L.A. Weekly's Scores

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For 3,750 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 46% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 51% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 8.7 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Movie review score: 56
Highest review score: 100 A Bread Factory Part Two: Walk With Me a While
Lowest review score: 0 Deuces Wild
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,540 out of 3750
  2. Mixed: 1,542 out of 3750
  3. Negative: 668 out of 3750
3750 movie reviews
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  1. Bossa Nova
    This suffocatingly pleasant cross between "Sliding Doors" and "Six Degrees of Separation" is barely rescued by one beautiful scene.
  2. The Red Violin
    Audaciously conceived, yet at times curiously flat, at others incongruously prosaic in its emotional tone.
  3. 13 Going on 30
    The director of 13 Going on 30, Gary Winick, was unable to infuse this material with either the sustained screwball cadences of his earlier "Tadpole" or an emotional resonance comparable to that of his superb "The Tic Code."
  4. Mr 3000
    Mr. 3000, which starts out promisingly, squanders Mac's natural gift of salty gruffness by shoehorning him into a dull, heartwarming cinematic lesson on humility and the joys of teamwork.
  5. Kinky Boots
    Kinky Boots is diverting, but it's only worth shouting about thanks to Ejiofor' quietly subversive take on what has become a stock movie character.
  6. The Newton Boys
    In his true-life film about four brothers who robbed banks out West during the late teens and early '20s, Richard Linklater seems to achieve the impossible: He makes Ethan Hawke bearable.
  7. What's Cooking?
    Despite some grace- ful performances, especially from Ruehl and Kazan, the result is a tepid repast at best.
  8. The Human Stain
    As both book and film, The Human Stain comes to vividest life in its extended flashbacks, which offer the most compelling exploration of Roth's perennial themes of self-loathing and reinvention.
  9. Madagascar
    Anemic.
  10. The Grandfather
    The picture's deepest strength, however, is the fire Fernán-Gómez conjures from deep within himself, as if "honor" were an extinct volcano he could will into exploding, given enough anger and time.
  11. Titus
    Taymor has done an inspired job of resurrecting one of Shakespeare's unruliest works, just in time for the new century.
  12. City of Ghosts
    Dillon doesn't yet possess the directorial chops to give his story the necessary snap; the action too often feels poky and muffled. But he does have a strong sense of place, and the movie's almost worth seeing just for Jim Denault's exquisite cinematography.
  13. Amen.
    Subtle distinctions have not been Costa-Gavras' long suit, but urgency becomes him in this forceful and intelligent evocation.
  14. Hannibal
    The flabbiest of cop-outs. Moore gives a flat, spiritless performance, almost matched by that of Anthony Hopkins, who, notwithstanding the Armani threads, shuffles around like a pensioner in bedroom slippers.
  15. My Life Without Me
    My Life Without Me was produced by the studio of Pedro Almodóvar, and one sees the Spanish director's influence in the way Polley edges her Madonna with a touch of the reckless sensualist.
  16. Code 46
    If the movie is finally something of a failure as a romance, it's rarely less than a triumph of soulful imagination.
  17. Faster
    An awesome introduction to the sport and the outspoken personalities -- riders, mechanics, engineers, lorry drivers, commentators, fans and girlfriends -- who support it.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Derailroaded
    In spite of its sympathy, Derailroaded veers into reality-TV voyeurism whenever the former street singer bemoans his lack of fame or breaks into childish caterwauling.
  19. Mardi Gras: Made in China
    Smart, witty look at the human cost of free-market reforms and globalization.
  20. Funny Money
    Never-hilarious but often-quite-amusing film.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Ten 'til Noon
    In more experienced hands, perhaps a great story could be told, but Ten ’Til Noon has two major factors working against it. First, the acting is wildly uneven...Second, once the conspiracy is more or less revealed, the story ceases to be interesting.
  22. Gandhi, My Father
    Gandhi, My Father radiates sincerity. It’s a beautifully shot and staged period reconstruction, and is at times impressively acted, at least in the secondary roles. What it lacks is fresh insight.
  23. Laura Smiles
    It casts an increasingly hypnotic spell, thanks in no small measure to Wright -- a fearless actress (and the real-life wife of writer-director Ruscio) who brings this sometimes despicable, often heartbreaking character to life with every atom of her being.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Defendor
    Although Harrelson displays the right balance of sweetness and quiet instability, Defendor’s genial spirit fails to mesh with the filmmaker’s exploration of darker emotional terrain.
