The A.V. Club's Scores

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For 10,413 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 2.5 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 10413
  2. Mixed: 3,735 out of 10413
  3. Negative: 1,107 out of 10413
10413 movie reviews
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  1. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
    Not every moment works, particularly in the draggy middle section, but the spirit of the thing still carries it along.
  2. xXx: State of the Union
    Thankfully, State Of The Union's pulpy, adrenalized blaxploitation spin on the secret-agent genre provides the dumb fun its predecessor should have dished out.
  3. 3-Iron
    3-Iron gains its hypnotic power by observing these characters through a slight remove. With total command of his effects, Kim transforms an already peculiar romance into something as otherworldly as a ghost story.
  4. À Tout de Suite (Right Now)
    Based on true events, À Tout De Suite reveals the seductions of criminal life to be something like Stockholm Syndrome for Le Besco.
  5. Funny Ha Ha
    Like a lot of scenes in Funny Ha Ha, the commonplace somehow seems invigoratingly original.
  6. The Holy Girl
    Adjusting to Martel's style requires patience, but her indirection pays dividends, culminating in an unforgettable final shot that flies in the face of narrative expectations.
  7. Ladies in Lavender.
    It's important to go in knowing the central secret of the movie: Nothing exciting is going to happen. Ever. Armed with that knowledge, viewers should be able to settle down and enjoy the extremely low-key, melancholy character study that plays out between a handful of excellent actors.
  8. The Tunnel
    The Tunnel boasts the kind of plot that would seem ridiculously implausible if it weren't based on a true story.
  9. Stalin's Wife
    Though serviceable as a primer on Soviet history under Stalin, the film's sloppy assemblage of dull interviews and stock footage never comes close to illuminating a life that the Russian people have long cherished as a precious enigma.
  10. Another Road Home
    Unforgettably documents the kind of journey that leads not to easy answers, but rather to an even thornier knot of questions.
  11. Casuistry: The Art of Killing a Cat
    The documentary is fair-minded but vague, and disturbing only when it describes the cat-killing in gruesome detail...Someone should take another crack at this story. Call it "The Art Of Killing Of A Movie."
  12. The Interpreter
    Made with an intelligence and craft that's increasingly rare in Hollywood thrillers.
  13. A Lot Like Love
    Kutcher and Peet are a low-wattage pair, with little of the verbal riffing that counts as seduction in most romantic comedies, but they have real chemistry together, and A Lot Like Love happily indulges their silly, juvenile one-upmanship.
  14. King's Ransom
    Devotes its first two acts to establishing the comic monstrousness of all its characters.
  15. Double Dare
    Given how well Micheli captures the personality and aspirations of two complicated professionals, it's too bad she never answers the key question: What makes one person a stuntwoman, and another a star?
  16. Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room
    Handsomely produced and photographed, which alone distinguishes it from the guerrilla standards of its cut-rate peers, Enron succeeds most by simply making a complex situation graspable, a tall order when the perpetrators are masters of grand-scale deception.
  17. Madison
    Madison couldn't be more wholesome if they served it with a tall glass of fresh milk.
  18. The Man Who Copied
    There's at least one good movie in The Man Who Copied's 124 minutes, but Furtado never settles on it.
  19. One Missed Call
    Miike doesn't do enough to shake up the formula, but he's still expert at delivering shocks, and when the level of craftsmanship is as high as it is in the white-knuckle finale, originality doesn't seem to matter anymore.
  20. Dead & Breakfast
    In a self-conscious moment late in the action, one character says she feels like she's in a bad horror movie. No kidding.
  21. Save the Green Planet!
    Has a free-ranging mood, mixing tragedy and comedy irregularly, but Jeong's film is equally free with genre, and entertains its audience openly before pouring on the astringent.
  22. The Amityville Horror
    The remake simply replaces the laughably dated horror tropes of the 1979 version with a commercial-slick J-horror aesthetic that's sure to look just as silly to audiences in another 15 years.
  23. House of D
    House Of D never feels honest, but when Duchovny consciously tries to score sentiment points, the strain is more than the film can handle.
  24. It's All Gone Pete Tong
    If only any of it were funny.
