Soren Andersen

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The Seattle Times
For 373 reviews, this critic has graded:
  • 54% higher than the average critic
  • 2% same as the average critic
  • 44% lower than the average critic
On average, this critic grades 2.1 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)

Soren Andersen's Scores

  • Movies
  • TV
Average review score: 63
Highest review score: 100 Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
Lowest review score: 12 Norm of the North
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 224 out of 373
  2. Mixed: 75 out of 373
  3. Negative: 74 out of 373
373 movie reviews
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    • 37 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    The Super Mario Galaxy Movie
    The prime attraction of this movie, and its predecessor, is that it envelopes the audience in the Mario world. Every square inch of the screen, from top to bottom, corner to corner, is packed with images derived from the game. Easter eggs abound. Watching it is akin being inside the 2007 Super Mario Galaxy game itself. Which is why it needs to be seen on the big screen. Seeing it on a phone or a laptop wouldn’t do it justice.
    • 34 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Mercy
    Shouting and struggling, poor Pratt vainly tries to give his character dimension and some sense of sympathy. So genial and engaging in the Guardians of the Galaxy series, Pratt flails grouchily and ineffectively in Mercy.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    The SpongeBob Movie: Search for Squarepants
    Everybody involved seems to be having a blast making this latest “SpongeBob” a funny, fast-paced pleasure.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    Zootopia 2
    The sweetness in the original is absent in the sequel. The players, including Judy and Nick, have an edge to them. Maybe that’s to be expected in that the main characters are now more settled in their parts, but there’s a sharpness in tone that makes them hard to warm up to.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    The Smashing Machine
    The picture itself is more workmanlike than transcendent. It marches along but doesn’t soar.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 100 Soren Andersen
    Highest 2 Lowest
    Both star and director are at the top of their game here, and that’s as good as movies get.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    The Naked Gun
    This “Naked Gun” tries hard, but the magic simply isn’t there.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    Eddington
    There are no safe places in his pictures. And Eddington is dense with multiple levels that stoke the ever-present unease.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 100 Soren Andersen
    How to Train Your Dragon
    There are plot levels here that are deeper than the original, which is quite complex and moving in its own right.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 38 Soren Andersen
    Ballerina
    You expect lots of fight scenes in a Wick movie, and Ballerina certainly delivers on that score. Overdelivers, in fact. It’s one damn dust-up after another.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    Lilo & Stitch
    Lively, fast-paced and ever so familiar, the picture is a happy addition to the holiday. It’s worth leaving the house to see.
    • 45 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    A Minecraft Movie
    Kids will likely be diverted by the colorful excess of A Minecraft Movie, but fans of the game may feel it misses the mark. More creativity, please.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    Mickey 17
    Bong covered many of the same aspects of “Mickey” in his 2013 sci-fi epic “Snowpiercer,” a more streamlined and hard-bitten work of social commentary with the have-nots battling the heedless rich. ”Mickey 17” is less focused and not quite as satisfying a production as that earlier movie.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    Nosferatu
    It’s not the best Dracula movie of all time, though it aspires to that. Murnau’s original still leads the pack. But it certainly is the most stylish. Eggers is a filmmaker with astonishing visual flair.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 88 Soren Andersen
    Mufasa: The Lion King
    After having been made and remade for the screen and converted into a long-running hit Broadway show, it might have seemed like “The Lion King” was a played-out property. “Mufasa,” under Jenkins’ poised and creative direction, proves there is still plenty of life left in the long-reining “King.”
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim
    Betrayals, narrow escapes and much battle action ensue in the course of the picture’s paint-by-numbers plotting.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    Moana 2
    Part 2 is undeniably lively and very obviously pitched to young kids. It’s colorful but not especially distinctive.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 88 Soren Andersen
    Gladiator II
    Big, bold and bordering on the unbelievable, Gladiator II delivers, big time.
    • 41 Metascore
    • 38 Soren Andersen
    Venom: The Last Dance
    “The Last Dance” brings nothing new to the series. In fact, it brings less than the previous two movies
    • 85 Metascore
    • 88 Soren Andersen
    The Wild Robot
    Complex and lively, The Wild Robot is thoroughly delightful on every level. It’s a rare treat, not just for kids but for adults as well.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Transformers One
    In the midst of all the mayhem it’s sometimes hard to stay awake.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 38 Soren Andersen
    Alien: Romulus
    The movie’s unrelenting sensory onslaught is exhausting. It’s torture to sit through.
