Los Angeles Times' Scores

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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
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  1. Harry + Max
    To consider Harry and Max as being about incestuous feelings would be shortchanging it, because the film is really about the evolving nature of love and the need to define it.
  2. Rory O'Shea Was Here
    A shameless heart-tugger of considerable appeal that, like many movies that start off with much going for them, could have been so much better had its makers aimed higher.
  3. Naked Fame
    An engaging and forthright documentary.
  4. The Jacket
    Intermittently compelling but unavoidably improbable.
  5. The Pacifier
    Has sufficient mayhem to please Diesel's action fans while allowing the star to reach out to family audiences.
  6. Dear Frankie
    Dear Frankie's surprises are few and low-key, but the story wraps up nicely.
  7. It's All Gone Pete Tong
    Grounded by a gutsy, over-the-edge-and-back performance by Paul Kaye as Frankie, It's All Gone Pete Tong takes the long way around before finally redeeming itself.
  8. The Game of Their Lives
    Despite strong performances by Gerard Butler and Wes Bentley as the leaders of the two factions and crisply directed soccer action, the movie lacks a powerful central presence to carry the drama.
  9. Pure
    This is a conventional, well-acted, English working-class drama in the familiar realist style, but it does not attain anywhere near the level of artistry and imagination of a Ken Loach film.
  10. The Great Water
    Intent as it is on being both artistically and politically involving, The Great Water periodically miscalculates its effects, coming on stronger than it intends.
  11. Ethan Mao
    At once a tender love story and a psychological suspense drama that lays bare the acute tensions that threaten to tear apart an upwardly mobile suburban L.A. Chinese American family.
  12. King of the Corner
    Warm and wise comedy of middle-age malaise.
  13. Stealth
    A slick piece of summer entertainment that is counting on elaborate special effects to make its derivative, convoluted story line all but irrelevant.
  14. The Aristocrats
    There's something about professional comedians breaking down what's funny for civilians that gets annoying after a while.
  15. Saint Ralph
    Though Butcher is appealing, Saint Ralph is anchored by Scott's persuasive work as a model of intelligent decency.
  16. Secuestro express
    Jakubowicz has aptly said of his film that "the beauty of Secuestro Express is how localized it is. The more local it becomes, the more universal it becomes." The truth of his remark resonates throughout this fast and furious film.
  17. Four Brothers
    A typically energetic urban action melodrama, offering car chases, beatings, murders, a dog mauling, attempted arson, frequent double-crosses and pitched street battles worthy of Fallouja.
  18. The Chumscrubber
    Every adult in the movie is a caricature: Close, Janney and Wilson are compendiums of such broad, unattractive traits they make the ladies of "Desperate Housewives" look complex. The men, meanwhile, are weak, clueless and preening, with the exception of Fiennes, who's nuts.
  19. Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance
    When it comes to serving up diabolical horror with bold, sophisticated glee, Park, best known for "Oldboy," is right up there with Dario Argento, Guillermo del Toro and Takashi Miike.
  20. The Baxter
    A tender love story and a dead-on lampoon of the genre, but its main drawback is that Showalter is egregiously miscast in the title role.
  21. 3 Dancing Slaves
    Although graceful and dynamic, Three Dancing Slaves is none too substantial or original, lacking the edge or complexity of Morel's impressive debut film, "Full Speed."
  22. The Future of Food
    Detailed and intensely researched documentary.
  23. Corpse Bride
    Corpse Bride has more warmth and appeal than its title would indicate, but it is finally more grotesque than good-humored. And, even at 75 minutes, it feels longer than its content can comfortably support.
  24. Thumbsucker
    Thumbsucker aims high but swerves too frequently between the engaging and the credibility-defying to be satisfying.
  25. One Bright Shining Moment
    The film's greatest asset and strongest selling point is the former senator from South Dakota himself, thoughtful and articulate at age 83, who talks candidly, even eloquently, about his political career.
  26. Dorian Blues
    With its moments of comic relief overly exaggerated and at odds with its realistic tone, Dorian Blues is at its best at its most serious.
  27. Little Manhattan
    An endearing, affectionately humorous and even lyrical depiction of the dawning of adolescence amid the privileged, yet Jennifer Flackett's script, for all its sheen, is problematic.
