The A.V. Club's Scores

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For 10,414 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 51% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 46% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 2.6 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Movie review score: 62
Highest review score: 100 Badlands
Lowest review score: 0 A Life Less Ordinary
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 5,571 out of 10414
  2. Mixed: 3,736 out of 10414
  3. Negative: 1,107 out of 10414
10414 movie reviews
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  1. Bottle Shock
    Trouble is, it's too rambling and digressive to feel focused, yet too calculating to feel as observational and natural as a good Altman flick.
  2. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2
    Video veteran Sanaa Hamri directs with smooth competence, and the leads all go pleasantly through their paces, but there are no surprises.
  3. Patti Smith: Dream of Life
    The paltry amount of live performances is a crime. In some ways, Smith singing "Gloria" live would've been all the context anyone would ever need.
  4. Frozen River
    If the role brings her more recognition and work, all the better, but Leo certainly isn't lobbying for it. She doesn't show off. She just does what she's always done: Reveals a character for who she is, nothing more, nothing less.
  5. The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor
    Dragon Emperor succeeds largely through sheer excess: It's doubtful that any idea was thrown out for being too implausible.
  6. Swing Vote
    This potentially sharp working-class fantasy proves strangely unsatisfying.
  7. Sixty Six
    The movie's climax is enough to provoke genuine tears, and not just from fans of the West Germany squad.
  8. In Search of a Midnight Kiss
    Even when Midnight Kiss is sputtering, viewers can tune the dialogue out and just watch the scenery in one of the most "there"-y L.A. movies ever made.
  9. America the Beautiful
    Roberts blunders amiably and cluelessly through his amateurish eyesore of a documentary on society's obsession with beauty, perpetually searching for a thesis that will transform a shambling mess of half-baked thoughts and pointless digressions into a real documentary.
  10. Man on Wire
    It's a story worth telling, yes--but after 90 minutes, it's hard not to wonder if the storyteller can talk about anything else.
  11. The X Files: I Want to Believe
    Carter and his underachieving cohorts have seldom given cultists less to believe.
  12. Step Brothers
    This is a loud, ugly, foul comedy whose shortcomings extends far into the supporting cast.
  13. Baghead
    Much of the fun of Baghead is that it's unclassifiable, by turns a movie-movie lark, an Eric Rohmer-like relationship comedy, and a surprisingly effective "Friday The 13th" kids-in-the-woods slasher film.
  14. Brideshead Revisited
    It's rare to find a work that explores issues of faith without veering into religious fundamentalism or militant atheism, which is reason enough to revisit Brideshead one more time.
  15. The Order of Myths
    So The Order Of Myths' central question remains tantalizingly unanswered: When a society respects its old-growth trees so much that they let the roots crack the sidewalks, are they being noble or ignorant?
  16. American Teen
    Though it's compelling enough as soap opera, American Teen digs deeply into why kids grudgingly accept the roles they've been given and the brutal consequences that come with straying outside the lines.
  17. CSNY/Déjà Vu
    The music isn't much of a relief either, mostly because Young keeps cutting away from the performances.
  18. Boy A
    For all Crowley's reliance on quiet naturalism, Boy A ultimately steals a page from film noir, showing how guilt and constant hounding can turn any ex-con into the desperate animal everyone presumes him to be.
  19. The Dark Knight
    The film's capes and cowls suggest one genre, but it's a metropolis-sized tragedy at heart.
  20. Mamma Mia!
    The incongruous mix of real locations and stage sets, real voices and overdubs, is a constant distraction, while the choreography lumbers in group numbers and goes flat in more intimate ones.
  21. Space Chimps
    Story remains Vanguard's weak point.
  22. Felon
    Felon's dialogue is overheated and some of its plot twists are preposterous, yet it's still white-knuckle tense, and held together by dozens of small, well-observed moments.
  23. Berlin
    If nothing else, Julian Schnabel's concert film Lou Reed's Berlin presents the album's 10 songs with a force they've rarely shown before.
  24. Transsiberian
    Though Anderson's storytelling gets murky at times, it's still a fine showcase for his versatility, adding to an impressive, under-the-radar résumé that includes the underrated science-fiction comedy "Happy Accidents" and the first-rate horror film "Session 9."
  25. Before I Forget
    It's hardly a rosy picture of what it's like to be gay and 60 in Paris. But it's an engrossing picture.
