Los Angeles Times' Scores

Select another publication »
For 16,524 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 56% higher than the average critic
  • 6% same as the average critic
  • 38% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 2.3 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Movie review score: 63
Highest review score: 100 Sand Storm
Lowest review score: 0 Saw VI
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 8,698 out of 16524
  2. Mixed: 5,809 out of 16524
  3. Negative: 2,017 out of 16524
16524 movie reviews
view
per page
  1. Stoked: The Rise and Fall of Gator
    It's a classic rags-to-riches-to-rage tale about the fatal nexus of celebrity and market forces, a story that is unexpectedly poignant even though it's told to an insistent punk rock beat.
  2. Intimacy
    A triumph for all concerned, it is especially so for the multitalented Chereau.
  3. The Cuckoo
    A rare bird indeed -- a disarming, appealingly modest discovery, beautifully shot, nicely performed. Perched on the knife's edge of absurdity, the story at once embraces the large questions (who is the enemy and why) and shrugs them off with a laugh.
  4. Adorenarin doraibu
    A rip-roaring romantic comedy that's as funny as it is light on its feet.
  5. Monsieur Ibrahim
    Surely there is room in the movies for a small film with an unabashed, even old-fashioned but timeless humanist spirit -- and a triumphant portrayal by a veteran star that is likely to be regarded as one of the year's best.
  6. Changing Lanes
    Frustrating yet deeply watchable melodrama that makes you think it's a tougher picture than it is.
  7. Itzhak
    As a portrait of a marriage forged in respect, love and companionship, Itzhak is in its casually wonderful way proof that life is rarely lived as a virtuosic solo.
  8. Hitler's Children
    Though Ze'evi's creative choices don't always serve the material — he unwisely attempts to pump up the emotional volume with an intrusive music score — his compassion for his subjects is clear, and their straightforward testimony is provocative.
  9. The Black Godfather
    Avant’s skin color is one aspect of his inspiring story, for sure, but the heart inside The Black Godfather — and the ways an honorable soul with personal power can effect meaningful change — spins its own joyful melody.
  10. Ong Bak
    It's a display of phenomenal dexterity and nimble grace that's a joy to watch. That, friends, is entertainment.
  11. Do Not Resist
    The parameters of homeland security are chillingly assessed in Do Not Resist, a troubling documentary examining the escalating militarization of the nation’s police forces.
  12. We Live in Public
    If anything, the film is a reflection of the Web zeitgeist, where observation comes easily but insight is rare. What saves the documentary from becoming a complete frustration is the sheer, stunning prescience of Harris.
  13. Sightseers
    It is the almost accidental way Tina and Chris go about going bad that provides Sightseers with its twisted humor and its unexpected charm.
  14. The Pink Cloud
    If you’re game for an emerging filmmaking talent’s stingingly uncanny foretelling, The Pink Cloud is an arresting examination of what it can look like when existence is misshaped into a compromised destiny.
  15. The Milk of Sorrow
    Solier delivers a performance of ferocious but frustrating reserve.
  16. Uncertain Terms
    As it stands, "Terms" proves too uncertain.
  17. The Harder They Fall
    Surely the truth (or something close to it) of who these men and women were must have been more fascinating, and more worth mythologizing, than what transpires in this strained mashup.
  18. Compliance
    With its harrowing restraint, Compliance is potent filmmaking that's not easily forgotten.
  19. A Dry White Season
    A tract, a dry rerun of Cry Freedom, with none of that film's visual sweep (whatever else its faults) and with nothing new to tell us. It's filled with obvious, earnest performances--Marlon Brando's ironic and subtle one is the only exception--and unresonant writing.
  20. Infamous
    The problem is that the first half of Infamous is nowhere near as comic as McGrath intends. Instead the picture gives off a tone of arch stylization that plays as artificial, overwrought and off-putting.
  21. Star Trek Beyond
    Fun but in a careful way, the film lasts just two hours, but it can seem much longer than that.
  22. The Origin of Evil
    Marnier could have taken another pass at the film’s secondary characters (the upcoming thriller “Saltburn” has the same problem with its dysfunctional clan), and whatever notions he’s trying to put across about the patriarchy don’t quite land. But he has a star in the sparkling Calamy.
  23. Icarus
    Even if you’re familiar with the facts, Icarus casts the depth of deception with an immediacy that’s often astounding.
  24. BuyBust
    In the cynical worldview of BuyBust, there’s no escaping this crushing cycle of killing and corruption. That real-life message makes this wild action film more powerful, but the violence is a hard pill to swallow.
  25. Primo Levi's Journey
    For while the idea of comparing the Europe of 60 years ago to the Europe of today sounds didactic, the results are anything but. Ferrario turns out to have a delicate, unforced eye for elegant counterpoints, and his style unobtrusively draws you into the journey.
