Chicago Tribune's Scores

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For 7,601 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 62% higher than the average critic
  • 2% same as the average critic
  • 36% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 1.3 points higher than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Movie review score: 66
Highest review score: 100 Autumn Tale
Lowest review score: 0 Car 54, Where Are You?
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 5,106 out of 7601
  2. Mixed: 1,473 out of 7601
  3. Negative: 1,022 out of 7601
7601 movie reviews
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  1. The Quiet
    A movie of good intentions and awful results.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Queens
    If frenetic pacing alone made a movie interesting, Queens would be cinematic solid gold.
  3. Buzz
    Fascinating as Buzz often is, the film obviously was made with limited resources, transferred to film from DV, with grainy clips from the trailers for Bezzerides-scripted movies rather than snippets of the movies themselves.
  4. Surviving Eden
    There's nothing classic about Surviving Eden, even if it is better than reality TV.
  5. The Dogwalker
    Gordon, she of the Selma Diamond voice and mournful glare, is by far the most interesting aspect in a picture that might be termed unreleasably dull, if it weren't in fact in release at the moment en route to DVD.
  6. Snakes on a Plane
    Snakes on a Plane represents a fairly craven mixture of deliberate cheese and inadvertent lameness, plus fangs.
  7. Accepted
    A mildly funny PG-13 effort that is just dying to release an R- or unrated DVD version of itself. That way all the pool party sequences can lay off the false modesty.
  8. The Illusionist
    One of the strengths of The Illusionist: Everyone in it actually appears to be acting in the same era.
  9. Factotum
    Factotum, starring Matt Dillon and Lili Taylor in two of their best film performances, is a good movie about the L.A. underbelly, as recalled by an expert: Charles Bukowski.
    • 43 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Trust the Man
    Trust the Man could easily carry the following subtitle: "Men Who Behave Like Petulant, Spoiled Children and the Women Who Decide It's Easier to Love Them As-Is Than To Try to Turn Them Into Grownups."
  11. Conversations with Other Women
    This minor relationship picture comes and goes, but her (Carter's) performance lingers.
    • 48 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Step Up
    It's no accident that the credits for the movie are a Who's Who of dance movie alumni: Director Anne Fletcher choreographed "Bring It On"; screenwriter Duane Adler penned "Save The Last Dance"; and the movie was photographed by Michael Seresin, who shot "Fame."
  13. Half Nelson
    No halves about it: Half Nelson is a wholly absorbing and delicately shaded portrait of an educator played by Ryan Gosling, a young man harboring an offstage secret.
  14. The Ordeal
    A stylish, nasty, very well-done Belgian horror movie.
  15. House of Sand
    Soarez isn't really saying much with House of Sand, beyond marveling at the quirks of fate brought on by time. But the acting keeps it from floating into the ether.
  16. World Trade Center
    Like Stone's "Platoon," World Trade Center has the visceral stuff it takes to appeal to audiences of all political stripes. Unlike "Platoon," however, its sense of craft feels impersonal.
  17. Lunacy
    While Lunacy leaves you with the impression that Svankmajer is more expressive with cutlets than he is with his atypically human-dominated dreamscape, some of the images are doozies.
  18. The Descent
    You either go for a movie like this or you don't. But though I didn't like it much, I've got to admit that The Descent is a nerve-jangler.
  19. Barnyard
    It's a better-than-average animated feature.
  20. The Night Listener
    The pacing and staging of the later scenes could use a little more electricity and momentum, and a little less restraint. Yet The Night Listener keeps you watching. And listening.
  21. Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby
    Lacks the guts of genuine satire.
  22. The Bridesmaid
    A classic of realistic terror, in which passion and murder can't lie buried.
  23. My Country, My Country
    The subject of Iraq haunts and divides us so much these days that a film like Laura Poitras' documentary My Country My Country is valuable, no matter its level of achievement.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Quinceañera
    Quinceanera took both the dramatic Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Award at this year's Sundance Film Festival, and it's easy to see why.