  25. The Muse
    If only the whole thing were as funny as an Albert Brooks movie.
  26. Hatchet
    This horror comedy is loaded with decapitations, bodies torn in two and spewing blood, and yet, unlike the grim, torture-filled gore-fests of late, Hatchet’s mayhem is so giddily over-the-top that you end up applauding the low-budget aplomb of it all.
  27. The House with a Clock in Its Walls
    Since the movie is in such a hurry, we’re not given much chance to soak in this strangeness. Making up for it: Black is paired with Blanchett, who plays a neighboring witch in smashing violet skirt ensembles; the two rat-a-tat insults at each other like a vaudevillian comedy duo.
  28. Strangers with Candy
    The film is never really more than a series of loosely connected riffs and set pieces. That'd be fine except much of it is slack and airless; the laughs are many but they're too spread out -- a far cry from the series' heyday of taut, rapid-fire lunacy. Still, it's worth catching the film just for Sedaris' performance.
  29. Bubba Ho-tep
    Campbell is flat-out great, muting his beloved Sam Raimi shtick in favor of a genuine character turn, an act of transformation that makes you wonder why he's never been called on to interpret Elvis before.
  30. Coach Carter
    The corniness and predictability feel, if not quite fresh, then not so groaningly stale.
  31. Assisted Living
    Yet for all its willful blurring of the lines between documentary and fiction, Assisted Living is the least self-conscious of movies.
  32. High School Musical 3: Senior Year
    Set against a production design seemingly inspired by the American flag, director Kenny Ortega's choreography is industrial and efficient, if haplessly stranded somewhere between Michael Jackson and the Village People.
  33. The Great New Wonderful
    Writer Sam Catlin and director Danny Leiner have fashioned an alert, shrewdly observed portrait of a moment in time.
  34. Traveller
    It's fine acting of - and chemistry - between Paxton, Margulies and Mark Wahlberg that gives this film (written by Jim McGlynn, directed by Jack Green) its kick.
    • L.A. Weekly
  35. The Tavern
    Although on the surface this is a modest comedy about the Catch-22 frustrations of the restaurant game (arcane insurance laws, backstabbing chefs), it is also a movie of some psychological depth, thanks to the understated precision of Dye's deep-welled performance.
  36. Up at the Villa
    Impressive supporting cast---, in character parts both expanded and invented, enrich the enterprise.
  37. The Man from Elysian Fields
    Despite its dry wit and compassion, the film suffers from a philosophical emptiness and maddeningly sedate pacing, and, in the end, the only aspect of the movie that truly commands attention is Jagger's desperately inexpressive acting, which hasn’t improved one iota since "Ned Kelly."
  38. Alila
    Though absorbing enough, Alila must be counted a noble failure, if only because its efforts to follow the screwed-up lives of 12 hapless souls in a seedy Tel Aviv apartment building finally add up more to mere mimicry than commentary.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    First Love
    The film, which is directed by Matteo Garrone (The Embalmer), could do with a bit more plot: It doesn't resolve so much as collapse in utter desolation.
  40. Antibodies
    Antibodies is fairly riveting, thanks to Alvart's command of craft and tone. He's a director to watch.
  41. Galveston
    Laurent's work as an actor serves her well as a director, and she allows her performers the freedom to find each moment’s emotional core. Foster and Fanning are excellent, their chemistry intensified by their characters' shared bitterness and loss of what could have been.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Michael Jordan to the Max
    Ultimately, it's as vapid as (Michael Jordan's) perfume and as disposable as a pair of his Hanes.
  43. Cet amour-là
    Sympathetic, if lackluster.
  44. Bread and Roses
    There are scenes here that fill one with rage or bring tears to the eyes.
  45. Dark Blue
    My own view is that, like me, the LAPD was defeated by the movie's incestuously proliferating plots. I've seen Dark Blue twice, and I still don't have a handle on all its comings and goings.
  46. Two Men Went to War
    More often than not, Two Men Went to War resembles a feature-length episode of "Hogan's Heroes," with the brave but clumsy Brits continually managing to outfox the even more bungling Nazis.
  47. Brother to Brother
    In movies, the young are forever being taken back in time by the old, but what sets apart this low-energy yet ambitious debut feature by writer-director Rodney Evans is the complexity of the questions that journey raises.
