Los Angeles Times' Scores

For 16,523 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:
16523 movie reviews
  1. Overcomplicates its plot and spends a lot of time floundering around in the shallow end.
  2. Long-winded and ultimately uninvolving.
  3. It is crucial when viewing All My Loved Ones, with its fine ensemble cast and well-evoked sense of time and place, to remember that it unfolds as a recollection of David, a boy of perhaps 10 in 1938.
  4. By far the most approachable of the director's recent films, with an emotional depth that's true to life and a streamlined narrative that for long stretches barely contains a word.
  5. Delightfully bittersweet culture-clash comedy. If what's funny is frequently hilarious, then what's nasty truly stings, and the film is honest enough not to tie up everything with a ribbon.
  6. It's a demented kitsch mess (although the smeary digital video does match the muddled narrative), but it's savvy about celebrity and has more guts and energy than much of what will open this year.
  7. Secret Ballot, which has a rich, spare score by Michael Galasso that blends Eastern and Western motifs, is funny, provocative, well-paced and leaves a memorable bittersweet aftertaste.
  8. xXx
    Built of action-sport stunts, has adrenaline to spare. But, c'mon. Where is its sense of fun?
  9. There's enough atmosphere, mayhem and just plain energy to make the film a viable midnight movie.
  10. Amazing, rich in authentic period atmosphere and detail, an ever-changing cyclorama of a movie.
  11. There's a certain pleasure in seeing a thriller that's almost a relic of a bygone era. There's nothing flashy about Blood Work, no in-your-face nihilism, no hot young actors you'd know from the WB network if you ever watched it.
  12. Though it's longer and more elaborate than it needs to be, it shares its predecessor's smart but relaxed sense of humor, a sophisticated imagination and the ability to be sharp and playful without being malicious.
  13. The extraordinary quality of White's script and Arteta's direction lifts the meticulously cast actors to the height of their abilities. "Friends" star Aniston digs deep but is never showy. Reilly reveals the tenderness, vulnerability and hidden depth that can lurk within a slob, and Nelson has some of the film's most outrageously funny and inspired moments.
  14. Lawrence is a no-holds-barred stand-up comedian who gets away with the strongest, most graphic language because he is so funny and because he makes himself the object of so much of his humor.
  15. When a set of pre-shooting guidelines a director came up with for his actors turns out to be cleverer, better written and of considerable more interest than the finished film, that's a bad sign. A very bad sign.
  16. Its portrait of the many ways we can complicate our romantic lives may have a few serious moments, but it's intended to go down easy, and that's what it does.
  17. But even Carvey's protean talent can't dent this ponderously unfunny and uninspired comedy. It's hard to imagine anyone older than 10 being diverted by its broad buffoonery, and kids deserve better than this in the first place.
  18. Shyamalan's great gift is the creation of atmosphere, the conjuring of spooky, unseen menace. When he gets around to doing this in Signs, all is well, but it's a tossup as to whether the film offers enough of a payoff considering how long it takes to get where it's going.
  19. Once again Chabrol's son Mathieu has composed a crucially evocative score, and Renato Berta's cinematography is gleaming. Merci Pour le Chocolat crackles with wit and elegance, humor and pathos.
  20. A witty, colorful and poignant account of the life and times of producer Robert Evans.
  21. Ambrose's Frankie, who is more intelligent and capable of reflection than those around her but is even more unworldly than she realizes, is tremendously appealing.
  22. Assured, vital and well wrought, the film is, arguably, the most accomplished work to date from Hong Kong's versatile Stanley Kwan.
  23. An exciting and involving rock music doc, a smart and satisfying look inside that tumultuous world.
  24. After a while, the only way for a reasonably intelligent person to get through The Country Bears is to ponder how a whole segment of pop-music history has been allowed to get wet, fuzzy and sticky.
  25. A gem of a romantic crime comedy that turns out to be clever, amusing and unpredictable.
  26. The only thing that won't make you laugh, unless you've got a 12-year-old's sense of humor, is the film's tireless parade of gross-out gags and scatological verbal jests. Myers gets a charge out of this material--it wouldn't be here if he didn't--but so much of it is so tedious it's difficult to believe an adult actually sat down and wrote it.
  27. This is a film that goes its own way to the end as it asks the audience, "What you just saw, were they happy times or not?" The question is a good one, and the answer, like this film, is sure to stay with you.
  28. K-19's determination to push hard for self-congratulatory morals and convenient resolutions undercut the film's strengths and make it more conventional.
  29. Though there's a thin noir line between lust and hate, Lansdown delivers nothing to stir the passions of filmgoers one way or the other.
  30. Like many modern children's films, Stuart Little 2 can't decide between teaching good values ("You're only as big as you feel") and tossing out fake-hip jokes. Though it doesn't happen as often as it should, this is a better film when it allows itself simply to be sweet.

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