  25. Torremolinos 73
    Though never unpleasant, thanks largely to Cámara and Peña's warmly convincing performances, Torremolinos 73 only really takes off when it deals with the filmmaking process.
  26. The Year of the Yao
    With their fawning documentary Year Of The Yao, directors James D. Stern and Adam Del Deo unreflectively buy into the spin on charismatic 7'6" basketball center Yao Ming, but on a certain level, who can blame them?
  27. The Girl from Monday
    There's ample opportunity here for a sharp consumerist satire, like a dryer cousin to the candy-colored pop-culture send-up “Josie And The Pussycats,” but Hartley misses his own joke.
  28. Palindromes
    Palindromes becomes a strangely compelling fractured fable, a grim cinematic fairy tale heightened by Nathan Larson's delicate, bittersweet score.
  29. State Property 2
    Dash directs with a certain visual flare and a sense of humor, but as the film lumbers toward its climax, keeping track of the innumerable allegiances and double-crosses becomes an exercise in futility.
  30. Raging Dove
    In the frustrating, underachieving documentary Raging Dove, the filmmakers seem to get shut down every time the film threatens to become interesting.
  31. Sahara
    McConaughey is usually a welcome presence, but here, he looks like making the movie was getting in the way of his exciting African adventure.
  32. Fever Pitch
    Barrymore has rarely been so bright and effortlessly charming, but it's all lost on Fallon, who often resembles one of those unfortunate SNL guests who freeze up on live TV, completely out of their element. If Fallon wants a life after SNL, he might want to try another medium.
  33. Kung Fu Hustle
    Its crowd-pleasing, action-packed brand of frenetic parody promises to spread Chow's mythos even further.
  34. Winter Solstice
    The result is a numbing void, and a long, frustrating wait for something to happen.
  35. ...And They Lived Happily Ever After
    On the whole, the film is a shallow, shrill, and all-too-familiar marital roundelay.
  36. Eros
    It's a triptych of erotic-themed short films directed by contemporary giants Wong Kar-wai and Steven Soderbergh, and nonagenarian master Michelangelo Antonioni. But the auteurist feast turns out to be a paltry spread, with one director on autopilot, another playing it safe, and the last apparently working on assignment for the European "Red Shoe Diaries."
  37. David Hockney: The Colors of Music
    A pleasant but fairly dull documentary that's long on affability and taste, but short on human drama and compelling conflict.
  38. In Satmar Custody
    Given the complexity of this case and of the Satmar/Zionist feud, the documentary would've benefited from some dryly expert talking heads and a more conventional structure.
  39. Sin City
    Sin City draws on the cumulative history of both mediums, creating a pastiche that would have been technologically impossible even three years ago. Its creators invent a queasily intoxicating new world.
  40. Dust to Glory
    Brown probably captures enough to satisfy hardcore enthusiasts, but everyone else might end up wondering why he ignored the glory for the dust.
  41. Girl Play
    In the process of becoming characters, the writer-stars have diminished themselves.
  42. Control
    Nimród Antal's terrific feature debut Kontroll takes some time to get up to speed--but once it's fully underway, it develops a heady momentum and a devastating impact.
  43. Look at Me
    The film satisfies in much the same way Allen's movie-a-year comedies used to satisfy.
  44. Beauty Shop
    Beauty Shop's shtick gets old and tired pretty quickly, but a breezy tone and air of easygoing likeability carry it a long way.
  45. Odessa... Odessa!
    Too pretty to dismiss, but too dull to recommend.
  46. Oldboy
    The result is a powerfully visceral experience that justifies itself almost entirely on surface chops, with striking color composition and a complex sound design that elevates the story to an operatic scale.
  47. Guess Who
    An implausible, wildly protracted setup that drags on forever before reaching a payoff that barely registers.
  48. The Ballad of Jack and Rose
    Some good Bob Dylan songs are called in to underline the big moments, but end up eclipsing them instead. There's more drama and insight in a snippet of "One More Cup Of Coffee" than the entirety of Jack & Rose.
  49. D.E.B.S.
    An incorrigible tease. It baits its audience with the promise of fluffy, light-footed cotton-candy fare, but delivers a clumsy, talky, indifferently filmed lesbian romance.