  48. G.I. Jesus
    Writer-director Carl Colpaert never loses his balance, despite the David Lynchian leap of faith he asks us to make midway, in a twist so bold as to be a backflip. If anything, this extra layer in the story effectively illuminates the moral choices Jesus must navigate.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    little man
    Conn is exasperating and heroic in equal measure, an altogether riveting portrait of motherly devotion at its most primal.
  50. Casanova
    The movie cries out for the bawdy, rompy air that filled Richard Lester's "Three Musketeers" movies, and what it gets instead is the same dispassionate "professionalism" that has made Hallström a steady fixture in a Hollywood that could do with an infusion of Casanova's own virile lifeblood.
  51. Cecil B. DeMented
    Neither Waters' funniest film nor, by a long chalk, his most radical. But it is, as promised, a passing of the torch and an article of suitably perverse faith in the next generation of nutso cinéastes.
  52. Skins
    The sharpness of Eyre's opening, however, ebbs away when he takes up the story of Rudy (Eric Schweig) and Mogie (Graham Greene), two brothers with neatly opposed responses to the reservation grind.
  53. Brotherhood of the Wolf
    Brotherhood has its goofy side -- it's a sleek, creepily atmospheric popcorn entertainment.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Sasquatch Gang
    Gavin’s story is typical teen-faces-bullies-and-gets-girl hokum, while Zerk is like a Mike Judge cartoon character come to life, with a revelatory slapstick performance from the often straight-laced Long.
  55. Buffalo Soldiers
    As social satire, though, the movie is a nonstarter, completely lacking in the zany lunacy of "M*A*S*H" and "Dr. Strangelove," or the whacked savagery of "Catch-22."
  56. Non-Stop
    Sabu takes an already wildly original concept and launches it toward brilliance.
  57. The Lizzie McGuire Movie
    The cast of the Disney Channel's Lizzie McGuire romped strenuously through a plot that would be old hat as a two-parter on a sitcom.
  58. The Escapist
    All might have been forgiven were it not for a needlessly Shyamalanized ending that deserves to earn Wyatt at least 25 years for grand-theft cinema.
  59. Die Another Day
    The result is the niftiest Bond movie in years -- fresh, funny, and jammed to the rafters with demented stunts, Boys'-Own gadgetry and brazen promiscuity.
  60. Weightless
    Jaron Albertin’s mix of crisp realism and oblique dream logic results in a haunting experience.... Still, while his first feature (shot by Darren Lew) may be gorgeous, the characters in this rural family drama prove so amorphous that their struggles engender detachment instead of empathy.
  61. Dark Blue World
    The uneasy meeting of cultures is mirrored all too well in the stiff and clumsy direction.
  62. Scream 3
    It's a pleasure to report that Scream 3 is an absolute riot, jammed with spicy cameos.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Game 6
    For viewers counting the minutes until opening day, Game 6 provides a quirky cinematic alternative to next week's "Benchwarmers."
  64. Fever Pitch
    Unfunny, charmless and hopelessly ordinary.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Winter Passing
    Winter Passing showcases Rapp's clever, conversational dialogue, while Harris, Deschanel, and Will Ferrell - on hand for comic relief as a Christian rocker turned literary bouncer - breathe life into this whimsical, but ultimately conventional, family drama.
  66. A Knight's Tale
    The skits are dreadful, the jokes suck.
  67. Human Nature
    Although a few moments are hilarious, this would-be romp remains laboriously earthbound when it should be swinging gaily through the trees.
  68. How Stella Got Her Groove Back
    This upscale Harlequin fantasy film works much the same terrain as Douglas Sirk's All That Heaven Allows, a '50s weepy about an affair between an older woman and a younger man, though without an iota of its wit or intelligence.
  69. A Dirty Shame
    I love what his films stand for -- inclusivity, tolerance, liberation and fun -- but I’ve always felt about his movies as I do about Monty Python: Half an hour is a riot; an hour and half starts to be a chore.
  70. Transporter 2
    This ridiculously entertaining sequel is that rare part deux that leaves you hankering for part trois. The action is, in a word, spectacular, but also playful, inventive and witty.
  71. The Family Stone
    A potentially interesting tale flailing haplessly in the quicksand of holiday-movie formula.
  72. The Crazies
    Despite a midfilm lull of his own, Eisner stages a series of nifty action sequences, nearly all of which feature a moment of surprise, as well as gruesome wit.
  73. Cabin Fever
    The result is something neither scary nor funny.
  74. I'll Sleep When I'm Dead
    Owen, perhaps for want of any definition to his character, turns in a performance at once so blank and so bloated with lugubrious bombast, one wants to chuck him under the chin and make him giggle.