  25. Boynton Beach Club
    Here Seidelman's more interested in warm and fuzzy than in carbonation. That's fine, as far as this modest picture goes. But the actors deserve more, and better.
  26. Miami Vice
    It's refreshing to hear some old-fashioned percussive tension in service of a director who knows what he's doing. Even when the screenwriter is losing his way.
  27. Scoop
    Scoop isn't going for complexity. It's a trifle.
    • 41 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    John Tucker Must Die
    Reasonably entertaining.
  29. The Ant Bully
    It lacks a sharp look and satisfyingly fleshed-out story and compensates with one numbing round of insect- or human-based peril after another.
  30. 13 Tzameti
    Creating a mood that suggests an unholy mix of Czech novelist Franz Kafka, American pulp fictionist Jim Thompson and French heist moviemaker Jean-Pierre Melville, Babluani's story is about the perils of get-rich-quick schemes.
  31. America: Freedom to Fascism
    Aaron Russo's America: Freedom to Fascism can't even think straight, it's so mad.
  32. Another Gay Movie
    Combine the uninhibited raunchiness of John Waters with the gross-out zeal of the Farrelly brothers and you get Another Gay Movie, a parody and comedy more numbingly disgusting than funny.
  33. Brothers of the Head
    Facetious form dictates hollow content in Brothers of the Head.
  34. I Like Killing Flies
    The self-taught man behind the griddle, his wife, Eve, and their five seen-it-all kids emerge as the ensemble of the year.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    Little Miss Sunshine
    Funny, and thoughtful, and deeply, viscerally satisfying.
  36. Darshan: The Embrace
    Jan Kounen, the maker of Darshan, is a French director with flashy credentials, including music videos, commercials, horror shorts, violent gangster movies ("Dobermann") and offbeat westerns ("Blueberry").
  37. Been Rich All My Life
    It's a modest but highly enjoyable tribute.
    • 33 Metascore
    • 38 Critic Score
    Shadowboxer
    Gruesome and supremely disjointed foray into the world of hired assassins.
  39. Clerks II
    More sentimental and ruder than its predecessor, though its brand of raunch tends to curdle halfway out of the characters' mouths.
  40. Lady in the Water
    The film is a rogue hunk of hooey.
  41. Monster House
    Set around Halloween, Monster House manages to cull bits and pieces from Hammer, Hitchcock and the old-dark-house genre of 19th Century literature and early 20th Century stage and film.
  42. My Super Ex-Girlfriend
    You'd have to go back to "My Stepmother Is an Alien" to find a male fantasy/nightmare this off-putting.
  43. Azumi
    A movie of such cheerful craziness and nonstop ferocity that you can't take it seriously for a second.
  44. Little Man
    I'd be lying if I said I didn't laugh at some of this--though it's not as funny as Laurel and Hardy as toddlers in "Brats." But I wanted to slap myself whenever I did.
    • 46 Metascore
    • 63 Critic Score
    You, Me and Dupree
    The end product feels less funny than formulaic.
  46. Changing Times
    This magnificent pair are the heart of Techine's film, and the sense of frayed, aging beauty and handsomeness they now carry helps project the picture's main theme: the imperishability of true love.
  47. The Oh in Ohio
    One of those movies that promises much but doesn't deliver. Despite a lot of misplaced talent, this movie is as silly and forced as its title.
  48. Time to Leave
    Time to Leave may not have made me cry, but it's affecting nonetheless.
  49. Edmond
    Mamet is a writer who turns off some audiences, and almost everything that might bother them is in Edmond: foul language, raging machismo, violence and seemingly bigoted tirades. But almost everything audiences like about him is there too: candor, suspense, ideas, crackling slang, vivid characters.
