San Francisco Chronicle's Scores

  • Movies
  • TV
Select another publication »
For 9,302 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 2.3 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 9302
  2. Mixed: 2,656 out of 9302
  3. Negative: 1,486 out of 9302
9302 movie reviews
view
per page
  1. Where's My Roy Cohn?
    Cohn was a strange mix of self-aggrandizing and self-loathing, or maybe that’s a familiar mix. In any case, he emerges from the film partly sympathetic, if only because he seemed so miserable all his life, but mainly as the prime example of what Shakespeare meant when he said, “The evil that men do lives after them.”
  2. Maleficent: Mistress of Evil
    The saddest thing about Maleficent: Mistress of Evil is that it’s not bad, but typical, that this emptiness — this immersion in mass numbification — is the modern style.
  3. The Lighthouse
    The Lighthouse is more than four times longer than a “Twilight Zone” episode, and 100 times worse.
  4. Jexi
    Jexi feels hopelessly out of step with the moment. Despite its subject matter, it’s a flip phone movie in a smart phone world.
  5. The Ground Beneath My Feet
    The Ground Beneath My Feet consistently serves as a powerful showcase for the talented Pachner, who manages a performance that is both distant and achingly vulnerable.
  6. The Addams Family
    Yes, there are funny lines, but nearly all of them are familiar to fans; it’s almost like a greatest hits of “Addams Family” quotables.
  7. The Dead Center
    Obviously, director-writer Billy Senese didn’t have a ton of money to work with, but The Dead Center wisely eschews gore and special effects in favor of setting a dark, malevolent mood.
  8. Gemini Man
    Incidentally, this is an Ang Lee film, though, beyond the first-rate production values, you wouldn’t know it. Lee seems happy that he has embraced technology, but what’s the point if the technology is in the service of an empty exercise? He has made one movie like this and doesn’t need to make another.
  9. Pain and Glory
    Economically and stunningly, Almodovar combines a high sense of style with a deep sense of humanity, along with a touch of erotic beauty that has always characterized his work.
  10. Lucy in the Sky
    But throwing fairy dust in our eyes can’t make us think we’ve entered Fairy Land. It just takes a lowdown tale and inflates it until it bursts.
  11. Midnight Traveler
    Midnight Traveler gets the bulk of its humanity from little Zahra and Nargis. The resilience of children is often amazing, and near the end of the film, when they play in the snow for the first time, you get a glimpse of hope for their futures.
  12. The Laundromat
    The Laundromat finds director Steven Soderbergh in a playful mood, but this time he’s a little too playful, and the result is a scattered and seemingly trivial movie about a serious subject — a lighthearted, jolly expose of international money laundering.
  13. Joker
    It’s a very good movie, and it features a blood-curdling performance from Joaquin Phoenix, in the most frightening portrayal of a violent maniac in decades. One more thing: It’s clearly a response to the times.
  14. The Sound of Silence
    Sarsgaard and Jones are good actors, and both are fine. The real star, though, is sound designer Ian Gaffney-Rosenfeld and his team, who bring a depth and dimension to the story that sorely needs it.
  15. The Death of Dick Long
    To be sure, The Death of Dick Long is a weird one, in that it starts out intense and gradually loses steam, until nothing really matters and the audience might as well leave. This movie could be used in film schools to teach how not to structure a story.
  16. End of the Century
    It’s a lovely film that’s poetic, erotic and bittersweet.
  17. Britt-Marie Was Here
    The most refreshing thing about the movie is having a more mature woman at the center of the action, and August knows not to overreach here. She is dryly funny, but also subtly affecting, and it’s a pleasure to watch her heart and mind slowly but surely open up to life’s possibilities.
  18. Judy
    A great movie was within reach with Judy — the new Judy Garland biopic starring Renee Zellweger — but the producers and creators made an epic mistake: They didn’t use Garland’s actual vocals. Instead, they let Zellweger pinch-hit for Babe Ruth and ended up spoiling the movie.
  19. Abominable
    Abominable delivers all the notes you expect from family-friendly animation these days. And, thankfully, a little bit more.
  20. Rambo: Last Blood
    The fifth entry in the John Rambo series is called Rambo: Last Blood, and we can only hope that’s a promise.
  21. Ms. Purple
    Ms. Purple is the kind of low-budget film, with inexpensive-looking slo-mo effects and an overwhelming score (the filmmakers anticipate any and all requests that the violins be cued) one usually sees only in local film festivals.
  22. Ad Astra
    It’s a probing, searching movie by one of the medium’s best American directors whose reach, like his protagonist’s, exceeds his grasp.
  23. Downton Abbey
    Although this story line’s turns are easy to anticipate, the seriousness with which Fellowes approaches it is refreshing in an otherwise lightweight film.
  24. Hustlers
    The movie is nonetheless strongly written, with a game cast. Wu is especially a revelation, with a layered and often moving performance that shows off dramatic chops not seen by many of her fans.
  25. Before You Know It
    For a film about an unexpected reunion between two daughters and their long-lost mother, there is shockingly little talk about family. We have no idea what these women see in each other, let alone want from each other. This strips the film of the emotional authenticity that it ultimately craves.
  26. A Faithful Man
    This project is in many ways a nod to the films of the French New Wave, and even if the surprisingly unsexy A Faithful Man doesn’t quite measure up, it’s never boring and keeps moving at a brisk pace.
  27. Raise Hell: The Life & Times of Molly Ivins
    Whatever one’s politics, it’s hard not to be charmed by Ivins’ feisty demeanor and, by extension, Raise Hell: The Life and Times of Molly Ivins.
  28. The Goldfinch
    Watching The Goldfinch is like reading a novel where someone ripped out every third page from front to back. You can tell there’s a good story, with compelling characters, and maybe a strong mystery. But the connective tissue is missing to the point of constant distraction.
  29. Linda Ronstadt: The Sound of My Voice
    After watching her belt, blast and harmonize with power and precision through wildly diverse styles of music like an Amazon heroine, to see her struggle her way through this short piece is the kind of heart-string moment documentary filmmakers can only hope to catch.
  30. Becoming Nobody
    There’s nothing particularly innovative about the filmmaking, but Becoming Nobody does its job: helping spread Ram Dass’ message in a polarized world in which we tend to emphasize our differences, not our similarities.
Page:

Top Trailers

See all »
See all trailers »