  75. Saints and Soldiers
    The triumph here is a matter of craftsmanship rather than art, but it's rare enough even on that level for a film to be worth celebrating.
  76. The Chorus
    The Chorus is sham art and questionable entertainment, but at the very least it sends you whistling out of the theater.
  77. Lords of Dogtown
    Unfortunately, whenever Ledger isn't onscreen, Lords of Dogtown takes a spill.
  78. How to Eat Fried Worms
    Worms is one of those rare kiddie flicks that successfully adopt a child’s-eye view of the world, where nothing is more important than saving face on the playground and where parents are as distant and clueless as storybook giants.
  79. The Big Kahuna
    It's a sweet chamber piece, beautifully played.
  80. The Five Senses
    Comes so freighted with tragedy and sensitivity that I left dreaming of converting the abject misery of one and all to everyday unhappiness with free drinks and a raucous sing-along down at the pub.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Speaking in Strings
    The less you know about the world of classical music and, specifically, about one of its more flamboyant denizens, the violinist Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, the less the offense of Speaking in Strings.
  82. Cruel Intentions
    In truth, the only reason this film was made was to allow viewers to ogle pretty young things behaving badly.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Cherry Orchard
    Cacoyannis lays on the atmosphere a bit thick with multiple repetitions of a lyrical Tchaikovsky motif underscoring unrequited love, one that is nonetheless beautifully rendered by pianist Vladimir Ashkenazy.
  84. Once Upon a Time in Mexico
    The movie is stolen by the gorgeous, droll and hilarious Depp. The movie crackles when he's onscreen and only fitfully sparks when he's not.
  85. It's All Gone Pete Tong
    The movie catches us up so profoundly in Frankie's self-destructive spiral (and gradual rehab), it's as though we’re seeing it all for the first time. I'd like to say that's because the story is true, only it isn't.
  86. Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil
    The film is consummately professional but phlegmatic, a slow fizzle.
  87. Driving Lessons
    While Driving Lessons' writer-director, Jeremy Brock, sticks to the all-too-familiar template of such tales, he's given Walters her best role since "Educating Rita." Hamming it up with the precision of a master, she makes this somewhat plodding film a pleasure, as does young Grint.
  88. All Access: Front Row. Backstage. Live!
    Less about music than about the possibilities of the IMAX system itself.
  89. Where's the Party Yaar?
    Mathews has obvious storytelling chops, and a sharp eye for absurdity. But there are sacred cows in hip, progressive America, too, and the truly fearless satirist has to be a carnivore.
  90. Sylvia
    The excellent cast is headed by Gwyneth Paltrow in the mood-shifting title role and Daniel Craig as the helpless, not-so-happily philandering Hughes.
  91. Danny Deckchair
    American-born writer-director Jeff Balsmeyer can't seem to make up his mind whether he's making a gentle romantic comedy with heartfelt trimmings, or a full-court Aussie farce.
  92. Stupid Boy
    Composed of artfully used split-screen, lots of hand-held camera, and expertly honed dialogue, the film floats on currents of sadness and understated humor. It also makes Loic's existential ache almost palpable.
  93. Wolf Creek
    Full of clever reversals, brief triumphs and bitter setbacks, Wolf Creek is consummately well-crafted, unapologetically vicious and leavened with moments of humor that merely intensify the horror.
  94. 39 Pounds of Love
    Despite Menkin's clear belief that he's crafted a rousing true-life drama, his film plays like a cliché-ridden, painfully self-conscious Hollywood melodrama about a noble person with disabilities.
  95. Breaking and Entering
    Bold in scope and aptly mimicking the loose structures of kinship, friendship and work most city dwellers make do with these days, Breaking and Entering nonetheless plays out too quiet and too loose for its own good.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Christmas in the Clouds
    More of a Lifetime holiday special than a theatrical feature, writer-director Kate Montgomery's tale of love and mistaken identity at a Native American ski resort is too sticky-sweet to be memorable.
  97. Bamboozled
    Spike Lee lost his nerve -- there are moments here, too, when it also seems like he lost his sense.
  98. The Minus Man
    A film without attitude or mystery...an exquisitely executed, and exquisitely banal, treatise on the banality of evil.
  99. CQ
    CQ is modest, especially for something bearing the grandiose family name, and it possesses both a tenderness and a quiet intelligence.
  100. Once Upon a Time in the Midlands
    A movie saved by great acting.
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