Empire's Scores

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For 6,818 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 54% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 43% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 0.9 points higher than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Movie review score: 66
Highest review score: 100 Oppenheimer
Lowest review score: 20 Superman IV: The Quest for Peace
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 3,006 out of 6818
  2. Mixed: 3,654 out of 6818
  3. Negative: 158 out of 6818
6818 movie reviews
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    • 49 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    CB4
    Not all Saturday Night Live sketches succeed in the transition from small screen 5 minute slot to hour and a half, with CB4 a fine example of one with mixed results. Rock and his group do well in mocking not only the blacks, but whites and all number of classes along the way, except the story doesn't quite manage to hold it's own as the joke begins to tire after the first hour.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Fire in the Sky
    Never scratching below the surface "facts" of the story, this is too thin and unsophisticated to truly compel.
    • 39 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Swing Kids
    For its historical detail and recognition that teenagers were around long before James Dean sparked up a Marlboro, this film deserves some credit.
  4. Amos & Andrew
    Two actors have wasted their considerable talents on this hapless comedy. With a flawed plot and far too few jokes, it's understandable why this isn't a particularly memorable film and just as well it's disappeared without trace.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Falling Down
    While the morality of D-Fens methods are questionable, there's a resonance about his reaction to everyday annoyances, and Michael Douglas' hypnotic performance makes it memorable.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Army of Darkness
    As a film in its own right, this quirky Ray Harryhausen tribute (a skeleton army!) rocks. As an Evil Dead film, though, it’s ultimately not funny, scary or gory enough.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Strictly Ballroom
    Fluff it may well be, but a more entertaining and engaging piece of fluff you'd be hard pushed to find.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Untamed Heart
    If the script lays the broken heart metaphor a tad too thick and the ending has a fatal inevitability that you can spot a mile off, Bill, to his credit, plays it all straight from the heart (pun intended). Go armed with a very large box of Kleenex.
  9. Loaded Weapon 1
    There may not be a laugh every minute, but there are enough to satisfy most devotees of the relentlessly silly, tasteless school of parody.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Sommersby
    A romantic drama which has lost some of the intended edge thanks to the Hollywood treatment.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Damage
    Like its seductress, Anna, it's ravishing to behold while ultimately failing to engage the emotions.
    • 29 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Body of Evidence
    An erotic thriller that's strangely unerotic and devoid of thrills, this is, however, mercifully short at 100 minutes.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Man Bites Dog
    Harrowing, visceral and definitely not for the squeamish, the fake documentary approach is an effective and unsettling tool, and while the film never quite reaches the horrific heights of John McNaughton's chilling Henry: Portrait Of A Serial Killer, it is, for better or worse, difficult to forget.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Alive
    Not exactly light entertainment and it can drag in places but when the drama is cranked up, it really works.
    • 41 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Nowhere to Run
    Little more than schmaltz and pitchfork-handed fisticuffs.
  16. Lorenzo's Oil
    The only phoney note, ironically, comes from Miller's gaffe of enlisting retired Yorkshire biochemist Don Suddaby, extractor of the said oil, for a self-conscious appearance as himself. That aside, this is exhausting, intelligent and undeniably moving .
    • 50 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Hoffa
    Danny DeVito's ambitious and violent biopic nonetheless paints an intriguing portrait of a complex and angry man while effectively exploring his uses and abuses of power.
  18. Trespass
    Hill remains a master of action pieces and is even director enough to get strong performances from his bunch of dressed-up pop stars. But this supposed sure-fire thriller, from a script that was called The Looters until the L.A. riots got in the way, fizzles like a Molotov cocktail with a soggy fuse.
  19. Toys
    A riot of confused, clever and dazzling moments, Toys is a true formula-defying one-off for which the phrase love it or loathe it might have been coined, and one so audaciously zany that you will be captivated or enraged.
  20. A Few Good Men
    This is a timeless thriller, a reminder of how stars who have been so average elsewhere can produce excellent — some career-best — work when given a decent script and a confident director.
  21. The Muppet Christmas Carol
    Vastly enjoyable despite the syrupy, soppy song bit in the middle (go make a glass of mulled wine during it). Michael Caine is perfect in the role and there are many genuine belly laughs.
  22. The Distinguished Gentleman
    Murphy occasionally does uninterrupted seconds of shtick, but the film is stuffed with cheap sentiment (a kid with cancer), extraneous characters and embarrassing simplistic politics.
  23. The Crying Game
    A finely-acted, sensitively-written tale.
    • 39 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Bodyguard
    Its popularity continues to confound critics everywhere.
  25. Aladdin
    The movie that brought a hip new sensibility to animated features and which still stands up in the age of Pixar and DreamWorks thanks largely to a blistering improv turn from Robin Williams.
  26. Bad Lieutenant
    Abel Ferrara out-sleazes even his own grubby oeuvre with this powerful if overbearing study of a soul swallowed by depravity.
    • 46 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Home Alone 2: Lost in New York
    Less a sequel, more a virtual remake of Home Alone, this "John Hughes production" follows the same route as its money-spinning predecessor, wheeling out the well-worn precocious-kid-on-his-todd scenario with scant regard for originality.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Malcolm X
    Lee's film suffers from message over substance and is slightly tedious as a result.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Bram Stoker's Dracula
    There was so much potential, yet when it came down to it, Coppola made his Dracula too old to be menacing, gave Keanu Reeves a part and took out all the action. So all we're left with is an overly long bloated adaptation, instead of what might have been a gothic masterpiece.
    • 50 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Passenger 57
    Though there are a few rather large nits to be picked from the sloppy plot - the action takes at least one unfathomable turn and, as a terrorist, Payne seems to have entirely forgotten to have a cause - if you enter into the spirit, this is thunderously good fun.
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