The A.V. Club's Scores

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For 10,425 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 2.6 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: 5,575 out of 10425
  2. Mixed: 3,741 out of 10425
  3. Negative: 1,109 out of 10425
10425 movie reviews
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  1. Possession
    For a film that depends so much on the interaction between words and passion -- and the drama of how each shapes the other -- the shortage of both leaves Possession looking like nothing more than an "Indiana Jones" in which card catalogs stand in for treasure maps, and footnotes for bullwhips.
  2. Fellini: I'm a Born Liar
    Turns a fond look back at the great Federico Fellini into an occasion for the kind of talky tedium Fellini's own movies would never have allowed.
  3. Real Women Have Curves
    One of the not-so-nice qualities of Real Women Have Curves is that it occasionally is as preachy as its title suggests.
  4. One Hour Photo
    Has a clean, antiseptic chilliness reminiscent of a Kubrick film. But too often, the director's stark visuals underline the naked simplicity of his story and make his picture of the suburbs seem hopelessly generic.
  5. The Visual Bible: The Gospel of John
    In the wake of T"he Passion Of The Christ," the three-hour chore takes on some positive qualities it wouldn't have had otherwise.
  6. Passionada
    Milos and Rossum are like Iberian "Gilmore Girls," only with an ocean view and without the clever dialogue.
  7. Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron
    It's handsomely mounted, and its heart seems in the right place, but that's not reason enough to put on a show.
  8. Like Mike
    Weirdly earnest and earnestly weird.
  9. Head of State
    Offers a smattering of big laughs and an overall tone of ramshackle likability, but considering Rock's talent and the film's potential for smart satire, Head Of State registers as a somewhat wasted opportunity.
  10. Nowhere in Africa
    With sumptuous widescreen photography and a pounding world-music score, the film makes for an absorbing travelogue at best, as pretty as a picture book and just as flat on the surface.
  11. Hey, Happy!
    Like its characters, Hey, Happy! is more comfortable with music, images, and rhythms than words, but unlike raves, narrative films generally need dialogue, and whenever the characters open their mouths, the movie crawls to a halt. Even at 75 minutes, it seems less like a party than an endurance test.
  12. Aileen: Life and Death of a Serial Killer
    Broomfield's documentaries present life on the fringes as one long, sick joke. The joke still works, but in Life And Death Of A Serial Killer, it leaves a bitter aftertaste.
  13. Hey Arnold! The Movie
    Nothing about Hey Arnold! The Movie cries out for the big-screen treatment, but it at least makes the transition from television to film with its charm intact.
  14. Men in Black II
    None of it sticks, but with the door left open for a third Men In Black movie, the one advantage of forgetting everything is not knowing exactly what's coming two summers from now.
  15. Below
    Twohy and co-screenwriters Darren Aronofsky and Lucas Sussman don't show their hand until late in the film, but by that time, Below has grown slack and silly.
  16. Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde
    If her adoring public doesn't mind paying for the same movie twice, Legally Blonde 2 stands to leave her star power unquestioned.
  17. All My Loved Ones
    A situation of such inherent drama only suffers from the director's attempts to intensify it, and eventually, the scenes of professional and personal rejection begin to suffer from an overabundance of pathos.
  18. Confidence
    Confidence doesn't provide anything substantial to latch on to: Its twists and turns aren't founded on the trust needed to pull them off.
  19. The Scorpion King
    Prototypical summer-movie fare, designed to be consumed, enjoyed, and forgotten all at once.
  20. Saints and Sinners
    While Saints And Sinners will strike some as a refreshingly even-toned social study, it's also a documentary heavy on talking heads and low on real drama. It's beautifully shot and deeply felt, but, for the most part, hearing a description of the film is as good as watching it.
  21. Duplex
    Looks and sounds like a black comedy, but by the time DeVito reaches the cutesy, nonsensical ending, he's lost the will to follow through on it.
  22. The Trip
    It doesn't help that Sullivan has twice as much screen time and half as much charisma as Braun.
  23. The Siege
    As a nail-biting thriller, The Siege is too confusing, and as a thought-provoking social drama, too confused.
  24. Cherish
    In the end, it becomes the cinematic equivalent of one of the songs Tunney adores: enjoyable enough while it lasts, but so thin that its ingratiating charms seem as much a source of frustration as pleasure.
  25. Bukowski: Born into This
    Goes to great lengths to show the man-child behind the barfly, but in its rush to deify its subject, it lacks critical voices and context.
    • 47 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    U.S. Marshals
    It isn't so much a bad action movie as a symptom of the greater problem with most action movies: Audiences tire of sitting through the same fitful, unfulfilling formula, no matter how much terse language and gunfire is tossed in.
  27. Amen.
    Amen should be a powderkeg of a movie, yet the urgency and force that defined Costa-Gavras' earlier work has been drained away, along with his invigorating newsreel craft.
  28. The Statement
    In Jewison's hands, this cat-and-mouse game plays like third-rate John Le Carré, treading lethargically over high-minded intrigue that mixes fact, fiction, and unlikely speculation in dubious relation to the historical record.
  29. Out of Time
    The two of them (Washington/Mendez) together, playing police-procedural dodgeball, make for a good movie. Too bad there are other people on the team, and that the pre-game show runs so long.
  30. American Chai
    The ethnicity of its leads is the only novel aspect of an otherwise bland exercise.
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