    • 52 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Despicable Me 4
    None of this is especially promising or, frankly, funny. In fact, for much of its length, “Despicable Me” is painfully unfunny.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes
    Ball takes his time presenting Noa’s world in detail. Too much time, frankly. There is no real sense of urgency here. Everything is carefully worked out. The visuals are handsome but unremarkable. Consequently, the picture feels dutiful and oddly bloodless.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare
    It’s an undeniably fun picture but rather too self-impressed. It’s Ritchie at his limited best.
    • 47 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire
    The CGI is off the leash. The manufactured chaos is unrelenting. Monsters punching monsters. The pyramids are peril. Awesome deconstruction there.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 100 Soren Andersen
    Kung Fu Panda 4
    The fourth time is truly the charm in this long-running franchise.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    Dune: Part Two
    A knowledge of the novel is helpful as well.
    • 26 Metascore
    • 38 Soren Andersen
    Madame Web
    By the end, it’s made glaringly obvious that the people who made Madame Web intended it to be the prelude to sequels featuring the three proto Spider-Women. Spare us.
    • 39 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    The Underdoggs
    So there’s not a single surprise along the way. But there is the comfort of familiarity operating in the movie’s favor. And it’s fun.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Migration
    It’s all big action. Big colorful visuals. Outsized vocal performances.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Aquaman And The Lost Kingdom
    Humongous undersea cities, enormous herds of aquatic creatures and a superabundance of monsters are laid before the viewer. The goal: Make people go, “Wow!” Pardon me, but the overall effect is more like, “eh.”
    • 64 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    Napoleon
    As far as truly caring about anything that goes on in this epic, well, that’s a chore. And with a run time of more than 2½ hours, that chore becomes ever more burdensome as the minutes tick away.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    Silent Night
    Limited by his budget, Woo makes the most of what he has, but the whole thing feels like he’s cautiously dipping his toe back in the Hollywood pool.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Thanksgiving
    By the time the big reveal comes along, it’s almost beside the point. The audience, so numbed by the gore, is likely to barely care who indeed did it.
    • 39 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    The Exorcist: Believer
    As an homage to Friedkin’s movie, Green’s take is respectful and genuinely scary. Let those tubular bells chime forth in celebration.
    • 33 Metascore
    • 38 Soren Andersen
    Five Nights at Freddy's
    The game, propelled by twitchy point-of-view camera work and abundant jump scares, is fast-paced. The movie is anything but.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 38 Soren Andersen
    Dicks: The Musical
    A more self-impressed movie than Dicks: The Musical would be hard to imagine.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    The Creator
    There are lots of ideas rattling around in it — about artificial intelligence, about racism, about American aggression on the world stage, about the future of humanity. And rattle and clang they do. And also clunk. The various elements are not well integrated.
    • 30 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Expend4bles
    The gunplay is primary though there are some obligatory scenes of martial arts fights.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    A Million Miles Away
    An engaging picture brimming with uplift.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    Blue Beetle
    Interspersed with the overabundant slam-bang action sequences which up the silliness factor with their increasing improbability are heartfelt paeans to the bracing solidarity of Jaime’s family. Their sincerity is the picture’s best element.
    • 52 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    The Last Voyage of the Demeter
    Every plot twist is easily anticipated...The ending hints at the possibility of a sequel, but that’s a prospect that leaves one cold. As far as “Demeter” is concerned, enough is enough.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 88 Soren Andersen
    Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem
    A fast-moving, clever and funny picture.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny
    Holding it all together is Ford, his hair steel-gray, his face craggy, playing the part with authority. And this time he invests Indy with an inner depth not previously seen.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    The Flash
    It’s nuts. It’s fun.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 88 Soren Andersen
    Transformers: Rise of the Beasts
    Director Caple Jr. takes his time allowing Ramos and Fishback to develop their characters as they fight being marginalized and dismissed in ‘90s New York. They’re no mere cardboard characters but rather fully dimensional individuals, a rarity in “Transformers” movies.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 100 Soren Andersen
    Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
    The movie becomes an immersive experience that sweeps the audience into all-encompassing venues of imagination.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3
    You know, there was a time when “Guardians of the Galaxy” was fun. That time was 2014, when the first picture came out... Now here’s “Vol. III.” And it’s no fun at all.
    • 46 Metascore
    • 38 Soren Andersen
    The Super Mario Bros. Movie
    Although the sense of being inside a video game is strong, one critical element is lacking: interactivity. Players are always working their controllers to send characters on their complicated journeys. They’re participants. A movie, by its very nature, turns everyone into spectators. We watch, but have no control over what we see. And what we see in “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” is nothing more than empty-calorie visuals.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 88 Soren Andersen
    Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves
    It’s a world of fantasy, but as depicted in Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, it has a solidity and imaginative depth that makes it seem astonishingly real.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 88 Soren Andersen
    John Wick: Chapter 4
    Directed once again by Chad Stahelski, the one-time stunt man who has become a first-rate visual stylist and master of pacing over the years of directing “Wicks,” “Chapter 4” is dazzling.