  50. Lipstick & Dynamite, Piss & Vinegar: The First Ladies of Wrestling
    Leitman gets some wonderful tall tales from her subjects, who open up like they've been waiting for years for someone to come along and ask, and she complements it with punishing footage of their exploits.
  51. Nina's Tragedies
    It's not often that good movies have a hole in the center, but Nina's Tragedies labors admirably to develop the strong feelings of longing and heartbreak that unite its damaged souls, however briefly.
  52. Miss Congeniality 2: Armed & Fabulous
    Even as sequels to bad comedies go, Miss Congeniality 2 seems completely at a loss for fresh ideas.
  53. Mondovino
    For all its pervasive irritations and lack of discipline, succeeds in using below-the-belt tactics to get its message across, especially for those unschooled in the rarified world of oenophilia.
  54. Beyond the Sea
    The stories Pérez-Rey's subjects tell are shocking, even moving. But they're also narrow, limited, and staid, and so is the film that contains them.
  55. Ice Princess
    Ice Princess will probably connect most strongly with kids who have yet to develop an awareness of sports- and family-film clichés.
  56. The Ring Two
    It's passably gripping and occasionally lively.
  57. Melinda and Melinda
    A second-rate comedy and a third-rate drama, Melinda And Melinda gives viewers two unsatisfying movies in one. The only genuine tragedy here involves a once-brilliant comedy writer plunging further into a seemingly permanent artistic freefall.
  58. Fifty-Fifty
    Though it's equally concerned with sensitive young criminals in squalid communities, Schizo is no "City Of God," for better and worse.
  59. Steamboy
    Steamboy adds a touch of innocent wonder to the formula through Ray's eyes, resulting in Otomo's most human film to date, but humanity rarely seems to be among Otomo's priorities. His films seem far more concerned with the spectacle he manages like no one else in animation.
  60. The Rider Named Death
    In spite of good performances and colorful design, The Rider Named Death is too grave and remote to stir much emotion.
  61. Milk and Honey
    Once Milk And Honey stops lurching after huge, actorly moments of near-psychotic intensity, it loosens up and actually gets around to telling a reasonably compelling human story.
  62. Hostage
    By the time the film escalates into a suitably ridiculous Grand Guignol finale, all connection to reality has been severed.
  63. Robots
    The amiable but thin comedy Robots does have a little more going on, but not quite enough to make a difference, although it looks good enough to distract viewers from that fact for a while.
  64. The Upside of Anger
    The film's outsized ambitions are deceptive: Everything here is less than meets the eye.
  65. Millions
    A little broad comedy keeps things perky, but the kids' excellent, restrained acting and the low-key script by "The Claim" screenwriter Frank Cottrell Boyce hold the whole sprawling project together, from weepy revelations to silly fantasy-saint sequences.
  66. In My Country
    Any social good the film might do gets lost in a soupy morass of histrionics, clumsy storytelling, overripe dialogue, and rampant didacticism.
  67. The Boys & Girl from County Clare
    The film's modest charms are ingratiating and sweet, thanks to Colm Meaney's hilariously salty lead performance and a soundtrack that channels the warm spirit of traditional Ceili music.
  68. Don't Move
    There's nothing cute, cloying, or playful about the lovers in Sergio Castellitto's opaque romantic drama Don't Move, but in their way, they're as incomprehensible as the stars of any gimmicky comic love film.
  69. Dot the I
    The plot's profound implausibility wouldn't matter if the ideas and emotions behind it had any power.
  70. Nowhere Man
    Cheap and ugly in every sense--morally, cinematically, creatively--Nowhere Man accomplishes the seemingly impossible by dragging the seedy revenge genre to a horrific new nadir.
  71. Off the Map
    Off The Map feels peculiar and remote, strangled by an air of arty disengagement. The most vivid characters are the earth and the sky, and they both give stellar performances.
  72. Sheriff
    But without taking anything away from Frederick Wiseman, who remains a master, Sheriff is almost as good any documentary he's made.
  73. Be Cool
    Be Cool more often evokes the image of a screenwriter furiously trying draft after draft to accommodate all the stars. Accommodating the audience becomes a distant priority.
  74. The Jacket
    Still, the central mystery remains effective and compelling for most of the film, until it becomes clear that it's all image and no intent.
