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. Pick of the Litter
    This film — which follows the process as a litter of puppies make their way through training to become guide dogs for the blind — shows us the best in humanity, as well as the best in dogs.
  2. John McEnroe: In the Realm of Perfection
    An idiosyncratic, metaphysical meditation on tennis, cinema, human behavior, maybe even life itself, "Perfection" at times risks being too pleased with itself for its own good, but its one-of-a-kind credentials are never in doubt.
  3. Chasing the Win
    Though practically everyone involved invokes a winning-is-everything sentiment, it’s clearly not entirely true. O’Callaghan and the Sheehys obviously care deeply for the animals they train and the film’s ending will leave a lump in the throat of even the most cynical viewer.
  4. Reprisal
    All in all, just another boring genre exercise.
  5. Boarding School
    Thrill-seekers should be warned that this is more a surreal, nightmarish and occasionally sexually explicit trip into an adolescent’s psyche than a spook show. Yakin uses genre packaging for an intense, personal film, which many viewers may find discomfiting — if only because it’s so hard to classify.
  6. Cynthia
    Screenwriter Robert Rhine and co-directors Devon Downs and Kenny Gage have made something polished, colorful and energetic but, ultimately, pretty disposable.
  7. Operation Finale
    The efforts of an international cast including stars Oscar Isaac, Melanie Laurent and Nick Kroll notwithstanding, Operation Finale sounds more involving than it actually plays, ending up earnest and acceptable more than compelling.
  8. A.X.L.
    It is a fine, if lightweight, little slice of throwback-’80s teen movie tropes with some high-tech flair.
  9. The Oslo Diaries
    Israeli journalist Amos Elon once wrote that the demands for justice presented by the Israeli-Palestinian impasse exceed the human capacity to administer it. The dramatic, involving The Oslo Diaries details the closest these adversaries have come to proving Elon wrong, a story that is heartening and heartbreaking by turn.
  10. Restoring Tomorrow
    A bit slick, especially in its last half hour, Restoring Tomorrow nevertheless hits its emotional marks in reporting the renaissance of an important community institution, and Wolf’s personal connection to the subject elevates what may have simply been a well-made promotional film.
  11. Last Curtain Call
    Last Curtain Call may lament the emptiness of its protagonist’s hedonistic and selfish lifestyle, but the film itself offers few pleasures with its poor pacing and cliched script.
  12. Memoir of War
    Resolutely somber, and self-aware about its deliberately tight and opaque visual style, it’s presentational more than lived, a series of filmmaking choices instead of something deeply felt and conveyed.
  13. Songwriter
    Songwriter is intimate while oddly lacking insight into the artist himself, beyond the heart he pours into his lyrics.
  14. Arizona
    Danny McBride is at his funniest and scariest in Arizona, a darkly comic film noir that works well as both a violent thriller and as a ruthless satire of over-extended American dreamers.
  15. Crime + Punishment
    Crime + Punishment is a quiet documentary but a potent one. Though its approach is low key, its passion, drama and concern for exposing wrongdoing is unmistakable.
  16. I Am Vengeance
    What the film mostly lacks is its own flavor.
  17. What Keeps You Alive
    Allen and Anderson are outstanding in roles that require a lot of levels and moods, as the central relationship goes from loving to shaky to … well, something else.
  18. Blue Iguana
    Writer-director Hadi Hajaig was obviously shooting for a mid-1980s indie vibe along the lines of Jonathan Demme’s “Something Wild,” but aside from an overstuffed soundtrack that goes heavy on the B-52’s, there’s nothing particularly engaging or nostalgic going on beneath all the forced irreverence.
  19. Support the Girls
    At a little over 90 minutes, Support the Girls has the brash trappings, if not the longevity, of a “Cheers”-style sitcom, and its generous humor is always in productive play with a tough, flinty realism.
  20. The Wild Boys
    Writer-director Bertrand Mandico’s The Wild Boys is a heady, sexually charged take on “Lord of the Flies” — an exciting sail on the waters of gender fluidity that energetically skewers any notion of the binary.
  21. The Bookshop
    Although it’s anchored by a deeply felt performance by the wonderful Emily Mortimer, with a marvelous supporting turn by the always-welcome Bill Nighy, the film, scripted and directed by Spanish filmmaker Isabel Coixet (“Elegy,” “Learning to Drive”), is at times a bit too mustily mounted and told to keep us as fully immersed as we might like.
  22. Cielo
    A curious film in multiple ways, Cielo does not always achieve its lofty ambitions of transcendence. However, accompanied by the eerie silence of the desert and the plaintive wail of Philippe Lauzier’s mournful score, McAlpine’s visuals transport the viewer to a state of reflection while reminding us of the sublime beauty of the space above.
  23. A Whale of a Tale
    A Whale of a Tale is an unfortunately directionless, low-gear rebuttal that hardly ever stirs up emotions as effectively as “The Cove” did.
  24. Dead Envy
    Dead Envy is interesting for the way it plays off of Di Nardo’s backstory, but this lightweight stalker-thriller doesn’t deliver much else.
  25. Papillon
    What’s missing is a more personal directorial imprint.
  26. Searching
    Searching is nothing if not ambitious, and its rapidly accelerating second half is jammed with bold twists, red herrings and breathless confrontations. It’s also here that the movie begins to slacken its grip — partly because some of the twists beggar belief, and partly because they strain the limits of the online-all-the-time interface.
  27. An L.A. Minute
    The salt in the wound of this painfully out-of-touch film is the footage of real L.A. homeless camps and people, as if the film were saying something trenchant about the issue. What a gross misunderstanding of this glib story about a rich man who steals stories and inspiration from struggling people.
  28. The Night Is Short, Walk On Girl
    The film is alternately intriguing and frustrating. The visuals are often strikingly handsome and oddly funny. But the movements are stiff, the characters chatter endlessly, and the unnecessary songs bring the plot to a grinding halt.
  29. The Motive
    With its probing camera and spare piano score, the film effectively creates a clinically sterile environment that’s as spiritually devoid as the soul of its protagonist, and while the inevitable twist ending doesn’t land with the unsettling thud it might have, getting there is quite the page-turner.
  30. Benched
    Filmed in Nashville several years ago, it isn’t really surprising that this poorly paced production has spent so long on the sidelines.
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