Stephen Dalton

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Film Journal International, The Film Verdict, The Hollywood Reporter
For 251 reviews, this critic has graded:
  • 36% higher than the average critic
  • 5% same as the average critic
  • 59% lower than the average critic
On average, this critic grades 3.9 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)

Stephen Dalton's Scores

  • Movies
  • TV
Average review score: 62
Highest review score: 90 A Hard Day
Lowest review score: 20 Unhinged
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 131 out of 251
  2. Mixed: 101 out of 251
  3. Negative: 19 out of 251
251 movie reviews
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    • 85 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Night Will Fall
    Inevitably harrowing and sickening in places, but with tender and uplifting moments, Night Will Fall is a somber treatment of a serious topic which earns its place in the broad pantheon of Holocaust-themed cinema. It is just a shame that Singer's worthy memorial feels a little too small for its world-shaking theme and world-famous cast list.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Kill the Jockey
    This ebullient equestrian comedy thriller is effortlessly enjoyable as camp spectacle, with shades of Almodovar in the mix, even if its twist-heady screwball plot ultimately delivers more style than substance.
    • 91 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    The Brutalist
    The Brutalist aims for symphonic grandeur and novelistic depth. It partially succeeds, though it too often mistakes pomposity for profundity, and bloated verbosity for literary nuance.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    The Ones Below
    For all its limited ambitions, The Ones Below serves its purpose as a solid calling card for Farr's filmmaking future, a gripping exercise in domestic suspense that sets out its stall on the shoulders of giants.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Honour
    An uneven mix of serious issue movie and sensational thrill ride, Honour is no masterpiece, but it is an accomplished debut.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    The State Against Mandela and the Others
    The State Against Mandela and the Others adds little essential to the vast library of documentaries about Mandela and the anti-apartheid struggle. All the same, this is a heartfelt, humane and visually inventive tribute to a fading generation of giants whose principled sacrifices ended up changing history.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Björk: Biophilia Live
    Strickland and Fenton bring an extra layer of visual invention, smartly expanding on the show's pre-existing video elements and adding their own bespoke cinematic touches.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Köln 75
    Köln 75 is an enjoyably off-beat blend of biopic, historical pageant and music-geek lecture from US writer-director Ido Fluk.
    • 94 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    45 Years
    Do not expect blazing emotional fireworks, just finely calibrated performances and deep reserves of inner torment.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Endzeit - Ever After
    The splatter violence is fairly tame by modern gore standards, and the episodic narrative sags in places, but the ecological subtext and feminist folk-horror elements make this almost entirely female-driven road movie an agreeably fresh addition to the zombie canon.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Weekend of a Champion
    Weekend of a Champion begins as a motorsports movie but ends up a portrait of two wily elder statesmen who have survived into their seventies by skill, stealth and sheer luck.
    • 30 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Jake Squared
    Goldberg has made a commendably adventurous and mostly enjoyable meta-comedy that recalls both the best and worst of 1970s Hollywood.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    I See You
    A twist-heavy crime thriller spiced with horror and noir elements, I See You is such a finely crafted exercise in slow-burn suspense that its loopy plot contortions only seem absurd in retrospect.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    We Are Many
    This is a solid and detailed record of an extraordinary protest movement.
    • 45 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Kill Your Friends
    Kill Your Friends remixes a brutally funny novel into an entertaining if somewhat familiar big-screen tale of amoral, chemically-fuelled decadence.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Jodorowsky's Dune
    The tone veers into film-fan geekery in places, but Jodorowsky is such a natural showman and irrepressible egotist that his ancient anecdotes never become tedious.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Apocalypse in the Tropics
    Adding an extra religious dimension to an already densely packed sociopolitical soap opera, Costa tells a rich story here about the fuzzy line between democracy and theocracy, clashing spiritual values and inflammatory culture-war rhetoric.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Cult of Chucky
    A lean 91 minutes long, Cult of Chucky is part self-spoofing slasher, part lowbrow bloodbath and all guilty pleasure. There are plot holes here bigger than Trump Tower, and almost as ridiculous, but only the most joylessly wrong-headed film critic would waste mental energy unpicking them.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Catch Me Daddy
    Over the long haul, the Wolfe brother never quite provide enough psychological and emotional ballast to flesh out their complex, conflicted characters. But these are minor flaws in an otherwise confident, gripping, highly charged debut.
    • 88 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Manuscripts Don't Burn
    An unflinching portrait of state-sponsored evil, Manuscripts Don’t Burn feels like the work of an angry artist who has been jailed, censored and harassed too long. This time it’s personal.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Evolution
    On many levels, Evolution is a dazzling high-wire act.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Scream of My Blood: A Gogol Bordello Story
    For casually curious viewers, Scream of My Blood is a fast-moving, well-crafted primer on the band, light on background detail but generally compelling.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    The Mafia Only Kills in Summer
    Though heavy-handed in places, The Mafia Only Kills in Summer is a generally charming and engrossing debut feature.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    The Black Guelph
    As it gathers to its grim conclusion with the inevitability of Greek tragedy, The Black Guelph becomes a quietly furious critique of power, corruption and lies among Ireland’s elites, from the police to the church to the upper echelons of government.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    The Second Act
    Not every joke hits the target, and not every thematic tangent is fruitfully explored, but a stellar cast and lively pacing lend comic force to even the weaker lines.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    A Gay Girl in Damascus: The Amina Profile
    The Amina Profile is an absorbing, artfully assembled and timely reconstruction of a fascinating digital-age hoax.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    West of the Jordan River
    Clearly weighted towards Gitai's own liberal political stance, but incorporating a range of other views too, West of the Jordan River is a dry and sometimes depressing film, but informative and humane too.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Grand Piano
    The young Spanish director Eugenio Mira and his American screenwriter Damien Chazelle have fun paying homage to the pulpy potboilers of yesteryear.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Jack Strong
    With its secret gadgets, poison pills and furtive assignations in snowy graveyards, it is also an enjoyable throwback to the cloak-and-dagger heroics of classic Cold War cinema.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 70 Stephen Dalton
    Alan Partridge
    Though not the finest screen outing for Coogan’s best-known alter ego, this is a worthy addition to the ever-growing Partridge archive, with enough weapons-grade comic zing in the first half to excuse the less sure-footed second.
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