's shattered psyche it's impossible to look away from her. It's thrilling to meet a character where you have no idea what she will do from one moment to the next.
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