  28. An Adolescent
    Decidedly uneven yet intriguing.
  29. Sueño
    First-time writer-director Renée Chabria's sincerity and commitment to Sueño are so complete they override its sentimental streak and some overly familiar plotting.
  30. 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.
  31. The Legend of Zorro
    Not as satisfying as the old and unimproved version. In a zealous attempt to broaden its appeal, the Zorro franchise has drifted from the qualities that made the previous film so successful.
  32. I Love Your Work
    Has its rewards for those up to the challenge of tackling its nonlinear structure and brooding nature.
  33. Zathura: A Space Adventure
    The movie has a lot of the elements that might make it thrilling and it's visually arresting, but it's missing the emotional connection necessary to make it interesting.
  34. Sarah Silverman: Jesus Is Magic
    Sarah Silverman has a bright, toothy smile; a sweet, innocent demeanor; and the most outrageously impious sense of humor of any comedian working today. And I don't just mean she's dirty. (She's filthy.) She makes fun of things other comedians wouldn't acknowledge, let alone mock.
  35. Cape of Good Hope
    The stories are interlinked effectively, and the film strikes an upbeat note yet does not address racism and discrimination. For all its affection toward its characters, however, the film is too long and too slack.
  36. Undertaking Betty
    Deliberate silliness is hard to sustain, but Undertaking Betty pretty much succeeds.
  37. Transamerica
    Felicity Huffman is such a wonder, at once funny and brave, playing a pre-op male-to-female transsexual in the uneven comedy Transamerica that she sustains several lapses that might otherwise have sunk it.
  38. Fun with Dick and Jane
    Plays like the setup for a movie that never materializes. It has all the elements for a successful comedy, but once the premise is presented, the film doesn't know how to deliver on its promise. That doesn't mean there is no fun in "Fun."
  39. The White Countess
    The White Countess takes place in a fascinating time and place, rife with conflict and turmoil. But to watch Fiennes float (and Richardson trudge) through it all, absorbed in themselves and their own private misery, is to wish they'd started falling earlier, if only to knock some sense into them.
  40. Hostel
    Seems to have been tailored to its designated R "for brutal scenes of torture and violence, strong sexual content, language and drug use."
    • 33 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Grandma's Boy
    It's as aimless and pointless as a joke told while stoned. There are some pretty decent shock-laughs, often provided by Jones, who hasn't ever been this nasty.
  42. Glory Road
    Ripped directly from Disney's playbook of inspirational sports movies, it's devoid of any original elements that might deter it from that successful formula, hewing closer to the sentimental cliches of "Remember the Titans" than the much better "Miracle" or "The Rookie."
  43. Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World
    Not Brooks' funniest film, but it possesses his trademark wry humor and is slyly observant.
    • 36 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Underworld: Evolution
    Wiseman, a former art director and music video director, has a definite sense of style and pace, and the creature transformations are eye-popping. In addition, the cast raises the movie above the level of routine genre schlock.
  45. Something New
    The movie nicely captures the area around Baldwin Hills, is crisply written by Kriss Turner and portrays the upper-middle class black community seldom seen in mainstream TV and film. However, the characterizations, even the leads, rarely rise above archetypes.
  46. The Second Chance
    A movie-of-the-week treatment of race and class, the film credibly portrays the day-to-day workings of an urban ministry.
  47. Don't Tell
    A persuasive if not groundbreaking drama.
  48. The Lady in Question Is Charles Busch
    An affectionate tribute to the drag artist who has been a Manhattan institution for more than 20 years.
  49. Yang Ban Xi: The 8 Modelworks
    Overall, the film lacks cohesion and a true point of view. Further muddling the film's meaning is a voice-over attributed to Jiang Qing, which we learn at the end is fictionalized.
  50. Quality of Life
    The ending, which unnecessarily veers toward lumpy, overwrought melodrama, undoes the scrappy elegance the film previously displays in fits and starts.
  51. Wassup Rockers
    At a certain point, Wassup Rockers transforms from a relatively naturalistic slice-of-life portrait into a surrealistic funhouse trap.
  52. Erosion
    The film toys with the grand themes of love and death as it understatedly moves toward an unsatisfying denouement. Although the narrative is not always compelling, Lu subtly conveys sensuality without nudity in the sex scenes, and something about the boldness of the exercise keeps you watching.
