San Francisco Chronicle's Scores

  • Movies
  • TV
Select another publication »
For 9,303 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 52% higher than the average critic
  • 2% same as the average critic
  • 46% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 2.1 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Movie review score: 63
Highest review score: 100 Mansfield Park
Lowest review score: 0 Speed 2: Cruise Control
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 5,160 out of 9303
  2. Mixed: 2,657 out of 9303
  3. Negative: 1,486 out of 9303
9303 movie reviews
view
per page
  1. Dracula: Pages from a Virgin's Diary
    Succeeds despite that mismatch of artist and material.
  2. A Family Affair
    Until now, it may not have occurred to you that what we needed was a witty lesbian romance. Once you see A Family Affair, you realize what we've been missing.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 25 Critic Score
    Only the Strong Survive
    Sometimes the story just lies there like an old cat in the sun.
  4. The Trip
    It is never a good sign when the audience is two steps ahead of the characters on the screen. Waiting for them to catch up wears everyone out.
  5. Man on the Train
    Taps into the same emotional current that sustains the entire "buddy picture" genre, but does so with feeling and unmistakable insight.
  6. Daddy Day Care
    A harmless and amusing summer comedy.
  7. The Shape of Things
    The film is certainly clever enough to hold an audience's interest throughout, though in the end it's a victim of its own ambition. As a moral investigation, it's shallow and ultimately ludicrous.
  8. Down with Love
    A very smart, very shrewd movie, and the smartest, shrewdest thing about it is the way it masquerades as just a fluffy comedy, a diversion, a trifle.
  9. Charlotte Sometimes
    Sexy, surprising romance.
  10. X2: X-Men United
    The movie is overplotted, a soulless maze of special effects and relentless action.
  11. The Dancer Upstairs
    An ambitious political thriller, a multilingual film of mood and texture and the occasional haunting image.
  12. Owning Mahowny
    A fascinating fact-based portrait of a gambling addict.
  13. Blue Car
    This is a film without a single false note. From the rain-streaked windshield to the unaffected line readings from a stellar cast, there is not a shot in Blue Car that doesn't ring true.
  14. The Lizzie McGuire Movie
    It works. "Lizzie" is wholesome, smart and sweet.
  15. New Suit
    An appealing Hollywood satire.
  16. Spellbound
    Resembles a Christopher Guest movie in that it follows obsessed, socially awkward folks on a seminal journey in their lives.
  17. Marooned in Iraq
    Ghobadi infuses his movie with a humor that can almost be called Seinfeldian, and it's this mix of laughter with tears that gives Marooned in Iraq its big impact.
  18. The Real Cancun
    There's a case to be made for The Real Cancun as a document of the mating dance as well as an unintentionally poignant film about the brevity of youth.
  19. House of Fools
    An ill-conceived comedy.
  20. City of Ghosts
    There's a way to love City of Ghosts, and that's to watch it not as a story that should add up to something, but as a series of little episodes with their own specialness and integrity.
  21. A Decade Under the Influence
    Unlike many documentaries about movies, it's neither underfunded nor perfunctory, but thoughtful and bracing.
  22. Manic
    Buoyed by some sensitive performances and nearly tanked by insensitive filming.
  23. Confidence
    Ultimately, the con we witness in the movie is almost as beautiful as the con that is the movie -- believable in the moment, too irresistible to question upon reflection and executed with invigorating confidence.
  24. Identity
    The violence and mayhem are constant, though the movie's style is refreshingly old-fashioned -- scream- and laughter-inducing, rather than coldly repulsive in the modern fashion.
  25. It Runs in the Family
    Achingly long and pointless, "Runs" is a movie about family that's dishonest in its presentation of every relationship.
  26. People I Know
    Becomes tiresome.
  27. Onmyoji: The Yin Yang Master
    The moments of action are interspersed with lengthy plot developments that are hard to follow.
  28. Winged Migration
    Stays in the mind, changing the way we look at the world.
  29. Holes
    It eschews obvious effects, but even more impressively, it tells a story without an obvious moral. It assumes that kids can wrestle with a fairly complicated narrative and draw their own conclusions.
  30. Lilya 4-Ever
    Riveting.
Page:

Top Trailers

See all »
See all trailers »