The A.V. Club's Scores

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For 10,447 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: 5,587 out of 10447
  2. Mixed: 3,746 out of 10447
  3. Negative: 1,114 out of 10447
10447 movie reviews
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  1. My Big Fat Greek Wedding
    Stays unrelentingly pleasant, but affability is a poor substitute for laughs or chemistry.
  2. Julie & Julia
    Two movies in one. That’s one more movie than it needs to be.
  3. Blood Diamond
    Much like Zwick's "Glory" and "The Last Samurai," Blood Diamond strives to be an "important" film while stopping well short of being genuinely provocative and artistically chancy.
  4. Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant
    Actually, by way of a sequel, the filmmakers could just set Cerveris, Dafoe, and Reilly up for a purr-off. That’d be more fun than most of this film.
  5. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
    Realized through old-fashioned camera mastery and newfangled special effects, it’s a stunning technical accomplishment, but one seemingly designed only to broadcast banal sentiments, when it says anything at all.
  6. The Proposal
    It's the material that stinks, failing to give even an old pro like White more than a couple of modest laughs.
  7. Everything Is Illuminated
    But the parts of Foer's lively novel that didn't get cut in the script stage have died on the way to the screen. To be fair, it's not an easy novel to adapt.
  8. 300
    Part of the fascination of the Thermopylae story is that it really happened, and it helped define real heroism. There's nothing remotely like reality to be had in this film.
  9. Coco Before Chanel
    There are indications scattered throughout Coco Before Chanel of a major designer quietly and persistently honing her craft, but most of the film could exist without the Chanel name and still smell like the same perfume.
  10. P.S. I Love You
    Working from a novel by Cecelia Ahern, LaGravenese brings some intelligence and maturity to a genre that sorely needs it, but it isn't enough to prop up this long-winded and thoroughly bland romantic comedy.
  11. Coach Carter
    Coach Carter eventually curdles into a grim love letter to discipline and accountability, which makes it the perfect sports film for W.'s second term, but not a whole lot of fun.
  12. Elektra
    The role needs a steely, inhuman reserve, and Garner's innate likeability works against her.
  13. The Chorus
    The Chorus plucks desperately at the heartstrings, but fails to breathe new life into a tired old tune.
  14. Travelers and Magicians
    Unsurprising tribute to the sweetness of rural dwellers.
  15. Assault on Precinct 13
    Retains every hooky, marketable, and superficially attractive element from its source material while losing everything that made it special.
  16. Watermarks
    Well-intentioned and exceedingly nice, Watermarks aspires to warm the soul, but succeeds only in numbing the mind.
  17. The Wedding Date
    The lucky Mulroney gets to play the kind of sensitive hunk that women want and men want to be, but he's the only one who can be heard over the tired wheezing of the romantic-comedy machinery.
  18. Assisted Living
    Assisted Living gets a little better as it wears on, and at least it's refreshingly short.
  19. Swimming Upstream
    The film begins as a delicate duet between Rush and Davis, but as Rush spirals out of control, his performance becomes a flashy, over-the-top solo akin to his hammy turns in "Shine" and "Quills."
  20. Because of Winn-Dixie
    Some might even find the leisurely pace a nice break from the rapid-fire approach favored by most kids' entertainment.
  21. Cursed
    Though Craven shows flashes of the old magic, Cursed eventually settles into rote, uninspired horror fare, hog-tied to the Williamson formula all the way to arbitrary finish. The film may be one of the best ever not screened in advance for critics, but that still doesn't put it in the finest company.
  22. Face
    Well-intentioned but muddled, Face groans under the weight of its earnest ambition.
  23. Hostage
    By the time the film escalates into a suitably ridiculous Grand Guignol finale, all connection to reality has been severed.
  24. Don't Move
    There's nothing cute, cloying, or playful about the lovers in Sergio Castellitto's opaque romantic drama Don't Move, but in their way, they're as incomprehensible as the stars of any gimmicky comic love film.
  25. Ice Princess
    Ice Princess will probably connect most strongly with kids who have yet to develop an awareness of sports- and family-film clichés.
  26. Fifty-Fifty
    Though it's equally concerned with sensitive young criminals in squalid communities, Schizo is no "City Of God," for better and worse.
  27. The Rider Named Death
    In spite of good performances and colorful design, The Rider Named Death is too grave and remote to stir much emotion.
  28. Beauty Shop
    Beauty Shop's shtick gets old and tired pretty quickly, but a breezy tone and air of easygoing likeability carry it a long way.
  29. ...And They Lived Happily Ever After
    On the whole, the film is a shallow, shrill, and all-too-familiar marital roundelay.
  30. The Amityville Horror
    The remake simply replaces the laughably dated horror tropes of the 1979 version with a commercial-slick J-horror aesthetic that's sure to look just as silly to audiences in another 15 years.
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