  26. Mad Detective
    Fleeting confusion and bizarre literalization aside, though, Mad Detective is an effective mystery story, with an oddball hero--like TV's Monk, but far crazier--and some moments of visceral violence that raise the stakes.
  27. Hellboy II: The Golden Army
    Ron Perlman returns as the film's loveable title character, a demon gone good who's tough on the outside but tender underneath, with a soft spot for kittens, candy, and babies.
  28. Journey to the Center of the Earth
    Like its early predecessors, it's a nominally fun trip, but it's tissue-thin and instantly forgettable.
  29. Meet Dave
    Proven comic talents like Judah Friedlander and Ed Helms make up much of Murphy's crew, but apart from speaking in contraction-free spaceman-ese, the film doesn't give them anything funny to do.
  30. Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired
    Falls short of being a great film because it lacks a certain ambition.
  31. August
    Chick's underwhelming exploration of post-millennial angst is as empty and vacant as its protagonist's inexpressive peepers.
  32. Das wilde Leben
    If the movie had greater style, it might approach the delirious badness of "The Valley Of The Dolls," but it's too dull to qualify as camp.
  33. Garden Party
    Taken together, these stories are a symphony of inconsequentiality, drained of tension and purpose until all that remains is a vague sense of collective ennui.
  34. Giorni e nuvole
    At times, Soldini gets so wrapped up in his characters' suffering that the movie loses perspective; it's a little hard to sympathize when the couple's needs grow so great that they're forced to sell their boat.
  35. Full Battle Rattle
    Full Battle Rattle works just fine as a two-fisted combat story, with unexpected bursts of violence peppering that old universal message that war is hell.
  36. Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson
    It's more Thompson-for-beginners than an exhaustive inquiry, but as introductions go, it's thorough and thoughtful.
  37. Kabluey
    While the film's social-satire elements are flat and overly familiar, its dry absurdity is unmistakably Lynchian.
  38. Diminished Capacity
    Broderick, Alda, and Madsen are all fine--and Alda has some poignant moments as he realizes the implications of his forgetfulness--but their presence in a movie like this reaffirms its conventionality.
  39. The Wackness
    The Wackness' main draw is Kingsley's giddily over-the-top performance as a pothead, and the film delights in showing Gandhi sparking a huge bong or making out with Mary-Kate Olsen in a phone booth.
    • The A.V. Club
  40. Tell No One
    The story starts at a low boil and quickly heats up, but the problem with Tell No One--a common problem with contemporary pulp literature--is that at some point, all the narrative's intriguing questions resolve with prosaic answers, delivered in long, convoluted speeches by people wielding guns.
  41. Hancock
    It's a daring, even mildly challenging mixture for a superhero film, and while the pieces don't entirely add up, the puzzle is at least original.
  42. Finding Amanda
    It's amusing but facile, reasonably clever but hopelessly glib.
  43. WALL-E
    It's Pixar's most daring experiment to date, but it still fits neatly into the studio's pantheon: Made with as much focus on heart as on visual quality, it's a sheer joy.
  44. Wanted
    Wanted is a queasily unapologetic power fantasy about becoming a better person through violence.
  45. Gunnin' for That #1 Spot
    Comes from a pure place. Or rather, it comes from a DESIRE for a pure place in a game poisoned by mercenary compromise.
  46. Trumbo
    Trumbo sexes up Trumbo's already dramatic story with a massive infusion of star power.
  47. Elsa y Fred
    It's hard to overlook how much of Elsa & Fred is rote and pre-chewed.
  48. The Last Mistress
    Given their reputations as feminist provocateurs, the coming together of Breillat and Argento seems natural, even inevitable, and The Last Mistress gets a charge from their feisty, uncompromising spirit.
  49. Full Grown Men
    Full Grown Men often becomes as intolerably silly as the twee Amerindies it's reacting to.
  50. Get Smart
    There are many stretches when it's easy to forget that Get Smart is a spoof; it's more like a third-rate James Bond with pratfalls.
  51. The Love Guru
    Myers combines his love of references, silly names, and mindless repetition by having his guru use "Mariska Hargitay" as a greeting/mantra. The first time it's employed, it's merely unfunny; by the 13th or 40th time, it's almost hypnotic in its awfulness.
