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. Selma
    As well done as much of Selma is, it periodically falls from grace with moments that are either emotionally flat or excessively agitprop in nature. Consistently the most ineffective scenes are those that involve powerful but obstructionist white people, especially the unhelpful trio of Johnson, Alabama Gov. George Wallace (Tim Roth) and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover (Dylan Baker). The deftness with acting and character that can be this film’s strength simply deserts it here.
  2. Kabbalah Me
    Bram, who also narrates (and writes, with co-director Judah Lazarus and Adam Zucker), may be earnest in his desire for enlightenment. But his approach feels overly self-serving; too much "Me," not enough "Kabbalah."
  3. Redemption Trail
    Sjogren's promising set-up, designed to unfold with understatement, ends up feeling remote and repressed when Sjogren miscalculates by burying her characters' emotions too far down.
  4. America: Imagine a World Without Her
    It's far more invested in elaborate historical reenactments, hypothetical dramatizations and special effects than interviews, research and data.
  5. Hector and the Search for Happiness
    Hector may indeed learn that narcissism stands in the way of happiness, but he also walks away with his privileges intact and unchallenged.
  6. Young Ones
    Paltrow's kitchen-sink visual sense may keep your eyes engaged, but it sucks dry any inherent drama, leaving you with a bunch of characters who feel pegged by a conjurer rather than nurtured from a wretched new Earth.
  7. Louder Than Words
    Unfortunately director Anthony Fabian prefers to dole out emotion in short bursts of superficial montage rather than fully dramatic scene work in which characters deepen through extended interaction. That leaves Louder Than Words feeling diffuse, choppy and cold rather than illuminative about how broken families heal after terrible loss.
  8. Last Weekend
    All the possibilities of a richly drawn family squabble fade faster than the final days of summer.
  9. The Young Messiah
    In the end, as with too many Gospel-derived dramas, The Young Messiah could’ve used less literalism, and more mystery.
  10. Around the Block
    Though Page-Lochard manages to make his passive participation in violence compelling, Around the Block remains more lecture than drama about racism and its tragic consequences.
  11. My Old Lady
    Awkwardly balanced between comedy and significance, with plotting that gets increasingly schematic and unconvincing, My Old Lady is bound and determined to get more serious than it is capable of sustaining.
  12. Two Night Stand
    It turns out Two Night Stand is a one-act sex comedy badly in need of two more — acts, not nights.
  13. The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: Them
    "Them" is spun from callow romantic notions, the sort that make for heady moments. What's conspicuously missing is any grasp of the lovers themselves.
  14. Godzilla: King of the Monsters
    Amazingly, somehow, an overstuffed Godzilla movie feels scant.
  15. Ben-Hur
    As directed by Timur Bekmambetov, this 21st century Ben-Hur is more phlegmatic than awful, a by and large dull and lethargic piece of work that is not bad enough to get mad at. What it lacks most of all is a convincing reason to exist.
  16. The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
    Being a mildly pleasant, passingly amusing light entertainment isn't exactly saving the world, yet the film crosses its wires to blow up even that modest assignment.
  17. Swim Little Fish Swim
    An art-versus-commerce drama that consists of one beautifully aching performance surrounded by a whole lotta twee.
  18. Autómata
    Visually inspired but thematically derivative.
  19. The Damned
    The script by Richard D'Ovidio is so packed with knuckleheaded moves and ultra-obvious dialogue ("Dad, there's something wrong with this place!") that the whole enterprise proves more risible than frightening.
  20. Second Opinion: Laetrile at Sloan-Kettering
    This one's for the conspiracy-minded only.
  21. The Pact 2
    Writer-directors Dallas Hallam and Patrick Horvath, picking up the baton from first film creator Nicholas McCarthy, do a serviceable job aping the original's clean, mostly lo-fi atmospherics and nervy framing... The story's a wash, though.
  22. Archaeology of a Woman
    Kirkland manages to rise above the soap opera script with its improbable twists, stilted dialogue and internal contradictions to give a believable and often-sympathetic performance.
  23. Alumbrones
    As the movie drifts from generalities about technique to vibrant scenery — evocatively photographed by Esteban Malpica — to the occasional, much-needed anecdote, the vagueness of his enterprise becomes increasingly apparent.
  24. The Pirates
    It's a derivative trove of swashbuckling action, romance, comedy, special effects and revisionist history — the kind of film that would be pitched to studio execs as "Pirates of the Caribbean" meets "Free Willy."
  25. Fishing Without Nets
    Although director and co-writer Cutter Hodierne tells the story from the pirates' viewpoint, he adds no more dimension to them than the one we saw in "Phillips."
  26. This Ain't No Mouse Music
    The narrative of Strachwitz as preserver of obscure music just repeats like a broken record with the introduction of each region, genre and musician.
  27. Tazza: The Hidden Card
    The film seems to have an entire deck of cards up its sleeve, and they're dealt out with more tedium than fun.
  28. Last Hijack
    Disjointed and unfocused.
  29. The Culture High
    Director Brett Harvey has gotten the documentary look and format down pat, complete with generic and gratuitous nature and cityscape shots. Where he shows an amateurish hand is in the term-paper-like voice-over narration and the inclusion of underqualified talking heads.
  30. The Water Diviner
    It's an unsurprisingly ambitious movie from the notoriously, proudly headstrong Crowe, which makes it such a disappointment that it feels so blandly earnest and unexpectedly hesitant, with none of the unnerving conviction the actor often brings even to lightweight promotional appearances.
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