The A.V. Club's Scores

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For 10,435 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 10435
  2. Mixed: 3,745 out of 10435
  3. Negative: 1,112 out of 10435
10435 movie reviews
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  1. After the Wedding
    With its soapy earnestness and use of suffering souls as set dressing, After The Wedding could be the cinematic equivalent of a Coldplay song. And while that isn't necessarily a slam, it isn't a recommendation either.
  2. The Hawk Is Dying
    A fragile little movie, occasionally ridiculous, but with M. Night Shyamalan's "Lady In The Water," Giamatti proved that he can make even the weirdest material believable.
  3. Shooter
    Fuqua keeps the action moving efficiently, but he doesn't know when to stop piling it on, and eventually, Wahlberg's army of one becomes more a comic-book vigilante than a righteously disgruntled patriot.
  4. The Hills Have Eyes II
    Assembles the most motley group of incompetents this side of a "Police Academy" movie, yet somehow misses the laughs. But humorlessness is probably the least of the film's problems, lagging behind amateur-night performances from the no-name cast, a homogenous visual palette (and from a music-video director, no less!), and lots of pointless sadism.
  5. The Last Mimzy
    If Mimzy serves as a gateway drug that gets "Shrek" fans into classic science fiction, then it'll have performed an invaluable cultural service.
  6. Pride
    There are formulaic moments aplenty in Pride, the "inspired by a true story" tale of Philadelphia swimming coach Jim Ellis, but in its first scenes, at least, it deserves some credit for doing the unexpected.
  7. Reign Over Me
    At its heart a simple story about friendship and loss, carried over with enough genuine feeling to excuse its uncertain footing.
  8. TMNT
    Only those already predisposed to love a TMNT movie that at least LOOKS edgy are likely to care.
  9. Color Me Kubrick
    The film makes funny use of music (particularly Lionel Richie's "Hello") and excellent use of Malkovich, but it literally only has one idea in its head, and when that idea runs dry, it's as lost as Conway is without his plethora of Kubrick masks.
  10. First Snow
    Pearce is usually dependable, but here, he's utterly unconvincing as a slick phony, and the film peddles a bogus bill of goods in kind.
  11. Offside
    It's a sports film unlike any other, and a political film that makes the personal profound.
  12. The Page Turner
    A little too neat, and self-consciously vague at the end. But it's fascinating to observe and try to interpret François' mysterious smile as she eyes her boss.
  13. 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.
  14. Dead Silence
    Again coaxing the worst imaginable performances out of his actors (see also: Cary Elwes and Danny Glover in "Saw"), Wan casts charisma-free unknown Ryan Kwanten as a young married man whose small-town past catches up to him.
  15. I Think I Love My Wife
    Though hampered at times by Rock's limitations as an actor and a director, I Think I Love My Wife stays faithful to the spirit of Rohmer's original, grappling honestly with the uncertainties of settling down and the temptations that lurk outside even the most stable marriages.
  16. Premonition
    Had it been easier to comprehend at the beginning, there's no telling how bad Premonition might have been.
  17. The Wind That Shakes the Barley
    There's a kind of dry tastefulness about The Wind That Shakes The Barley's historical recreations, even when Loach is staging rapes and executions.
  18. American Cannibal: The Road to Reality
    Still, no matter how Grebin and Nigro are selling it, American Cannibal isn't about the horrors of reality TV. It's about guys like Roberts and Ripley, who convince themselves that ANY job in show business would be preferable to waiting tables.
  19. 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.
  20. The Host
    Most of all, The Host functions as a popcorn movie par excellence, loaded with the most familiar conventions, but shot through with such conviction and visual panache that even its clichés seem invigorating.
  21. Beyond the Gates
    Hurt steals scenes with a brilliantly nuanced character, a man bitter enough to make every line delivered to his peers a challenge or an accusation, yet experienced enough to present those challenges with an ingratiating politesse that only cracks in extremis.
  22. Maxed Out: Hard Times, Easy Credit and the Era of Predatory Lenders
    Maxed Out sacrifices depth for breadth and like a lot of low-budget documentaries, it's done no favors by its grimy, no-fi aesthetic. But the film's scattered ruminations on credit card mania add up to a powerful indictment of a culture of mindless consumption spinning out of control.
  23. The Namesake
    It's well-acted and filled with striking compositions, but director Mira Nair has trouble with a different kind of balance.
  24. The Exterminating Angels
    The problem with Exterminating Angels is that its explanatory side overwhelms its playfully perverse side.
  25. Zodiac
    Zodiac is the rare serial-killer movie in which the psychosis stems as much from the pursuers (and the filmmaker) as the pursued.
  26. Wild Hogs
    Abysmal.
  27. Black Snake Moan
    Like "Hustle & Flow," Moan succeeds on languid atmosphere and the conviction of its leads. But it'd be nice if the execution matched the startling audacity of its premise.
  28. Full of It
    Despite a novel premise and an appealing, energetic cast, Full Of It seldom finds magic in its supernatural whimsy.
  29. Into Great Silence
    As a place to enter and meditate, Into Great Silence is imminently worthy, but as a documentary, it doesn't do enough to probe the meaning of the quotation Gröning returns to repeatedly: "Oh Lord, you have seduced me, and I was seduced."
  30. The Astronaut Farmer
    Too odd for a studio movie, too cornpone for the independent scene, The Astronaut Farmer finds its creators stuck awkwardly between worlds, making what amounts to a deep curiosity.
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