  52. Brick Lane
    Brick Lane comes far too late to be groundbreaking, and tries to do too much to be fully coherent, but its talent for avoiding obvious choices on all fronts, narratively and stylistically, make it worth a look.
  53. Kit Kittredge: An American Girl
    By the time it reaches an action-packed finale that's choreographed like an ancient Keystone Kops short, Kit Kittredge has cornered the market on bland.
  54. Medicine for Melancholy
    Medicine For Melancholy offers a personal spin on the "walking around a city" genre.
  55. The Happening
    Shyamalan still has an abundance of personality and ambition, and there are scattered moments of craft throughout, but the gulf between his lofty aspirations and feeble accomplishments has seldom been wider or more chuckle-inducing.
  56. The Incredible Hulk
    The Hulk himself looks more steroidal than superheroic, as if the expressive beast from the first film had been replaced by a WWE star.
  57. Chris & Don. A Love Story
    Describing the early stages of their sexual attraction, Bachardy sums up the whole outrageously fortunate arc of his life. "It was exactly what the boy wanted," Bachardy says. "And he flourished."
  58. My Winnipeg
    Maddin talks at length about Winnipeg's hidden layers, but what makes My Winnipeg perhaps his best film to date is that so much of it is right out in the open.
  59. Quid Pro Quo
    Stahl quietly plays the straight man, giving the usually skillful Farmiga plenty of room to overact with abandon; she plays her character as one part Rosanna Arquette in David Cronenberg's "Crash" to two parts Natalie Portman's magical life-saving pixie in "Garden State."
  60. To the Limit
    To The Limit is full of a lot of talk about "risk" and "dreams" and "making the impossible possible," and Danquart's stabs at making this an inspirational tale can be a little exhausting.
  61. Encounters at the End of the World
    A sort of distracted, freewheeling form of inquiry and observation drives Encounters At The End Of The World, a loosely constructed documentary that seems to have been made on a whim.
  62. Kung Fu Panda
    Yet another celebrity-voiced animal adventure, but it stands out from the crowd of similar films with its lightning wit and whirlwind brio.
  63. You Don't Mess with the Zohan
    Spectacularly, unimpeachably, relentlessly preposterous.
  64. Mother of Tears
    Compared to a recent Argento dud like "The Stendhal Syndrome," Mother Of Tears at least has some of the go-for-broke gothic spirit of his earlier work. He's just lost the ability to shape it into something artful.
  65. The Promotion
    It's a sweet, human movie, if not an entirely successful one.
  66. Take Out
    The movie took a long time to get distribution, but there's no expiration date on filmmaking this strong.
  67. Dreams with Sharp Teeth
    All told, Ellison is a fascinating person to spend 96 minutes with. But you probably shouldn't risk that 97th.
  68. Operation Filmmaker
    Operation Filmmaker takes a thrilling left turn from its original conceit, and Davenport does a nice job rolling with the punches.
  69. Bigger Stronger Faster*
    Attempts to look beyond the hysteria and consider exactly how and why a culture that values physical power has internalized the idea that steroid use in sports is a scourge.
  70. The Foot Fist Way
    Trouble is, the gags just keep finding new ways to make McBride's strip-mall sensei seem pathetic, and the few scattered laughs never justify the cruelty.
  71. Savage Grace
    Savage Grace should have the force of Greek tragedy, but Kalin's chamber drama feels curiously stifling and flat, and Moore's volatile turn isn't enough to quicken its pulse.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 67 Critic Score
    Sex and the City
    Ultimately, Sex And The City serves as a glitter-laced love letter to its fans, which is really all it needs to be.
  73. The Strangers
    It isn't particularly original--for one, it owes an unacknowledged debt to the French film "Them"--but as an exercise in controlled mayhem, horror movies don't get much scarier.
  74. Stuck
    It's a righteously nasty piece of work, and a rare example of a movie that traffics in B-movie grime without a trace of "Grindhouse"-style self-consciousness.
  75. Cleaner
    Don't let the film's highbrow cast, portentous tone, and leisurely pace fool you: Cleaner is just as empty and formulaic as his previous films, just much, much duller.
  76. The Children of Huang Shi
    It's a polished, beautifully shot story, and it acknowledges the messiness of real life. But like real life, it's often baffling and frustrating.
  77. War, Inc.
    The overall experience is manic, juvenile, and hit-or-miss, as if the auteurs behind "Epic Movie" were trying to remake "Wag The Dog." It's too soon to laugh about Iraq, and it'll never be time to laugh about it with this kind of maladroit humor.