  53. The Da Vinci Code
    While the story plays better on the page than the screen and some of the film's elements work better than others, a proficient Ron Howard version of things is certainly competent if only occasionally thrilling.
  54. Down in the Valley
    For a film that has allegedly undergone extensive tinkering following its premiere at last year's Cannes Film Festival, Down in the Valley abounds in nagging loose ends and suffers overall from logy pacing.
  55. The Omen
    Despite slick camera work by Jonathan Sela and intense, naturalistic performances by Liev Schreiber and Julia Stiles, The Omen retains the aura of ceremonious kitsch of the first movie, favoring a well-lighted, upscale Goth aesthetic punctuated with flashes of well-timed, cymbal-crashing shockers and giggly camp.
  56. District B13
    More athletes than actors, Raffaelli and Belle are terrific when their bodies are in motion but the movie grinds to a halt when they open their mouths.
  57. The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life of Ethan Green
    Inoffensive even as it makes some fairly explicit sex jokes, "Ethan Green" may not exactly be fabulous, but it is pleasantly diverting.
  58. Leonard Cohen: I'm Your Man
    Succeeds best when it intensifies its focus on the work and life of its main subject, seen in interviews, home movies and in a climactic performance with Bono and the Edge on "Tower of Song."
  59. Superman Returns
    Star Routh's presence and the joys of flight keep Superman Returns alive, but all those missteps dog its heels, holding it back like little touches of Kryptonite in the night.
  60. The Road to Guantanamo
    There are some blunders on The Road to Guantanamo. The movie front-loads its first-person accounts with a short list of facts to keep in mind as we watch, creating an imbalance that serves only to undercut the movie's overall credibility.
  61. The Great New Wonderful
    The movie falls short of the grandeur it's reaching for, but if you're looking for balm to soothe your frazzled nerves, you may be able to scrape some from the movie's rawer edges.
  62. Scoop
    The rapport between Allen and Johansson (pretending to be father and daughter) is lively, and the variations on the same old jokes are plentiful.
  63. Lunacy
    For all its visual surprises and visceral shocks, Lunacy is still the kind of film that is easier to admire than it is to actually like.
  64. Hollywoodland
    This overly derivative motion picture thinks it is doing and saying more than it is. Instead, it ends up as little more than a reasonable facsimile of the real thing, despite a subtle and effective performance by Ben Affleck, of all people.
  65. I Trust You to Kill Me
    Has enough virtues -- principally Sutherland's presence and the quality of the music -- to make it an enjoyable trip.
  66. Haven
    Haven is far from perfect, with some uncomfortable pacing, wayward accents and less-than-satisfying denouements. But it's a refreshing, character-driven antidote to the late-summer movie-house blahs, and Flowers looks like a talent worth watching.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The U.S. vs. John Lennon
    There may not be a moral, but it's a fascinating human story, one that The U.S. vs. John Lennon only begins to tell.
  68. Renaissance
    A visually wondrous experience in high-contrast black and white, bogged down by a slow, underwrought story and uninvolving characters. It would be easy to dismiss it as another great-looking film with little else to offer, but that wouldn't be entirely true.
  69. Open Season
    An amusing if slight excursion into nature with a group of animals who turn the tables on their collective nemeses, the hunters.
    • 38 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Facing the Giants
    Facing the Giants, which despite its flaws is ultimately a sweet, sincere movie about Christian faith.
  71. Shortbus
    Though it flirts with the hard-core, there is something strangely flaccid about Shortbus, a ragged, uneven quality that, however purposeful, makes it feel less than fully formed.
  72. Driving Lessons
    Driving Lessons follows the well-worn path laid down by other, better movies while making strained, ludicrous things happen toward the end.
  73. Saw III
    Bottom line, those in the "Saw" factory know their audience and have brought along the appropriate buckets and bibs. Even devotees, however, may note pacing problems and tire of Jigsaw's selective omnipotence.
  74. Cocaine Cowboys
    In a sense it's a shame that Cocaine Cowboys is so obsessed by violence, because the film has interesting points to make.
  75. The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause
    As a full-service holiday movie, The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause gets you into the mood to shop early and often by making the North Pole look like a shopping mall with a never-ending school pageant.
