The A.V. Club's Scores

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For 10,436 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: 5,578 out of 10436
  2. Mixed: 3,746 out of 10436
  3. Negative: 1,112 out of 10436
10436 movie reviews
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  1. The Kids Are All Right
    Cholodenko's casually observant style perfectly matches the cast's thoughtful work, though the film ultimately proves more successful at creating messy situations than trying to resolve them.
  2. Predators
    The Predator series needed a shot of vitality, not another workmanlike go-around. SSDP: Same shit, different planet.
  3. Despicable Me
    Until the "creep + orphans = happy family" formula starts demanding abrupt, unconvincing character mutations, Despicable Me is a giddy joy.
  4. The Girl Who Played with Fire
    More disappointingly, the entire cast seems less committed than they were the first time out.
  5. Winnebago Man
    Steinbauer's eagerness to draw information--and, let's face it, exclusive new clips--out of his recalcitrant subject borders on exploitation at times, but the smart, cagey Rebney has an agenda of his own that Steinbauer can't entirely control or define. The documentary gives him a forum to be his funny, irreducible self, which is a luxury the accidentally famous are rarely afforded.
  6. [Rec] 2
    What Balagueró and Plaza lose in novelty, they partially gain back by sheer relentlessness: The film is a slab of raw meat for horror addicts, impeccably crafted mayhem that clocks in at under 90 minutes. Just don’t give it too much thought.
  7. The Last Airbender
    The Last Airbender isn't that much different from the rest of this summer's generally dire multiplex fare-from "The A-Team" to "Jonah Hex"... But it is remarkable in one respect: It's the worst of them.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Twilight Saga: Eclipse
    While Eclipse’s action highs are higher, its expositional lows are lower, particularly during the numerous scenes featuring Lautner.
  9. The Agony and the Ecstasy of Phil Spector
    Currently serving out a sentence that will likely consume the remainder of his life, Spector turns the interview into a trial on his own terms--one that's gripping, revelatory, and a little self-incriminating.
  10. Love Ranch
    So with two great, ideally cast actors and such potentially fascinating subject matter, why does Love Ranch feel like a clumsy TV movie?
  11. Grown Ups
    If Grown Ups were any lazier or more slapdash, it'd be a home movie.
  12. Dogtooth
    It's an exhilaratingly unpredictable experience, and not an easy one to shake.
  13. Restrepo
    Restrepo can be tedious at times and nerve-racking at others, but why shouldn't it be? That's exactly what Junger and Hetherington saw on the front lines, so that's what they show, with very little filter.
  14. Wild Grass
    Whatever it is, Wild Grass is so overtly artificial and aggressively trifling that it's bound to put some viewers off, though it's also so bright and funny that it's hard not to be at least a little enchanted. Resnais' music is so sweet, even when his words are nonsense.
  15. South of the Border
    Stone's film, more an act of boosterism than inquiry, is a tremendous missed opportunity.
  16. Knight and Day
    Cruise is thrown into many sticky situations, with legions of trained assassins surrounding him on all sides, but he never once suggests that things aren’t entirely under control. It’s profoundly boring to watch a hero without weaknesses; after all, even Superman has Kryptonite.
  17. Jonah Hex
    Every once in a while, a film limps into theaters so stitched together, it's a wonder it doesn't rip apart in the projector. Jonah Hex is such a film.
  18. Cyrus
    Once again with the Duplasses, there just isn't enough of anything: not enough funny lines, not enough variation of mood, not enough plot. If these guys were students, Cyrus might merit a "promising." But this is their third movie. It's time for them to stop turning in first drafts.
  19. I Am Love
    What keeps the story fresh isn't so much Guadagnino's swooning sense-reveries, which sometimes flow with dreamlike wonder and sometimes just drag; instead, most of the power comes from Swinton, who always makes the most of characters imbued by passion, but straitjacketed by expectations.
  20. Let It Rain
    There’s not much left to chew on when the movie is over; when Resnais adapted Jaoui and Bacri’s scripts, he added a visual counter-narrative that’s absent from Jaoui’s more functional approach. But a passing delight is a delight all the same.
  21. Toy Story 3
    The film never lets banter, visual gags, or the usual manic kid-flick running about interfere with its more delicately handled thoughts on loyalty, longing, broken relationships, and generational continuity. It honestly earns its emotion, moment by painstakingly executed moment.
  22. Stonewall Uprising
    Davis and Heilbroner lean a bit too hard on the most outrageous forms of abuse in the pre-Stonewall era, as opposed to the everyday traumas of living in the closet, but Stonewall Uprising picks up momentum once it starts detailing the event itself, drawing on the vivid memories of the people who lived it.
  23. The Karate Kid
    That the film works as well as it does--as an attractive, rousing time-passer for children--speaks more to the endurance of a good formula than its revitalization.
  24. The A-Team
    The film's featherweight tone and self-conscious excess would be a lot more palatable if everyone didn't seem so insufferably pleased with themselves. The film acts as if it's won the race before the starting gun has even been fired.
  25. Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work
    A Piece of Work is the antithesis of Jerry Seinfeld's engaging but superficial 2002 documentary "Comedian": where the innately private Seinfeld holds nearly everything back, Rivers loudly broadcasts the kind of fears, anxieties, and ambitions most people would do anything to hide.
  26. Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky
    The movie's saving grace is its performances.
  27. Winter's Bone
    Granik has no taste for noir archness, opting for a chilly, shot-on-decaying-locations naturalism that feels as lived-in as Lawrence's performance.
  28. Ondine
    Ondine looks heavy and it ends up feeling a little slight, but between those two extremes there's a beguiling siren song of a movie about the way the unexpected has a way of intruding on even the most fatalistic lives.
  29. Splice
    Played with black humor that never gets in the way of the horror, Natali’s film cleverly exploits Dren’s uncanny semi-humanity.
  30. Get Him to the Greek
    Hill, dialing back on the pissy vulgarity of his supporting roles in "Knocked Up" and "Funny People," makes the perfect foil, as passive and impressionable as Brand is reckless and impulsive.
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