The A.V. Club's Scores

Select another publication »
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
view
per page
  1. Stranger Than Fiction
    Amid all this metafictional hoopla lies the real heart of the movie, a tentative romance between Ferrell and a tax-withholding baker played with adorable prickliness by Maggie Gyllenhaal.
  2. Cairo Time
    It's a postcard-lovely movie that, in spite of its best intentions, ends up feeling a little touristy.
  3. Damsels in Distress
    Even though I'm not sure I understand what Stillman was going for minute-to-minute, I was swept away by how original Damsels is, and how funny.
  4. Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning
    Sure, it gets repetitive, and as one of the most expensive productions in history (the reported budget was around $400 million), it inevitably smacks of an imperial industry in decadent decline. But somewhere into the nearly three-hour runtime, the movie passes that crucial point where a critic stops taking notes and decides to simply enjoy themselves. The end is nigh, and it’s mostly a good time.
  5. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
    Is this massively ambitious, unfairly burdened sequel as good as Black Panther? Definitely not—and it probably could never have been. But in a mythology where death is more often used as a narrative device than a true measure of loss, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever magnifies the truth that the title character’s world will endure, even if he doesn’t—and there are at least as many lessons to extract from his absence.
  6. Chevalier
    As a celebration of a musical genius, Chevalier is a wildly entertaining ride, a thrilling history lesson in the making that remains as timely as ever.
  7. Nowhere Boy
    It's a tender, but sometimes untended, portrait of the artist as a young man-and occasionally as a young asshole-that's handsome, dutiful, and finally, a little dull.
  8. Zathura: A Space Adventure
    Director Jon Favreau, who dipped profitably into family entertainment with 2003's "Elf," effectively recreates the illustrative universe of a good children's book, but he's stuck with a story that noisily grinds its gears.
  9. The Darjeeling Limited
    The men are fuzzily defined and the film feels incomplete. The devil may be in the details, but for the first time, Anderson's obsession with them has caused him to lose sight of the bigger picture.
  10. The Peanuts Movie
    While it’s more technically elaborate treatment than the characters have ever received, it’s also gentler and more eye-pleasing than any of Blue Sky’s other features. It‘s also a neat extension of Schulz’s style—though, granted, no one needs to see Pig-Pen’s permanent cloud of filth rendered more vividly.
  11. Ronin
    Here's a strangely flawed and strangely satisfying movie.
  12. The Wrecking Crew
    The Wrecking Crew casts about between genres like driftwood caught by the tide; for two hours, the script cycles between family trauma drama, goofy Hawaiian noir, meathead romp, and wham-bang slugfest. The indecision at least showcases some consistency, though, in that each approach is equally dissatisfying.
  13. Barney's Version
    The film, lacking narration or much explanation of the character, is an outsider's version rather than his own. It's intriguing, but almost always frustrating.
  14. The Swenkas
    It all feels formal and unreal, the product of high ritual. But it also feels like one of the few rituals they're playing out entirely for themselves rather than for the sake of Rønde's neatly packaged modern fairy tale.
  15. Over the Hedge
    Over The Hedge stands out as genuinely witty and even a little barbed. Its chipper, sneering outsider's look at suburban sprawl and conformity isn't going to change the world, but it's still self-aware enough to be reasonably smart.
  16. The Prisoner or: How I Planned to Kill Tony Blair
    By recounting Abbas' ordeal as an endless inarticulate monologue, The Prisoner reduces it to a dull anecdote--timely and relevant, perhaps, but an anecdote all the same.
  17. Dolemite
    Dolemite's plot has something to do with Moore squaring off against crooked cops and a crooked politician, but as in all of his movies, the story is less important than the cheap entertainment.
  18. The Girl with All the Gifts
    Starts off strong but dilutes its impact with every consecutive reveal.
  19. Cinemania
    A voyeuristic look at voyeurs, Cinemania never seems sure whether it's a comedy or a tragedy. Instead, the film just seems intent on depicting its subjects as lovable kooks, a reductive portrayal that does little to acknowledge the desperation and loneliness that permeates every frame.
  20. Me Without You
    Aided by raw, committed performances from her two leads, Goldbacher makes them tough company for themselves and anyone else around them, on or off the screen.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Hipsters
    Light as a bubble, Hipsters suggests that age may catch up with everyone, but that there will always be people fighting against the current of conformity, even if they only express it via how they wear their hair.
  22. Solaris
    Though glazed in chilly surfaces -- the Kubrickian spaces, Cliff Martinez's gorgeous ambient score, the elliptical editing rhythms of Soderbergh's recent work, particularly "The Limey" -- the film contains a surprising depth of feeling within its egg-shaped head.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    As Good as It Gets
    It all adds up to a compelling, deftly executed film that thoughtfully examines the actions and motivations that draw people together, directing their uneasy relationships.
  24. The Goebbles Experiment
    Mostly though, The Goebbels Experiment proves that historical figures have the worst perspective on themselves.
  25. Run
    A psychological thriller with frustratingly little to say about the trenches of the human mind, Run nevertheless satisfies as a taut and titillating get-out movie that lands somewhere between HBO’s "Sharp Objects" and "Whatever Happened To Baby Jane?"
  26. No Man of God
    Sealey, whose formal touch often flirts with cliché (lots of circling around Hagmaier and Bundy, with one man’s face temporarily obscured by the back of the other’s head), pointedly reminds us of Bundy’s many victims, even though none of them are shown.
  27. Rudo y Cursi
    Carlos Cuaron's otherwise terrific new comedy Rudo Y Cursi barely survives its third-act "Goodfellas" descent into seedy coke-and-crime drama.
  28. Score: A Film Music Documentary
    Where Score proves its value to those fans is when it simply allows them to watch these composers at work.
  29. Power Ballad
    While Power Ballad is sometimes a good enough hang, especially during its opening half, its sitcom humor never rises to its stars’ level.
  30. Deep Cover
    The central conceit quickly feels like window dressing for a film that wants to be in a particular genre but hasn’t put in any real effort to fit there.
Page:

Top Trailers

See all »
See all trailers »