The A.V. Club's Scores

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For 10,423 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 10423
  2. Mixed: 3,739 out of 10423
  3. Negative: 1,109 out of 10423
10423 movie reviews
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  1. The Holiday
    Even with a wild card like Black desperately retooling his lines, there's nothing authentic or personal about The Holiday--it's as chilling as heart-warmers get.
  2. Unaccompanied Minors
    The film is too busy hurling its cast from one labored slapstick setpiece to another to loosen up and allow them to have fun or be spontaneous.
  3. Off the Black
    Nolte almost makes it work.
  4. Screamers
    The band is sincere, and many of its followers are just as sincere, but there's always a danger that too much "screaming" can turn a meaningful statement into an inarticulate din.
  5. Family Law
    While Family Law is well-shot, it's not spectacularly well-shot, or involving in any conventional cinematic way.
  6. Days of Glory
    Days Of Glory isn't subtle in its exploration of the racial politics of warfare, but its grim, cynical portrayal of young men considered worthy enough to die for a foreign country, yet unworthy of being treated as equals, proves bluntly powerful.
  7. The Lives of Others
    von Donnersmarck gives his debut feature, The Lives Of Others, no particular style, and the absence of visual risk-taking renders an exciting premise ponderous and stolid.
  8. The Nativity Story
    A filmed Sunday-school lesson that favors a dry, by-the-Book approach over even a suggestion of dramatic interpretation. It's more Christmas pageant than movie.
  9. Van Wilder 2: The Rise of Taj
    Penn, who probably didn't need this shoddy placeholder after the cult success of "Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle's," acquits himself with a gentle charisma that makes the crudity go down easy. Granted, it's still s---, but with a sweeter odor than usual.
  10. 3 Needles
    Give Fitzgerald credit for ambition and good intentions, but for all its truth-to-power saber-rattling, 3 Needles is distressingly dim.
  11. 10 Items or Less
    Freeman is clearly enjoying himself, but his charisma and heavyweight presence can't quite redeem this featherweight concoction.
  12. The Architect
    The Architect wears its heavy social consciousness like an albatross, and Tauber's plodding, earnest direction does little to wean the material away from its stage roots.
  13. Turistas
    Once the torture finally commences, the film attempts to float a political point about the Third World taking back First World health-care privileges, but the chief torturers' sadistic humanitarianism is never seriously considered.
  14. Our Daily Bread
    The non-sensationalized "this is what really happens" approach makes Our Daily Bread extra-creepy at times.
  15. The Fountain
    Viewers not attuned to his (Aronofsky's) heartfelt, bombastic Richard Wagner-by-way-of-"2001: A Space Odyssey" lyricism might be better off looking elsewhere. But they'll never see anything else quite like it.
  16. Deck the Halls
    A rancid new Yuletide comedy.
  17. Deja Vu
    Rarely have Bruckheimer and Scott been so upfront about insulting people's intelligence.
  18. Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny
    From the looks of it, a good 90 percent of The D's creative juices were expended on The Pick Of Destiny's brilliant opening sequence.
  19. Backstage
    Bercot moves the characters up and down like lines on a chart, never granting full access to what any of them are thinking. And access is what Backstage promised.
  20. Opal Dream
    The filmmaking here is flat, straight, and thoroughly lacking in poetry, and the script--co-written by Cattaneo, Rice, and Phil Traill--tells instead of showing.
  21. The History Boys
    History Boys boasts a dazzling verbal cleverness--the gleeful rat-a-tat of snappy banter expertly executed--that doesn't keep it from also being deeply, exquisitely sad.
  22. Casino Royale
    In its overt attempts to balance high-spirited spy adventure with more realistic acting and actio--conveying the realities of government-sponsored murde--Casino Royale is a step in the right direction for the Bond franchise. But it's a small, tentative step.
  23. Happy Feet
    It's a gorgeously rendered marvel that pulls out all the stops to wow its viewers, but in spite of its crowd-pleasing ploys, it holds onto its integrity with a smart and surprisingly deep story.
    • 27 Metascore
    • 25 Critic Score
    Let's Go to Prison
    Prison makes its 84-minute running time feel like a five-year sentence with no chance for parole.
  25. Candy
    Though it's a well-worn story, Candy does touch on a universal anxiety. For two people basking in the heat of an all-consuming love, what happens when the power gets cut off?
  26. Fast Food Nation
    Less a movie than a political act, Fast Food Nation aims to disseminate its counter-propaganda to the widest possible audience, which is the only plausible reason why the book has been shoehorned into a narrative instead of a documentary.
  27. For Your Consideration
    Hollywood features can be hellish, but in Guest's view, they're no different from "Waiting For Guffman's" community-theater productions, and that's just an impossible message to swallow.
  28. The PianoTuner of EarthQuakes
    Perhaps the film will connect with those attuned to the Quays' allusive wavelength, much as a dog responds to a whistle. Others won't hear a thing.
  29. Bobby
    The film has virtually nothing to say about the man, or about much of anything, really. It's a sketchbook trying to pass as a tapestry.
  30. The Aura
    The Aura holds together as a dreamy variation on "Reservoir Dogs'" heist-gone-wrong fatalism and the know-thyself confrontations of David Mamet's "Homicide."
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