The A.V. Club's Scores

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For 10,440 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: 5,581 out of 10440
  2. Mixed: 3,746 out of 10440
  3. Negative: 1,113 out of 10440
10440 movie reviews
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  1. Hell Hole
    When the guts and goop start flying, however, there’s no denying that the Adams Family have cooked up another bloody good time, even if the overarching mood doesn’t feel as consciously constructed.
  2. Eden
    Eden winds up yoking Howard’s more domesticated movies with his thwarted-adventure narratives. The suspense lies in whether certain characters will figure out whether they’re on a bold, one-off exploration or the cusp of a sustainable new life—and whether humanity on the whole is any good at telling them apart.
  3. Black Bag
    For better or worse, the director tucks Black Bag away so cleanly that it’s easy to forget what a good time it is.
  4. The Dead Thing
    A well-crafted, slow-burn art-horror offering that falls somewhere between doomed character study and moody ghost story, the movie exudes an unerring confidence in its own skin. It’s not an eager group of individual showcases or a proof-of-concept for another project, but a creatively executed rumination on universally relevant themes.
  5. Pavements
    It all threatens to resemble a hat on a hat, possibly worn by a snake eating its own tail. Yet Perry isn’t really going for a trippy hall-of-mirrors approach, even when he cuts together multiple performances of songs so that Pavements past, present, and fake-ass trade verses on their catalog of ’90s non-hits.
  6. Familiar Touch
    As Chalfant preens, jokes, and carries on throughout her character’s evolving mental landscape, she threads recognition and persistence into a performance defined by confusion. This approach contributes to the idea that our lives are not a single fading picture, but formed from a long series of imperfect snapshots—like how single frames, quickly played in succession, form the illusory whole of a film.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Dog Man
    Dog Man is a sugar rush.
  8. Song Sung Blue
    Like a Diamond song, Song Sung Blue is a little corny and a touch overly familiar. But when it finds its wavelength, the good times never seemed so good.
  9. The Colors Within
    Low on incident but high on emotion, The Colors Within poignantly draws a line from our most private selves to the art we create as an expression of who we really are inside.
  10. The Bad Guys 2
    What The Bad Guys 2 has to say about turning over a new leaf isn’t profound, but it’s effective nonetheless, especially when accentuated by so many goofy laughs and sticky-fingered thrills.
  11. 28 Years Later
    A blistering adventure filled with dread and wonder, there’s a macabre classicism to the film—a sense that, even if life as we know it falls apart, some essential elements persevere.
  12. Lurker
    Of course things get out of control—it’s not like the dark underbellies of music-world organizations haven’t always exceeded our worst expectations. The strength of Lurker, though, is when it’s operating as a slick, slimy social-engineering thriller that anyone could relate to.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    The Wedding Banquet
    The Wedding Banquet may not take its modern queer skepticism as far as its characters could naturally go, and its green card plot device may feel particularly tenuous in light of the alarmingly pressing fascism of border control, but it is an enjoyable, worthwhile 100 minutes spent laughing, groaning, and hoping.
  14. By Design
    It’s a pointedly strange experience, sometimes annoyingly so and sometimes unexpectedly crushing, but all enjoyably kooky depending on your tolerance for this kind of thing.
  15. The Ugly Stepsister
    Blichfeldt’s film offers a R-rated counterpoint better than most “faithful” fairy tale adaptations.
  16. The Perfect Neighbor
    The documentary’s damning look at stand-your-ground laws and the ineffectiveness of police even when they’re doing everything “right” (because the body-cam footage that makes up this film wouldn’t exist if they thought they were doing something “wrong”) is awful and thorough, avoiding cliché through a devotion to fisheye footage. Its upsetting, explicit-bordering-on-exploitative access drives its points into the pit of your stomach.
  17. Together
    The profound depth of feeling generated by Brie and Franco in the midst of this genre film, one perhaps unattainable if they weren’t also married in real life, gives Together a real shot as the greatest romance of the year.
  18. OBEX
    This blend of genres, aesthetics, realities, and virtual realities doesn’t all add up—or adds up a bit too neatly, as the script makes Conor’s hazy backstory unmistakably clear—but OBEX is still endearingly contained, passionately executed, and impressively unique.
  19. Caught Stealing
    It’s remarkable, then, how well Caught Stealing holds together as entertainment; as much as Aronofsky seems incapable of the modulation needed to make a crime caper, he’s also a big part of why this particular variation works anyway.
  20. After the Hunt
    After The Hunt does eventually add up to something greater than its flood of but-what-about details.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Blue Moon
    Though this can seem like a quibble, the cheated blocking Linklater uses to make Hawke look comically shorter than Scott distracts from some truly great writing.
  22. Bring Her Back
    Like a punk band turning four chords into pure angst, Bring Her Back turns familiar trauma-based horror into a traumatic experience. To sit through Bring Her Back is to endure it.
  23. Ne Zha 2
    It’s not hard to understand why global audiences turned out in droves to see Ne Zha 2. Its boundlessly creative visuals, rich character design, all-enveloping sound, and imaginative scenarios are truly original. But that sensory onslaught—those endless fights with their own progressive stakes—comes at the expense of focus, character, and story.
  24. Cheech and Chong's Last Movie
    The tension between Cheech & Chong is a tale as old as time. But their overwhelming respect and love for each other make Last Movie an amiable tour through an unlikely and historic career, arriving at an even more unlikely send-off.
  25. Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie
    Nirvanna The Band The Show The Movie is so affable, so good-natured, so modest—just so gosh-darned charming—that it’s difficult not to crack at least a little bit of a smile while watching it.
  26. Hallow Road
    Hallow Road really thrives when at its most simple. Sticking with Pike and Rhys in a simple windshield shot, cutting only to other tight, static angles from inside the car, allows the pair to carry the film.
  27. Project Hail Mary
    Over two-and-a-half hours, the duo’s film gazes in wonder at alien engineering, opens its heart to human vulnerability through karaoke, and makes the case that inspiring the next generation (or at least perpetuating its existence) is alluring enough to shake the smarmiest manchildren from their self-imposed exile. Most effectively, though, Project Hail Mary sees a personal sense of humor shine through the bludgeoning grandeur of a AAA sci-fi.
  28. Tornado
    It’s more that the specific combination of jidaigeki period piece, highland character study, and frontier justice that’s new, making Tornado a harrowing, blustery, violent amalgamation of an idiosyncratic spirit.
  29. Roofman
    It’s a star vehicle for Tatum and Dunst that can’t put all of its faith in the healing power of charisma and chemistry.
  30. Bono: Stories of Surrender
    While chiefly serving as an engaging conversation piece for those already familiar with the man and his band, director Andrew Dominik’s film is also an artistic, effectively streamlined celebration of reflection.
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