  26. North Country
    To see this overly schematic movie, is to be made to feel -- inaccurately as it turns out -- that the whole thing is a hopelessly exaggerated fabrication. The taint of the melodramatic techniques used in key segments infects the entire movie and makes us question the truth of a significant historical reality.
  27. Bullhead
    An intense, shattering film, a confident and accomplished, punch-in-the-gut debut by Belgian writer-director Michael R. Roskam that starts out like a thriller and turns into a disturbing tragedy in an unlikely and unexpected key.
  28. The Night
    A goosebumps-inducing affair, The Night is at its most effectively unsettling when the focus is to evoke fear as opposed to when it physically shows what’s haunting the characters trapped in their respective secret tragedies. Their unseen demons spook harder.
  29. The Luckiest Man in America
    The film is so much more than just an exploration of this anomalous oddball story and character who managed to outsmart the media. The focus on the control-room panic illustrates how these corporate narratives shape the myth of the American Dream, effectively deconstructing the fantasy that any of this was ever about luck at all.
  30. The Business of Being Born
    This unflinchingly shot picture is not for the squeamish. Epstein and Lake's own commitment to you-are-there realism is remarkable as well, each bringing new meaning to the phrase "naked truth."
  31. First Match
    While First Match is more ambitious than most films in the genre, it still provides moments to cheer our complicated heroine, whether she's on the mat or off.
  32. Mutt
    It’s not uncommon that the most intriguing first films are the ones that stumble on their way to purposefulness, and Mutt easily meets that standard, presenting us with a vivid character we unabashedly root for as the day’s challenges try to pierce a newly armored soul.
  33. Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict
    Lisa Immordino Vreeland deftly choreographs the story in her vibrant documentary Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict, at once a capsule history of Modernism and a poignant personal portrait.
  34. Tunnel
    Unfortunately, there’s not enough story here to warrant the film’s more than two-hour running time; 90 taut minutes tracking a week in the ruined tunnel would have sufficed. Still, it’s a vivid and relatable tale.
  35. Like Crazy
    If you are experienced enough to understand love's fragility but still romantic enough to embrace its power, Like Crazy will put you away.
  36. Terms and Conditions May Apply
    In inverse proportion to typically long-winded, inscrutable terms of service, the film is concise, direct and thoroughly engaging.
  37. My Love, Don't Cross That River
    In following this couple, Jin’s film celebrates the wonder and magic of every single life; finding the extraordinary in the ordinary.
  38. Equity
    The screenplay by Amy Fox is mechanical, the plot more contrived than charged under Meera Menon’s lackluster direction. But as a study of endurance and self-preservation in the face of persistent double standards, the movie clicks.
  39. Art and Craft
    Landis has acknowledged mental issues in interviews, and it registers so much more on film. The constant scrutiny of a camera seems exploitative and cruel, even if you are at all suspicious when he rationalizes his behavior as childlike mischief.
  40. The Hunger Games
    Making a successful Hunger Games movie out of Suzanne Collins' novel required casting the best possible performer as Katniss, and in Jennifer Lawrence director Gary Ross and company have hit the bull's-eye, so to speak.
  41. A Housekeeper
    A summer treat for sophisticated moviegoers -- graceful and serious, yet not overly so. This easy-to-take movie gets everything just right and is a pleasure to watch.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The War Zone
    Much of its strength resides in the way it eschews narrative contrivance. The movie observes behavior without explaining or judging it.
  43. In My Skin
    Spectacularly grotesque and literally nauseating, even for this usually intrepid moviegoer, In My Skin is among the more disturbing films in this blood-drenched cinematic season.
  44. The Yes Men
    Smart and amusing.
  45. Jump Tomorrow
    Many try but few succeed as well as writer-director Joel Hopkins with his beguiling first feature, Jump Tomorrow, in giving a fresh spin to '30s screwball comedy.
  46. Così ridevano
    The sweeping, confounding conclusion therefore unfolds with a beauty and an ease that seem truly organic. The Way We Laughed has that feeling of being a work of art.
  47. Chain Camera
    On the whole, Chain Camera is encouraging.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    For Whom the Bell Tolls
    Victor Young’s score is glorious and soaring and Ray Rennanhan’s cinematography is breathtakingly lush and vibrant. Equally vibrant are Cooper and Bergman, who both received Oscar nominations. Two of the most beautiful people to ever grace the silver screen, their love scenes are sexy, touching and sweet.
  49. Paper Spiders
    Taylor plays Dawn’s slide into this mental health crisis beautifully, and with conviction, and Owen is stunning as the high-achieving, yet fragile Melanie, who seeks oblivion and solace in a risky boyfriend (Ian Nelson).
  50. The American President
    Genial and entertaining if not notably inspired. But its most interesting aspect turns out to be fantasies of another kind, pipe dreams about the American political system and where it could theoretically be headed.