  50. Gabrielle
    If all this potent drama recalls Bergman, the beautifully articulated staging and setting suggest that master of operatic social-sexual drama, Luchino Visconti ("The Leopard").
  51. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
    Two of the big action set-pieces easily outdo anything from the previous edition.
  52. A Scanner Darkly
    It's one of the most faithful movie adaptations of any Dick story to date, and it comes from the scariest of all his books, as well as the truest.
  53. Beowulf & Grendel
    While cinema may be a visual medium foremost it's also an aural one, and the cacaphony of dialects sounds not so much "universal" or interestingly multicultural as simply all over the map.
  54. Heading South
    The racial and sexual politics of Heading South may trouble some audiences; Cantet is definitely not a moralist in the usual sense.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Once in a Lifetime: The Extraordinary Story of the New York Cosmos
    You don't need to be a soccer fan to, like Cosmos fans, fall for this captivating tale, told in "Rashomon"-like style.
  56. Islam: What the West Needs to Know
    Has one point to make: Islam is a bad, baaaaaaaaad religion, and it's a miracle you're even alive and reading this, so intent most Muslims are on your destruction.
  57. The Devil Wears Prada
    It's an occasion for Streep to play against a stereotype, and win. It's a rout, in fact.
  58. Superman Returns
    Superman Returns has everything going for it except surprise.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 25 Critic Score
    Room
    Williams does a fine job with her role. I was pulling for her throughout her dreary journey. It's too bad it didn't get anywhere.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Strangers with Candy
    Easily the wittiest, most ridiculous and best-written comedy of the year.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Wassup Rockers
    Very different than "Kids." Where the earlier film was exhausting in its nihilism, the latest retains a good-natured charm.
  62. Click
    Aside from influences such as "A Christmas Carol" and "It's a Wonderful Life," Click is so much like the Jim Carrey vehicle "Bruce Almighty"--Steve Koren and Mark O'Keefe worked on both--the writers could sue themselves for plagiarism and then write a screenplay about it.
    • 37 Metascore
    • 63 Critic Score
    Waist Deep
    The performances are pretty good--with the exception of the nauseatingly sweet H. Hunter Hall (the son of the director) as Junior and a one-note scowl from rapper The Game, who plays Meat--and the screenplay, by Hall and Darin Scott, has some genuinely funny moments.
    • 41 Metascore
    • 25 Critic Score
    Two Drifters
    With a weak script, utterly unsympathetic characters and a nonsensical plot, it can barely keep plodding along.
  65. The Road to Guantanamo
    It's a fervent, topical political drama of extraordinary impact and ferocity.
  66. The Great New Wonderful
    The story lines don't intersect in that schematic, "Crash"-y way, which is refreshing. Less refreshing is the neat-and-tidiness of the individual exchanges in Sam Catlin's script.
  67. The Forsaken Land
    A stark, lyrical and affecting portrait of war's aftermath.
  68. Leonard Cohen: I'm Your Man
    I'm Your Man has at its spiritual center a troubadour with a distinctive, cagey mellowness about him.
  69. The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift
    For all its crashes and flash, this is a movie that drifts away as we watch it. Muscle cars and all, it's often a waste of gas.
    • 37 Metascore
    • 63 Critic Score
    Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties
    When the humans have the sense to keep quiet, and the animals are doing their shtick, there's great fun to be had.
  71. The Lake House
    This is a project whose elements, from concept to script to casting, refuse to follow the usual formulas, which is good, yet they never quite cohere.
  72. Nacho Libre
    The film is easy to take and easy to forget, even with Black running around Oaxaca in turquoise wrestling tights.
  73. The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life of Ethan Green
    The film's tone veers from misjudged sincerity to shrill sketch comedy of the broadest stripe.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Only Human
    The film's snappy action and frank sexuality are reminiscent of "Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown," while the mordant humor and conflicting identities are vintage Allen.