  78. Postal
    A provocation first, an insult second, a publicity stunt third, and a film a distant fourth.
  79. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
    The biggest problem with Crystal Skull is one that's lately plagued Spielberg in otherwise excellent films like "Munich" and "War Of The Worlds": He fails to stick the landing. And for an entertainment with nothing much on its mind, that hurts.
  80. The Edge of Heaven
    Akin divides The Edge Of Heaven into thirds, and ends the first two sections with emotionally devastating scenes of violence, before easing into a third section that deals with the repercussions and lessons learned.
  81. A Jihad for Love
    Even though the message that people should have the right to love whomever they want is hardy groundbreaking, Parvez captures some interesting conversations about what it means to be gay and Muslim.
  82. The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian
    Ultimately, it's an absence of personality that does the film in. The creatures remain beautifully designed and Narnia still looks like a colorful, inviting place, but it feels as lifeless as the fantastical anyworlds found on glittery unicorn posters.
  83. Reprise
    Like many debut features, Reprise is a foremost a statement of purpose, and in that respect, at least, Trier shows limitless promise.
  84. Sangre De Mi Sangre
    The film seems even more one-note when compared to the recent indie feature "Chop Shop," which also follows young immigrant hustlers in NYC, yet takes the time to provide a fuller picture of the city and its opportunities. Zalla prefers to wallow in the dead-end, an approach that's initially powerful, then numbing.
  85. Speed Racer
    Borderline-experimental in the way it challenges the limits of perception. It's forward-thinking, visionary, and much of the time unwatchable.
  86. The Fall
    It's the most glorious, wonderful mess put onscreen since Terry Gilliam's "Brazil."
  87. Frontier(s)
    There's no depth, surprises, or wit to the screenplay, which seems motivated by the sole desire to generate the vilest, most disgusting people and images imaginable.
  88. Noise
    Bean always writes interesting scripts that toy with big ideas, but the films that result aren't always good. (Or even bearable.) Here he sets out to make an aural "Fight Club," but instead he's made a movie about a guy who really needs to buy earplugs.
  89. OSS 117: Cairo, Nest of Spies
    The film bounces along on cheap but entertaining Mel Brooks-worthy audio and visual gags, like the live-chicken-throwing fight, or the sequence where the camera discreetly pans away from Dujardin and a partner making out on his hotel bed--only to focus on a full-length mirror in which they're still fully visible.
  90. Surfwise
    How can a freethinking father mandate his ideals without violating them? Pray covers it all, and movingly so.
  91. What Happens in Vegas
    Complain all you want about the affable slobs in Judd Apatow comedies; at least they're not tools.
  92. Before the Rains
    The one appealing aspect of Before The Rains is that there are no villains, just three characters who are driven first by shared desires, then by a natural impulse for self-preservation that brings them into conflict.
  93. Battle for Haditha
    Unsubtle but gripping.
  94. Iron Man
    Iron Man is the rare comic-book movie that makes the prospect of a sequel seem like a promise instead of a threat.
  95. Fugitive Pieces
    In many ways, Fugitive Pieces is a beautiful film. But it's a bit TOO beautiful.
  96. Made of Honor
    What do you call it when someone pulls a gender reversal on someone else's movie? If that movie is "My Best Friend's Wedding," you call it Made Of Honor.
  97. Mister Lonely
    Has its moments of wonder and beauty, but the film is obscure by design, and meant to appeal to those who favor the alternative canon of directing greats: the one that includes the likes of Alejandro Jodorowsky, David Lynch, Crispin Glover, John Cassavetes, Claire Denis, Abel Ferrara, and Vincent Gallo.
  98. Redbelt
    The film unravels a bit in the last few moments, amid unanswered story questions and a simplistic climax, but until that moment, Redbelt is Mamet's richest film of the decade.
  99. Son of Rambow
    The shooting of the movie-within-a-movie offers the brightest moments in Son Of Rambow, a testament to the innocence of the boys' creative impulse and the sheer unlikely pleasure of their friendship.
  100. Viva
    Biller obviously feels for these plywood people she's created. She surrounds them with rich color and eye-popping décor, and fills them with the awareness that as awkward as their sex games may be, they may one day miss what they stood for.
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