The A.V. Club's Scores

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For 10,442 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: 5,583 out of 10442
  2. Mixed: 3,746 out of 10442
  3. Negative: 1,113 out of 10442
10442 movie reviews
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  1. Jackass Forever
    It’s the group’s most joyous installment to date, even if the series itself is starting to show some wear and tear.
  2. Spring Blossom
    In creating material so close to her lived experience, Lindon is able to avoid the common clichés of teenage stories.
  3. Cinderella
    While this version of Cinderella likely won’t top anyone’s list of all-time best adaptations, it’s a winking, glittering family comedy that’s cohesive in tone and confident in what it wants to be. And mostly it just wants to be flashy, toe-tapping karaoke.
  4. What Drives Us
    The film works better as a casual glimpse behind the curtain of big-name acts, exuding a voyeuristic appeal in the footage and anecdotes of beloved musicians opening up about their pasts. It’s breezy fun, if a little forgettable, spending 90 minutes with charismatic performers who have a knack for a good yarn.
  5. The County
    Hákonarson alternates between crowd-pleasing defiance . . . and a downbeat assessment of how much change is realistically possible, never fully committing to either mode. The result feels less complex than just wishy-washy.
  6. Shotgun Wedding
    Although the madcap antics come up short in some areas, and it’s unable to strike a good balance between its main and supporting players, you’ll find it easy to say “I do” to this one.
  7. Holler
    The specificity and authenticity of its setting are the biggest thing Holler has going for it, given that indie drama is rife with variations on this type of social realist coming-of-age tale. The gloomy mood also tamps down thriller elements that appear late in the story, which leaves little but despair for the audience to chew on.
  8. All Light, Everywhere
    All Light, Everywhere is about both making and questioning connections, but by the end, its methods feel not so much productively protean as frustratingly noncommittal.
  9. False Positive
    Glazer and Lee both work primarily in comedy, but the commentary here is drier and more serious, producing knowing nods instead of outright laughter.
  10. Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain
    In terms of celebrating his life by letting us soak in his impassioned, inspiring presence one more time, the film is successful. But viewers should take one more note from the man himself and not fall for easy scapegoats and trite narratives, whether they concern countries or a person who devoted his life to exploring them.
  11. Don't Breathe 2
    The increasingly ornate violence (much of it taking place in a newer if no less creaky location) fuels an effective thrill machine, and if that machine can’t match the unexpected sweetness of the T-800’s relationship with John Connor, well, maybe that’s for the best.
  12. Sabaya
    As a journalistic depiction of the rescue operations as they happen, Sabaya brims with heart-pounding tension and immediacy. But given the access obtained and Hirori’s connection to the people and the land where this grim chapter in modern history is unfolding, the superficial handling of pivotal aspects of the story is disappointing.
  13. The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf
    It’s fun to see this world, with all of its inhuman monsters and monstrous humans, from a different point of view, even if it isn’t quite as refreshing or engaging as Geralt’s.
  14. A Chiara
    Though the path to its conclusions is at times more plodding than meditative, the finale is a subtle, emotional twist of the knife that makes the journey worth taking.
  15. The Hand of God
    It has as many superfluous sequences as great ones, with moments that serve no grander purpose than landing a single joke.
  16. The Electrical Life of Louis Wain
    The more Electrical Life conforms to what one would expect of a Louis Wain biography, the less idiosyncratically compelling it becomes. An entirely fictional story loosely inspired by the man and his wife, but beholden to nothing, might have been genuinely electrifying.
  17. The Mad Women's Ball
    This is a work of feminist melodrama, one that uses real events as a backdrop for a romantic, woman-centric tale of rebellious spirits and dreams deferred. As such, it might not be the most nuanced portrayal of this particular chapter in history. But it is passionate, fathers and doctors be damned.
  18. Fauna
    Fauna has some smart things to say about how the drug trade and its attendant stereotypes have changed the Mexican popular imagination. You just have to pay attention to follow the film’s many idiosyncratic twists and turns.
  19. Zeros and Ones
    What Zeros And Ones conveys, in its shoestring terms, is the actual mood of a world of uncertainties.
  20. The Transformers: The Movie
    As an '80s curio and perhaps the only film to feature the voices of both Welles and That Guy From The Micro Machines Ad Who Talks Real Fast, it possesses a kitschy, low-budget charm.
  21. The Guilty
    For most of its brisk 90 minutes, The Guilty is just Gyllenhaal, in tight close-up, constructing a movie out of sweat and tears alone: a glorified radio play of a thriller whose thrills are generated almost entirely through his reactions.
  22. Clean
    This movie loves big, operatic gestures. At least visually, it lands them all.
  23. Futura
    Self-reflexiveness is no guarantee of value in a documentary, and Futura works perfectly well as cinematic reportage. Still, the film does at times feel slack and arbitrary—a bit like a census that no one could argue is unimportant but which nonetheless has the feel of a box-ticking exercise.
  24. Bingo Hell
    A sometimes clunky but always bold blend of social satire and delirious style.
  25. V/H/S/94
    File 94 somewhere between the inspired, crowd-pleasing bloodshed of the second film and the series-low ineptitude of the third, V/H/S Viral.
  26. Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre
    For the most part, Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre is a fun time at the movies. There’s laughter, action, and movie stars playing to their strengths. It’s exactly what audiences expect to see from Ritchie and that’s its main selling point. If only the second hour was tighter, maintaining the film’s fast rhythm.
  27. The Phantom of the Open
    Directed by Craig Roberts, this achingly British offering (its opening lines involve the request for a cup of tea—no milk, six sugars) is a pleasant movie of smaller stakes that, for better or worse, sidesteps inspiration in favor of more laidback reflection.
  28. Dirty Work
    If a great movie is one with two great scenes and no bad ones, then Dirty Work is half a great movie. It contains more than its share of bad scenes, but it does have two brilliant ones.
  29. The Bad Guys
    Like the Despicable Me series, The Bad Guys may find ever-diminishing returns once the villain protagonists no longer qualify as despicable or bad. For now, at least, that mixed morality is not just part of the fun, but the primary selling point.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 67 Critic Score
    Blue Beetle
    It’s the cohesiveness among the cast members playing Jaime’s family that lends their performances both authenticity and relatability.
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