  75. The Pacifier
    Revealing hitherto unseen depths of stiffness, Diesel stumbles badly in the role.
  76. Dear Frankie
    On its own terms, Dear Frankie works much better than it really has any right to. Auerbach tells a small, contrived story, but gives it the weight of life.
  77. Face
    Well-intentioned but muddled, Face groans under the weight of its earnest ambition.
  78. Gunner Palace
    For the soldiers, it's about living to see the next day and living with the things they see, and Gunner Palace honors their perspective like no other Iraq documentary has to date.
  79. Intimate Stories
    Intimate Stories stays doggedly, purposefully minor, in part because director Carlos Sorin and screenwriter Pablo Solarz want to explore the casual interactions of people doing nothing.
  80. Walk on Water
    When it unexpectedly shifts back into its initial thriller mode, Walk On Water loses in human drama what it gains in tidiness, revealing itself as a film that carries more weight in its light scenes than its heavy moments can sustain.
  81. Whisky
    Mordantly funny deadpan comedy.
  82. The Best of Youth
    A big, family-style Italian dinner, catered to the broadest tastes, yet satisfying all the same.
  83. Crazy Legs Conti: Zen and the Art of Competitive Eating
    Within its limited scope, the film celebrates Conti's peculiar dreams and earnest intensity without dipping into condescension.
  84. Cursed
    Though Craven shows flashes of the old magic, Cursed eventually settles into rote, uninspired horror fare, hog-tied to the Williamson formula all the way to arbitrary finish. The film may be one of the best ever not screened in advance for critics, but that still doesn't put it in the finest company.
  85. Diary of a Mad Black Woman
    The whole three-ring circus winds up in a church for a redemptive finale, but by then, Diary has committed too many sins for even the most generous soul to offer salvation.
  86. Man of the House
    Jones' role, on the other hand, only requires him to look embarrassed at all times, which shouldn't have been too hard to pull off, considering the circumstances. Is that what they call "method" acting?
  87. Up and Down
    Sags into a dreary, humorless family melodrama.
  88. The Other Side of the Street
    Montenegro's performance is typically multifaceted, displaying keen wit and a thick streak of self-doubt.
  89. Turtles Can Fly
    Turtles Can Fly creates a haunting reminder that collateral damage can't always be measured in casualty rates, and that it goes on long after the news cameras have left the scene.
  90. Because of Winn-Dixie
    Some might even find the leisurely pace a nice break from the rapid-fire approach favored by most kids' entertainment.
  91. Constantine
    Reeves rigid delivery makes Constantine's occult backstory sound pretentious and silly, and converts Constantine himself into a repressed cipher. The film's biggest revision isn't in not making him blonde, or not making him British. It's in not making him human.
  92. Son of the Mask
    No doubt extensive market research shows that there's an audience out there for movies like Son Of The Mask, but it's too depressing to speculate who that might be.
  93. Alexandra's Project
    But de Heer's high-concept feminist tract loses some of its integrity over time, as it slowly devolves into a seedy, voyeuristic thriller that takes all too much pleasure in turning the screws.
  94. Nabbeun namja
    The film works best as a passionate tale of obsessive love, with two people brought together under harrowing circumstances.
  95. Downfall
    Downfall's overstuffed melodrama juggles countless subplots and a small army of characters who manage to make an impression in spite of limited screen time.
  96. Schultze Gets the Blues
    With dialogue as spare as its harsh landscapes, the film is so tonally dry that it makes Aki Kaurismäki look like the Farrelly brothers--it begins at a snail's pace before speeding up to a turtle's drowsy crawl.
  97. Her Majesty
    It's as if Gordon feared his film's none-too-subtle suggestion that kids should ask questions and decided to provide answers instead, tying up his story with a phony happy ending.
  98. Cinévardaphoto
    Someone as attuned as Varda to the quality of an image should know that a flat, disposable medium like video makes images harder to internalize.
  99. Ong Bak
    Makes up in action what it lacks in storytelling finesse.
  100. Bride & Prejudice
    Chadha doesn't seem at home with either Austen or Bollywood, and her ambitions far exceed her competence in the song-and-dance numbers, which are a clutter of stiff choreography and silly original lyrics.
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