    • 47 Metascore
    • 25 Soren Andersen
    Shazam! Fury of the Gods
    With scenes of epic destruction uncorked with numbing frequency, the picture drags. It’s two hours and 10 minutes long and you feel every last second.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    The Whale
    The fat suit is in a sense a distraction in that you wonder how Fraser was able to act within it. But the fact that he does so and so effectively makes The Whale a searing, moving experience.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Cocaine Bear
    As a creature feature, Cocaine Bear isn’t bad. Not great, mind you. But not bad.
    • 48 Metascore
    • 38 Soren Andersen
    Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania
    “I’m tired.” — Overheard from a member of the audience at the end of the seemingly endless closing credit crawl at the critic’s screening for “Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania.” - I hear you, lady. Believe me, I hear you.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Plane
    There’s nothing special about any of this, but as a generic thrill machine, Plane certainly delivers the goods.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Avatar: The Way of Water
    So yes: Wow! Gasp! There are some really pretty pictures here. But wow! Gasp! The story is really pretty … stupid.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    Violent Night
    The picture is a hugely entertaining crowd-pleaser studded with laugh-out-loud moments from beginning to end.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Strange World
    The uneasy marriage of clunky psychodrama and overwrought special effects along with the fact that none of these characters are particularly likable make Strange World a chore to sit through.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 100 Soren Andersen
    Good Night Oppy
    “Oppy” is a salute to the best of what humans are capable when they unite in a common purpose to expand their knowledge of matters beyond the realm of the known.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    Causeway
    Henry’s performance is delicately nuanced. His character is by turns cheerful, ruminative, anguished. His performance and Lawrence’s are complementary. They play off each other well.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 100 Soren Andersen
    Till
    Under Chukwu’s steady, sensitive direction, Deadwyler’s performance is such that it overshadows everyone else in the movie.
    • 41 Metascore
    • 38 Soren Andersen
    Black Adam
    Once it gets going, Black Adam feels like a continuous closed loop of destruction where the moments of mayhem blend darn near seamlessly one into the other. And those special effects look incredibly cheesy.
    • 51 Metascore
    • 38 Soren Andersen
    Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile
    The whole picture is an exercise in obvious effort, try, try, trying really hard to win the audience’s affection. However it only succeeds in trying the audience’s patience. It’s a trial.
    • 48 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Don't Worry Darling
    There’s nothing original in the movie. Indeed, the off-screen controversy that’s been consuming social media lately over the casting of pop superstar Styles and whether Pugh and Wilde are at odds overshadows the movie itself.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 88 Soren Andersen
    See How They Run
    See How They Run is the Saoirse Ronan show. Start to finish. Top to bottom, Now and forever. Amen.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 88 Soren Andersen
    Flight/Risk
    Despite its flaws, Flight/Risk is a comprehensive and stinging critique of a once-proud company that has lost its way and is struggling to make a comeback. And it’s a tribute to the people who died and the families who mourn them.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 100 Soren Andersen
    Honk for Jesus. Save Your Soul.
    Hall’s performance is remarkable, full of shadings and intimations of significant emotional depths.
    • 45 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Samaritan
    Originality was on vacation when this picture was made.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 38 Soren Andersen
    Beast
    Elba, always a powerful presence in whatever role he takes on, does the best he can in Beast, but the threadbare nature of the plotting and dialogue ultimately defeats him.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Bullet Train
    Leitch’s emphasis on excessive and nearly nonstop stunt-filled action is hardly surprising. His lack of directorial discipline, however, is. The guy apparently couldn’t help himself, piling on the action beats until they become numbing. By the end, you’re more than ready to get off this Bullet Train, feeling drained and disheartened.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 100 Soren Andersen
    Vengeance
    It’s a detective story. It’s an insightful commentary on the state of us, which is to say us, the U.S., in this divided, disjointed, distracted age. It’s a comedy, sharp and frequently hilarious. It is, above all, consistently surprising.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    Nope
    It’s fun, but it’s not prime Peele by any means.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris
    Mrs. Harris Goes To Paris is all sweetness and light. So sweet it nearly dissolves one’s fillings, especially at the end. So light it practically floats off the screen. It’s a gossamer fairy tale. Pleasant. Charming. A trifle, though not without some substance.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    Minions: The Rise of Gru
    Kids will love all the silliness, but oddly the greatest resonance of the Wayback Machine plot will be felt by the kids’ grandparents (if any find themselves in attendance) who were around in those bygone days.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 88 Soren Andersen
    The Bad Guys
    The characters are well-defined and Rockwell holds the picture together as he conveys Mr. Wolf’s shifting emotional states: suave, vexed and morally conflicted. Kids will love The Bad Guys and there’s plenty of substance for adults as well.
