Empire's Scores

  • Movies
  • TV
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:
6818 movie reviews
  1. Falls slightly short of being the definitive Alien doc, but Memory is slick and thoughtful, and will deepen your love of a classic.
  2. A Jamaican classic with an awesome OST.
  3. It’s a small, lightweight picture but Good Posture is alive to the messy realities of becoming a grown-assed adult, becoming more charming and involving as it goes on. It also suggests a bright future for writer-director Dolly Wells.
  4. This is intentionally jagged but nevertheless frustrating, a little too self-satisfied for its own good. Yet there are some great moments and, when it relaxes a bit, it has charm to spare.
  5. On paper, Don’t Let Go’s premise — a supernaturally flecked crime story with a hint of time travel — should be exciting but it is let down down by workaday writing and routine filmmaking.
  6. Hotel Mumbai benefits from strong filmmaking and an unflinching gaze, yet it lacks dimensions, both in its characters and take on its subject matter. Still, it’s a punchy, promising debut.
  7. An earnest stab at crunching a brilliant breezeblock of a novel down to film-size, but one that fails to pay off. Frankly, you might have more fun watching a pigeon for 149 minutes.
  8. As a last hurrah for a once great action icon, Rambo: Last Blood is a damp squib. Put your headbands at half mast and remember him from his glory days.
  9. The Kitchen flits through scenes, coming across as its own trailer rather than a full movie. And it makes disappointing use of its great components, wasting three chewy, thoughtful core performances.
  10. Both a vehicle for Awkwafina’s formidable talents and an incredibly charming ensemble piece. If there’s any justice, it’ll be remembered when it comes to award-scattering season.
  11. Anchored by a dazzling turn by Samara Weaving, Ready Or Not brilliantly fuses thrills, satire, laughs and horror. Don’t count to 100 — just go and see.
  12. Liam Gallagher: As It Was lacks the narrative shape and drama of previous Oasis doc Supersonic, but provides an interesting snapshot of an artist in transition, both professionally and personally.
  13. For Sama powerfully mixes the personal and the political to thought-provoking, emotional ends. The result is one of the best documentaries of 2019.
  14. Stunningly beautiful and quietly powerful, this is a portrait of a vanishing way of life and of a determined woman who’s just trying to make her way in the world.
  15. A giddily entertaining homage to female power that illuminates bold ambition in its stars and director alike, Hustlers is the kind of era-defining film that Hollywood didn’t know it needed.
  16. Gentle, unchallenging drama for people who already know they like it, this is a nostalgic and rosy depiction of an England that was, surely, never so innocent.
  17. At a time when television is easier to make than films, it's a pity that a quart of plot in a pint-sized pot is largely to blame for this muddled misfire, which wastes some promising ideas and an impressive cast.
  18. With each subplot reinforcing the simmering sense of unease, this compelling recreation of a pernicious period soberingly exposes the ease with which morality can become a casualty of human nature.
  19. A psychologically merciless sequel, everything here is as it should be: deeper, scarier, funnier. Muschietti in particular has stepped up, skilfully guiding us through a rollicking funhouse. It is obscenely entertaining.
  20. Inna De Yard, while not always incisive, is soulful and uplifting in its exploration of the hearts behind the music Webber clearly loves — a feeling compounded by its charming subjects.
  21. Despite the formidable talents of Timothy Spall and Vanessa Redgrave, Mrs Lowry & Son doesn’t really get under the skin of the artist or the man, resulting in a film as dreary as Pendlebury’s colourless skies.
  22. Bold, devastating and utterly beautiful, Todd Phillips and Joaquin Phoenix have not just reimagined one of the most iconic villains in cinema history, but reimagined the comic book movie itself.
  23. Despite an imposing performance by Renée Zellweger, Judy never exposes the dark heart of Garland’s last years, creating an enjoyable backstage drama movie while failing to get under its protagonist’s skin.
  24. Fleeting charm and pretty packaging will leave you partially satisfied but later craving a bolder film that puts its battle-worn title character to better use.
  25. Existential but also intimate, Ad Astra is a stunning, sensitive exploration of the space left by an absent parent — and the infinite void of actual space.
  26. Joanna Hogg paints a precise picture of a woman trying to develop her own artistic vision while caught in the slipstream of a toxic relationship. An understated, exquisite gem of a film.
  27. It’s well-intentioned and pretty, but not much else. Occasional stylistic flourish aside, it offers nothing we haven’t seen before, buckling under the weight of its own conservatism.
  28. A big, lumbering bastard of an action movie sequel. It achieves more-or-less exactly what it promises — which, given this franchise’s track record, is a low bar to clear.
  29. As a mindless summer horror diversion, Crawl is watchable if rarely all that thrilling. The movie’s far from toothless, yet often substitutes easy scares for any real substance, and suffers for that.
  30. The scares and monsters are effectively conjured, but if you’re not familiar with Austin Schwartz’s source material, you may be left a little cold.

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