  76. Commune
    Unfortunately, producer-director Jonathan Berman only scratches the surface of daily life at Black Bear. We're left with many unanswered questions about the nuts-and-bolts of the place, even the basic social interactions and what it's like today. There are so many voices in the piece that we never get to know any of them; it's a dizzying array of opinions.
  77. Copying Beethoven
    Shot by Ashley Rowe to look like a cross between a Vermeer retrospective and a music video, Copying Beethoven is silly and misguided, if reasonably entertaining for its charming lack of self-awareness, its weakness for lines like "Loneliness is my religion!" and its transcendently beautiful music.
  78. The Painted Veil
    The Painted Veil has all the elements in place to be a great epic, but it fails to connect, to paraphrase Maugham's contemporary E.M. Forster, the prose with the passion. It's impeccable, but leaves you cold.
  79. The Pursuit of Happyness
    "Inspired by" is an interesting phrase because the movie is more inspiring than inspired. The man's struggles are emotionally engaging, but dramatically it lacks the layering of a "Kramer vs. Kramer," which it superficially resembles.
  80. The Dead Girl
    If the segments are uneven, Moncrieff -- with the help of her excellent cast -- nevertheless crafts a gripping overall narrative that exposes a shared dissonance among the protagonists.
  81. Code Name: The Cleaner
    Offers no surprises but is good-natured and funny. It's mercifully devoid of car chases, although it does have a truly inane gunfight -- did any of these trained killers ever hear of target practice? -- and some out-of-left-field martial arts.
  82. Catch and Release
    An oddly appealing, if innocuous, movie of considerable charm.
  83. Seraphim Falls
    Brosnan and Neeson make fine adversaries mining the terse dialogue for veiled dramatic fervor.
  84. Funny Money
    Once the farce finds its stride, however, it's generally worth the wait.
  85. Puccini for Beginners
    Bisexuality certainly increases the geometric possibilities of the romantic comedy, completing its triangles and allowing for quadrangles and other, more amorphous layers of amorous involvement.
    • 47 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Reno 911!: Miami
    Often mildly amusing but rarely laugh-out-loud funny, the film works best in scenes with a distinct Miami flavor.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Starter for 10
    If the journey is familiar, at least the company is good.
  88. I Think I Love My Wife
    Despite the creakiness of the vehicle, there are some genuinely funny moments and observations.
  89. Reign Over Me
    Movies about male friendship are often trivialized with the "buddy" tag, but this one resonates beyond that.
  90. Memory
    Oddly enjoyable at its most implausible.
  91. The Reaping
    The seeds of most Biblical horror movies are sown in the Book of Revelations; The Reaping at least gets marks for originality for springing from Exodus.
  92. Whole New Thing
    More satisfying than not, and it plays out credibly.
  93. Everything's Gone Green
    The film's tone is on the sitcom side, but its likable cast and zany subplots make it palatable.
  94. The Wedding Weekend
    A breezy, well-paced diversion, amusing rather than scintillating yet clearly personal.
    • 52 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Wind Chill
    This isn't merely a horror film about things going bump in the night, but a study of the effects of desolation on our sense of personal consciousness.
  96. Civic Duty
    By the time the movie introduces an element of ambivalence in the story, lecture hall ennui has long ago set in, and no amount of jittery horror movie conventions can change it. With nowhere for any of the characters to go, literally, the story becomes a tendentious exercise in belaboring a point.
  97. American Pastime
    Director Desmond Nakano, who co-wrote the script with Tony Kayden, does a fine job in evoking the events and era and in guiding his actors through emotion-filled scenes. However, much of the plot revolving around a climactic baseball game is trite and detracts from the overall drama.
    • 52 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Gracie
    An earnest, well-acted, poignant drama that nevertheless runs afoul of sports movie clichés.
  99. Ocean's Thirteen
    Better than the fiasco that was "Ocean's Twelve" (how could it not be?) but not as engaging as "Ocean's Eleven."
  100. Hostel: Part II
    Hostel II is far too shrewd and savagely witty to be caught engaging in higher seriousness. Roth could probably go even further with this particular franchise if he wanted to. Yet somehow, I think he's meant for grander, subtler and more intricate distractions than this.
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