Los Angeles Times' Scores

For 16,536 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 2.2 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:
16536 movie reviews
  1. A stirring ode to cultural bridge-building.
  2. Eubank's fizzy mix of self-conscious, set-piece image-making and small-scale human detail is admirable.
  3. What DeBlois has deepened in No. 2, is the film's emotional core. Though there are moments when the tension goes slack, the cast steps up to keep things afloat.
  4. Lapid's filmmaking skill helps keep us involved, as does Policeman's philosophical underpinnings.
  5. This film throws an enormous amount of information at us both in terms of original interviews and archival footage from more than 100 sources, but it's too sophisticated to suggest that any one-size-fits-all solution is lurking just over the horizon.
  6. While often affecting and absorbing, the film proves intellectually and contextually light. This is especially true given a leisurely running time that could have easily accommodated more dimensional probing.
  7. The first half is a cautiously dread-inducing tour de force as the suspicious interlopers parse the shiny, happy members for signs of a darker version of paradise... The second half, however, when all hell breaks loose a little too quickly, is the disappointment.
  8. This flatly shot picture remains cramped by its homespun roots.
  9. Though the dialogue is pretty basic and the narrative dots don't always quite connect, The Human Race, in its own gutsy, grindhouse-movie way, manages style, vision and tension.
  10. Korengal is a bracing reminder of the inexplicable will to endure hell and come out the other side alive.
  11. There is nothing noble about Eric's mission or about the considerable violence he resorts to to get the job done, but Pearce's willingness to give him an integrity of purpose mixes well with Michôd's intense, controlled direction and his ability to blend unexpected, empathetic character moments with all the killing.
  12. With all the finesse of a bullhorn that sprays noise and blood, All Cheerleaders Die shows just how difficult it is to pump life into the shopworn teen horror-comedy genre.
  13. Everything unfolds at a glacial place, with so many emotional beats overplayed that the experience is more wearing than moving.
  14. A great deal of insanity ensues, none of which would work if Tatum and Hill weren't so disarming in their roles. Their level of comfort with the characters and each other helps 22 click.
  15. As Obvious Child stumbles its way to the final punch line, it echoes Donna's onstage musings — funny but rough around the edges. A work in progress that somehow hooks you anyway.
  16. The result is a type of cinematic performance art, with all the self-consciousness that suggests — a sibling love story that's no less heartfelt for being in the form of a first-person poem.
  17. The AIDS scare remains as much window dressing as do other period details such as rotary phones and cassette tapes. Test seems to be about dance above all, with choreographed montages filling the bulk of its running time.
  18. First-time writer-director Jocelyn Towne takes an admirably novel stab at familial dysfunction in her father-daughter drama I Am I, but she proves unable to keep the film's originality from rapidly curdling into preposterousness.
  19. The proportions of the narrative strands sometimes feel off, but the movie pulses with the unpredictability of full-blooded characters.
  20. Light, frenetic and anecdote-rich, it's the kind of back-patting Hollywood toast to the guy behind the guy that's breezy good fun if you don't examine it too hard.
  21. Heli is a stunning piece of filmmaking. It's a hypnotic, starkly beautiful, often disturbing drama that puts a working-class Mexican family in the cross hairs of its country's drug war.
  22. The film is certainly interesting, despite the fact that it's a glorified promotional video for Muniz's installations.
  23. What sustains the film through the rockier times are its challenging themes, offering real issues for the young protagonists to wrestle with, rather than whether anyone will be carded trying to buy beer.
  24. Emotional and analytical by turn, The Case Against 8 is a thoroughly engaging documentary.
  25. Despite the visual and cultural accuracy, Ping Pong Summer is missing an elemental magic and vibrancy; a kick factor that makes the picture's endless pop throwbacks (break dancing, cassette tapes, giant boom boxes) seem more tackily forgettable than sweetly nostalgic.
  26. Ever mindful of the line he straddled between thinker and flamethrower, this "Gore Vidal" is nevertheless a lovingly packaged greatest hits from a legendary rebel of letters.
  27. Thee inside-Hollywood dramedy Trust Me contains so much terrific writing, acting and observation that it becomes a bit easier to forgive writer-director-star Clark Gregg when his ambitions best him during the movie's convoluted last third.
  28. First-time Spanish director Jorge Dorado aims for Hitchcock and misses by a mile with Anna.
  29. [An] earnest but terribly ham-fisted drama.
  30. Director Megan Griffiths and writers Huck Botko and Emily Wachtel flesh out a female perspective that's refreshing and engrossing without demonizing or objectifying men.

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