  75. Wordplay
    There's genuine suspense and a lot of humor.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 63 Critic Score
    Cars
    Whatever you do, don't leave before watching the snippets that run during the closing credits--the self-referential, tongue in cheek "outtakes" are quite possibly the funniest part of this movie--a visual stunner that seems to have misplaced its heart.
  77. A Prairie Home Companion
    Like his recent, elegant dance film "The Company," A Prairie Home Companion will appeal especially to those who are not story-dependent. Altman's sidewinding tribute to a surprisingly hardy 32-year-old public radio phenomenon is like a 105-minute putter in the garden, with a few songs and some jokes.
  78. Agnes and His Brothers
    It's a slick, ambitious movie that doesn't always nail all the many moods and themes it's after.
  79. Autumn
    With its quick fades and creamy lighting, Autumn is all about looking good. McGee may well have strong films in him, but this one feels pretentious and gassy.
  80. The Heart of the Game
    If you or any kid over the age of 10 has even a half-interest in the definition of the word "teamwork," as well as the words "real-life suspense," this is the movie.
  81. Psychopathia Sexualis
    An independent American art film that seems to be masquerading as Victorian-era pornography--and it's not quite as interesting or provocative as that description might make it sound.
  82. The Omen
    Schreiber and Stiles are good actors, and they're actually acting, if not to any actual avail. In the silliest recasting, a comically exaggerated Mia Farrow takes over for steely Billie Whitelaw in the evil nanny role.
    • 46 Metascore
    • 63 Critic Score
    The Break-Up
    It's Aniston's return to the emotional authenticity that surfaced too briefly in "Friends With Money" and made "The Good Girl" such a revelation.
  84. District B13
    A ridiculous but exciting action movie.
  85. Peaceful Warrior
    The cast is quite good. But Peaceful Warrior, which is basically "The Karate Kid" with a bigger kid and a bigger mentor, represents a journey of predictability, rather than a destination worth the trouble.
  86. The War Tapes
    Gripping documentary.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 63 Critic Score
    The Puffy Chair
    An enjoyable road movie that feels both comfortable and completely fresh.
  88. Typhoon
    As silly movies go, this one is at least pretty exciting. But in the end, Typhoon leaves you feeling as exiled from the two Koreas as Sin is.
  89. Coastlines
    It's only a mild disappointment. The talent is still there, the film better than most. It just needs less crime, more love.
  90. X-Men: The Last Stand
    Disappointingly, X-Men: The Last Stand slides back between the first two episodes. It's not stuporous, and it's not super.
  91. An Inconvenient Truth
    The film's context and talking points are more interesting than the film itself, which settles for an earnest (though rarely dull) nudge in its chosen direction: PowerPoint cinema.
  92. La Moustache
    With his thin-lipped grimace and big, soulful eyes, Lindon's an ideal actor for this sort of puzzle.
  93. The Da Vinci Code
    It stars Tom Hanks in his first genuinely dull screen performance.
  94. Over the Hedge
    Even with Levy and O'Hara and Shandling adding what they can, you can only enjoy the voices behind the critters so much when the images fall so short.
  95. The King
    The King simply unsettles and bothers us -- and it finally misses both the true terror and the twisted redemption it needs for its wicked song, a would-be "Heartbreak Hotel" of horror, to really chill our spines.
  96. Lemming
    Begins like a house afire and then fizzles out into a quasi-supernatural dead end.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Twelve and Holding
    The kids deliver uniformly solid, occasionally remarkable performances.
  98. Poseidon
    At least Poseidon takes care to dispatch the Black Eyed Peas' Stacy Ferguson who, as the shipboard entertainer, sings what may be the worst song ever written, reprised over the end credits.
    • 29 Metascore
    • 38 Critic Score
    Just My Luck
    Presumably, this movie was designed to be a fun romp, and in that it fails.
  100. Goal! The Dream Begins
    Most sports films are also fish-out-of-water stories, and this one qualifies as both.
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