    • 47 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Sonic the Hedgehog 2
    So it goes, with Sonic, fleet of foot and quick of tongue, racing from one dire situation to another. It’s exhausting, but the makers knew exactly how to tailor it to its game-mad audience.
    • 35 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Morbius
    Smith, on the other hand, throws himself avidly into his work, communicating a, uh, biting malevolence and sick glee in his portrayal. The picture only truly comes alive when he’s masticating his scenes. Otherwise, “Morbius” is dead at its center.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    Potato Dreams of America
    Two very strong performances anchor Potato Dreams of America, Seattle-based filmmaker Wes Hurley’s thought-provoking dramatization of his childhood in his native Russia and, later, as a teen in Seattle.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    Dog
    Through it all, Tatum balances exasperation, an easygoing lightheartedness and a deep empathy for his character’s and Lulu’s inner turmoil. His command of the role and his confident direction of the picture make Dog a very engaging experience.
    • 41 Metascore
    • 25 Soren Andersen
    Moonfall
    As terrible as it is — and make no mistake, Moonfall is epically awful — it is also undeniably entertaining. A guilty pleasure, if you will. See it on the biggest screen you can. It’s a, er, riot.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 100 Soren Andersen
    The Matrix Resurrections
    Wachowski has taken the familiar and modified it in such a way to make it seem new. It’s a brilliant act of transformation.
    • 45 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Ghostbusters: Afterlife
    You wait and you wait, through many overamped special-effects action sequences, for the cavalry to save the day, but by the time it finally appears, the picture has been long dead.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Antlers
    Director Scott Cooper really lays it on thick. He brings no modulation to the horror elements in his frightfest. Everything is gloom, gloom, gloom. And doom.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 100 Soren Andersen
    Dune: Part One
    It’s remarkable.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    The Last Duel
    Director Ridley Scott, who knows a thing or two about how to mount sweeping historical epics (see “Gladiator”), is in his element here.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    The Card Counter
    In fact it’s really writer-director Schrader who is Isaac’s true co-star in “The Card Counter.” A product of a strict Calvinist upbringing in Michigan, the filmmaker’s trademarks — guilt, redemption, a soul in torment — are all here.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    Free Guy
    The plot may be nothing special, but Reynolds most certainly is. He’s just so relatable, genial, nice, in an unforced sort of way that he makes the movie, which he also produced, a fun ride.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 88 Soren Andersen
    The Suicide Squad
    Gunn masterfully mixes humor and bloodshed and manages to give a surprising number of characters room to develop their personas. And when it comes to staging set pieces, he’s at his best.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Stillwater
    For most of its length, Stillwater goes along as a meticulous examination of its central characters. And then suddenly near the end it jumps the tracks.
    • 43 Metascore
    • 38 Soren Andersen
    Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins
    The fight scenes, full of swordplay and gunfire, are choppily edited and somehow lackadaisical. It’s as though Schwentke was operating from a checklist of expected action-movie clichés and hurries through them all.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    The Paper Tigers
    It’s a fun, satisfying picture.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    The Way Back
    Affleck, who has struggled in real life with alcoholism and has been in and out of rehab on a number of occasions over the years, makes his character’s pain palpable and totally believable.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 50 Soren Andersen
    Onward
    This is a picture whose subject, loudly and frequently proclaimed, is magic. But there is precious little of the genuine article to be found in it.
    • 48 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    The Call of the Wild
    The essence of the London story is retained, with stouthearted Buck being annealed by adversity, overcoming brutality, confusion and loneliness and then responding to the kindness of Thornton to become the leader of the pack. And all that is accomplished with a soft touch. What we have here is the call of the mild
    • 47 Metascore
    • 63 Soren Andersen
    Sonic the Hedgehog
    Sonic the Hedgehog is bright. It’s cheery. It’s here and then it’s gone in a relatively compact 100 minutes, leaving little beyond a slightly sweet aftertaste to mark its passage.
    • 51 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    The Gentlemen
    The dialogue, the violence, the humor (largely provided by Grant’s character) and the intricacy of the storytelling make for a picture in which most everyone in it seems to be having a great deal of chatty, bloody fun.
    • 26 Metascore
    • 75 Soren Andersen
    Dolittle
    For a fun time to dispel the gloom of January, Dolittle is just what the doctor ordered.
    • 48 Metascore
    • 25 Soren Andersen
    Underwater
    The first creature feature of the new decade is here, and boy is it dumb.
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