  51. Step Up To The Plate
    As for the so-called "food compositions" seen here, like the film itself, they're more impressionistic and artistic than enticing. For a far more satisfying cinematic meal, check out the similarly themed "Jiro Dreams of Sushi."
  52. Valentino: The Last Emperor
    Unexpectedly involving documentary.
  53. A Somewhat Gentle Man
    Like the Coen brothers at their least convincing, the mix of low-grade depression and amped quirkiness never shakes off the feel of self-conscious posturing.
  54. Casino Jack and the United States of Money
    A film that's always on the move, a smart, lively, thoroughly involving doc about a complex, critical subject.
  55. Bhutto
    As Bhutto, the thorough and involving documentary on her life conveys, Benazir was a formidable personality all by herself.
  56. Family Romance, LLC
    In the final act, the film embraces some of those larger points, and Herzog ends with a striking final image leaving us to contemplate the transactional nature and true cost of all human relationships.
  57. Akira
    Akira is a jumble of high-tech visuals that will appeal only to hard-core Japanese animation fans. Viewers in search of a coherent narrative or polished animation should look elsewhere. [14 Mar 1990, p.F3]
    • Los Angeles Times
  58. Applause
    It is a singular performance and a deeply affecting if imperfect film.
  59. August Evening
    Though this artful film inches toward its not-unpredictable conclusion and could logically have ended several times before its final fadeout, I was sorry when it was over. How rare is that?
  60. Babe: Pig in the City
    Undeniably clever and inventive, Babe: Pig in the City has nevertheless sacrificed part of the freshness and buoyancy that made the original "Babe" so luminous. This sequel is more elaborate, more calculated and more self-consciously dark than its deservedly beloved predecessor.
  61. Addiction Incorporated
    The film's bigger problem is that after a certain point the way in which Evans allows DeNoble to narrate his own story comes to feel self-congratulatory and makes Addiction Incorporated seem a bit more like an advertisement or an endorsement than an investigation or exploration.
  62. Braveheart
    Never tries to confuse our loyalties or question the strategies of our hero or bring home the all-embracing soul-destroying horrors of war for all sides. Braveheart may be rip-roaring, but it isn't all that brave.
  63. Pierrepoint
    At once desperately grim and unnervingly gripping, providing an exacting sense of the detail and procedure that went into death by hanging.
  64. Selena Gomez: My Mind & Me
    There’s a tear-jerking moment roughly every five to 10 minutes in this movie, as Gomez reveals her essential dilemma of being someone who loves making fans happy and loves being creative but lives in fear — as many people do — of disappointing their benefactors and loved ones.
  65. Crazy, Stupid, Love
    Between the writing, acting, directing and the rest, it works. Not crazy, not stupid, and filled with love. Period.
  66. Deepwater Horizon
    Swift, no-nonsense and pummelingly intense, this is the big-budget Hollywood disaster flick on a CrossFit regimen and a Paleo diet — a hellish cataclysm that never risks overstaying its welcome.
  67. Limbo
    Determined to use melodrama as a vehicle to get to other places and explore other possibilities, Sayles simply assumes the audience will go along with him. His skill is such that we invariably do, but the journey, like that of his characters, is not always an easy one. [04 Jun 1999, p.F6]
    • Los Angeles Times
  68. Lamb
    It’s a different register for Rapace, who remains controlled, with a few explosions of emotion. But she is present and instinctual, imbuing Maria with a steely but soft power: decisive, persuasive and feminine.
  69. Fighting with My Family
    Within the context of a sport that thrives on artifice, writer-director Stephen Merchant spins a story whose emotions feel entirely genuine.
  70. Mr. Jones
    Though it’s a shame that Mr. Jones is not more cohesive, the remarkable story of Gareth Jones retains its potency. It’s a bracing reminder that we can never allow the advocates of truth to be silenced.
  71. End of Watch
    A visceral story of beat cops that is rare in its sensitivity, rash in its violence and raw in its humor.
  72. Dovlatov
    A dreamy, compelling, often wry look at a writer.
  73. Floyd Norman: An Animated Life
    Like the man himself, Floyd Norman: An Animated Life is genial on the surface but lets us go a little deeper into an unusual life than we might have expected.
  74. Apocalypto
    Numerous good things can be said about Apocalypto, the director's foray into the decaying Mayan civilization of the early 1500s, but every last one of them is overshadowed by Gibson's well-established penchant for depictions of stupendous amounts of violence.
  75. Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
    Blithe, reasonably witty, with as many story twists as a Riviera roadway, its greatest assets are its glorious look and Michael Caine, his hair full of Dippety-Doo, his heart full of larceny. [14 Dec 1988, p.1]
    • Los Angeles Times
  76. Potiche
    Helping to keep this ship from keeling over is the great professionalism and light touch of Deneuve and Depardieu. Costars numerous times, they go together as comfortably as an old pair of gloves. Potiche very much counts on this, and it has not miscalculated.
