The A.V. Club's Scores

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For 10,443 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: 5,584 out of 10443
  2. Mixed: 3,746 out of 10443
  3. Negative: 1,113 out of 10443
10443 movie reviews
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  1. Marion Bridge
    If von Carolsfeld had worked more surprises into her style and presentation, Marion Bridge wouldn't live down to its genre stereotype so readily.
  2. Pellet
    When El Bola isn't drawing cheap sentiment from the sight of a bruised and scarred little boy, Mañas raises vexing questions about how and why parents leave lasting impressions on their children, and whether good intentions really matter.
  3. Berlin Babylon
    The film's deep, precise colors, which look like they belong in a Peter Greenaway movie, are Berlin Babylon's first major surprise. The second is how watchable it is, given its obsessive focus on buildings.
  4. Cuba: Island of Music
    As one man's vacation video, it's outstanding, but as a documentary, it lacks verve, stylistically or journalistically.
  5. Red Trousers: The Life of the Hong Kong Stuntmen
    Shou focuses on a meaty subject, and he has an insider's access to the world he's exploring. But his behind-the-scenes film doesn't spend nearly enough time behind the scenes.
  6. Firedancer
    For the most part, Fire Dancer presents an energetic mosaic of a displaced culture.
  7. Better Housekeeping
    The exaggerated white-trash environment and the naturalistic style mix poorly over time, giving off a stale odor that's funny in more ways than one.
  8. Persons of Interest
    The absence of style can be numbing, but it serves a purpose, positioning the documentary as a public record, not a work of art. As such, the film is eye-opening.
  9. Yugoslavia: The Avoidable War
    As persuasive and exhaustive as the film's evidence is, the stock footage of charred corpses and bombed-out communities demands more than the smug talking heads that Bogdanich presents, safe in their offices and comfortable with their rightness.
  10. Valley of Tears
    Not everything Perry's voices say seems relevant to his central thesis, but they speak fervently and colorfully, and their intensity is compelling even when their message is lacking.
  11. The Letter: An American Town and the 'Somali Invasion'
    Makes effective drama, but ultimately it's just an outrage machine, designed to get the viewer fired up by the sight of warring ideologues preaching to their own.
  12. 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.
  13. 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.
  14. A Decent Factory
    Director Thomas Balmès mostly just tags along for the ride, but the incidental details he picks up taint the sense of guarded hopefulness.
  15. A Sidewalk Astronomer
    Jacobs focuses almost exclusively on Dobson's theories and mission, which he illustrates by contrasting jaw-dropping images of the sun's surface with people ignoring Dobson's entreaties to "Come look at the sun."
  16. God's Sandbox
    The sensual sex scenes and raw violence of God's Sandbox make it pretty much an exploitation film, and as an exploitation film, it isn't bad.
  17. Young Rebels
    The documentary is short, vividly shot, and packed with interviews in which desperate young men and women let loose their personal philosophies. In fact, there's so much philosophizing that there's not much time left for rap.
  18. Hotel de Love
    It's glossy, dumb fun that is diverting enough but forgotten 20 minutes after it's over.
  19. Hard Goodbyes: My Father
    Panayotopoulou's background in photography shows in the way she lets her chiaroscuro lighting mirror her characters' emotions. It also shows in the still-life quality that Hard Goodbyes never quite gets beyond.
  20. Three Days of Rain
    Beautifully lit, with some inventive but unobtrusive framing, and the moody jazz score unifies the multiple storylines without overwhelming them. Yet while the movie never goes slack, it never really transcends its good intentions either.
  21. Escape from L.A.
    Escape From L.A. is a mild letdown. It repeats the basic plot of the original, with a lighter tone, cheaper-looking (yet actually more expensive) special effects, and a grunge soundtrack.
  22. My Bodyguard
    It’s all riveting enough, the kind of youth film that still has parables for adults and moves along at a quick and witty clip for kids—never a prat fall into sticky sweetness. My Bodyguard offers a charming take on what could have been a generic after-school-special tale, and couldn’t have picked a better backdrop to do it in.
  23. Red Dawn
    As an action movie, Red Dawn is a repetitive headache, and anyone with Blue State sympathies will be appalled at its manipulations and exaggerations. But there's smart subtext beneath the big dumb explosions.
  24. What's Up, Tiger Lily?
    When it does work, it's very funny, and worth a look both as an example of Allen's still-developing talent and—thanks to The Lovin' Spoonful—as the source of one of the greatest rock 'n' roll title songs ever to come out of a decade filled with excellent rock 'n' roll title songs.
  25. A Fistful of Dollars
    The visual scheme of Leone’s movie leaves no doubt as to his familiarity with Kurosawa’s movie. Plopping Eastwood’s roving gunman down in the middle of a dusty street with opposing gangs lodged at either end, Fistful replicates Yojimbo’s visual plan to an almost distracting extent. The bigger problem with Fistful is that Leone is still attempting to work with a conventional plot, which never plays to his strengths.
  26. Moon 44
    Generic but enjoyable with some nifty low-budget effects work.
  27. Permanent Midnight
    The framing device, which has Stiller recounting his tale to a fellow recovering addict (Maria Bello) over the course of a weekend sex session, stops Permanent Midnight dead in its tracks every time it pops up, but Stiller alone is almost enough reason to check out the film.
  28. Nenette and Boni
    Despite an alluring set-up and heartfelt performances from the leads, nothing ultimately coheres, and mood trumps logic on every occasion.
  29. Rambo: First Blood Part II
    It may be a dishonest, xenophobic, exploitative act of historical revisionism, but it's effective, and Jack Cardiff's cinematography lends Rambo's comic-book adventures an epic sweep.
  30. Touch
    Touch never quite catches the satiric fire its subject seems to warrant. It's pleasant, disarming, and likable, but never quite miraculous.
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