  77. Girls Can't Swim
    Birot is an engaging storyteller who can inspire luminous, spontaneous portrayals, but her ending is so drastic that it feels unearned, a note of bleakness struck merely for its own sake.
  78. Alice et Martin
    Boldly structured, intensely focused and briskly paced, Alice and Martin has a tremendous emotional density that places the utmost demands upon its actors--and asks a lot of audiences, too.
  79. Burnt Money
    It is a bravura work that attests to Pineyro's command of a style rich in texture and nuance and also of multilayered material.
  80. Creature from the Black Lagoon
    A drive-in classic that is one of the most cherished horror pictures of the '50s. [30 Oct 1997, p.F17]
    • Los Angeles Times
  81. Borat Subsequent Moviefilm
    With a few exceptions . . . Borat’s satirical jabs don’t land with quite the same cringe-making force this time; the setups are too convoluted, the anonymous targets too genial, the payoffs too meager.
  82. Chopper
    A most ambitious first film. Dominik pulls it off impressively, assisted by a selfless cast, a driving score by Mick Harvey, and gifted cameramen Kevin Hayward and Geoffrey Hall.
  83. The Adventures of Tintin
    Think of The Adventures of Tintin as a song of innocence and experience, able to combine a sweet sense of childlike wonder and pureness of heart with the most worldly and sophisticated of modern technology. More than anything, it's just a whole lot of fun.
  84. Becket (re-release)
    While major stars thrust together on screen often end up undercutting each other, one of the pleasures of Becket is how easily and generously these two commanding actors play off each other, each allowing the other the space to make the most of their individual roles.
  85. Bopha!
    If we'd never seen another film on the horrors of apartheid, all this might have been more impressive, but we have and it isn't.
  86. The Meddler
    The Meddler offers a charming, authentic and well-observed mix of comedy and poignancy.
  87. The World's Fastest Indian
    Based on the real-life exploits of Munro, it's a boilerplate fish-out-of-water/road trip/underdog sports movie -- but it's a heck of a ride with Hopkins leading the way.
  88. What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael
    Dealing with a personality this strong could not have been easy, and director Garver, whose background is in short films, does a balanced job, giving space to Kael’s partisans while finding time for the other side.
  89. Ask Dr. Ruth
    The experience of watching Ask Dr. Ruth is a bit like that of meeting someone unaccountably delightful and almost being knocked backward by the gale-force strength of her personality, and then wanting to go out and buy one of her books so as to actually learn something about her ideas.
  90. The Kindergarten Teacher
    Lapid confidently peppers the film with enough provocative beats, unsettling behaviors and bold camera moves to keep us intrigued — if not necessarily invested.
  91. A Place at the Table
    The filmmakers vividly illustrate the power and depth of the long-spiraling problem of "food insecurity" by immersing us in the hardscrabble lives of a cross section of our nation's poor.
  92. Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence
    The dark sequel offers gorgeous images, with an updated and stylish design, but its characters' angst gets in the way of storytelling.
  93. Song of Granite
    More than the story of an individual, the film is a stirring tribute to endangered folk traditions.
  94. Some Came Running
    A rambling fat memoir about a soldier returning home to a Midwestern city, where his roughhouse, bravura ways tear the delicate social fabric apart, has lots of sleazy, low-life glamour on the screen. Scenarist John Patrick and director Vincente Minnelli made it work in this memorable 1959 film.
    • Los Angeles Times
  95. Learn to Swim
    Tommy just riffs freely, aping the moody, improvisatory style of classic jazz as he works some rich variations on the all-too-common story of an artist knocked around by a rough romance.
  96. $9.99
    Less than the sum of its parts. The connective tissue of its episodes and set pieces -- some of which pack a memorable punch -- is not a compelling story line but the painterly physicality of the movie's stop-motion animation.
  97. Unclenching the Fists
    This is a different kind of prison escape picture, focusing on the stifling confines of a life devoid of possibility.
  98. Here
    It's hard to say if the two ever really mesh or if they were intended to. Here seems motivated by a tone of searching and yearning, not of finding a single way.
  99. Sembene!
    A richly crafted documentary that serves as an enlightening tribute to the filmmaker who masterfully tapped into the medium's wide-reaching socio-political potential.
  100. What You Gonna Do When the World's on Fire?
    Solemn in tone and indispensable in significance, the latest from an artist with a track record for surveying marginalized Americans is structured like a collage of incendiary and heart-wrenching moments that toe dip into social justice issues without staying long with any one idea.
Page:

Top Trailers

See all »
See all trailers »