The A.V. Club's Scores

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For 10,422 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 10422
  2. Mixed: 3,739 out of 10422
  3. Negative: 1,108 out of 10422
10422 movie reviews
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  1. This Girl's Life
    Marquis herself rarely comes off as less than fascinating, in spite of her cheaply titillating material.
  2. Home of the Brave
    Di Florio loses her grip on Liuzzo's story whenever she lapses into generalities. But when Di Florio gets into the specifics of her subject's legacy, Home Of The Brave stands out as both relevant and moving.
  3. Sideways
    Good comedies are rare, but rarer still are those that conflate laughter with intimacy.
  4. Fish Without a Bicycle
    This vanity project belongs to an audience of one.
  5. Undertow
    Undertow may prove the least immediately satisfying of Green's films, but it remains an achievement, emotionally rich and rife with biblical and mythic undertones.
  6. Hearts and Minds (re-release)
    During his clumsiest moments, Davis' fondness for provocation rises to the surface, which is unfortunate, since it weakens the impact of his many salient points about how American men are socialized to be warriors.
  7. Lightning in a Bottle
    When Lightning In A Bottle steps back and simply lets the old-timers ply their trade, the result is consistently riveting.
  8. Postmen in the Mountains
    Huo never quite finds the filmic vocabulary to tilt the film toward greatness-and the mawkish synth score does little to help-but Postmen In The Mountains ultimately succeeds.
  9. The Machinist
    Unrelentingly dreary, and seemingly destined to be remembered, if at all, as that movie Christian Bale lost a full third of his body weight for. It doesn't deserve any better.
  10. The Grudge
    Less a film than a terror delivery system, The Grudge repeatedly shows off Shimizu's technical chops, but never gives viewers a reason to care about or identify with the victims.
  11. Surviving Christmas
    Affleck's psychotic enthusiasm aside, no one seems to be having a good time, and the ill will becomes infectious.
  12. Sex Is Comedy
    When she (Breillat) succeeds, as she does in "Fat Girl" and in the final minutes of Sex Is Comedy, the impact can be overwhelming for filmmaker and audience alike.
  13. P.S.
    While not dwelling on plot eventually gets P.S. in trouble during the slack finale, it gives Linney and Grace plenty of room to maneuver.
  14. The Final Cut
    Naim directs The Final Cut as if it were the pilot to a TV series: He teases the audience with all sorts of story threads, focuses on a minor self-contained mystery, and leaves the rest for future episodes that will never come.
  15. Moolaadé
    Though Moolaadé doesn't shy away from the task of educating its viewers about the brutality of "purification," it works equally well as a tribute to righteous defiance wherever it surfaces.
  16. Being Julia
    It looks handsome but seems infected by the idea of playing different roles; a comedy in one scene, it adopts a mood of a high seriousness the next and clutters the stage with minor characters that contribute little. In the end, this inability to make up its mind does the film in.
  17. Saints and Soldiers
    Too often, Saints And Soldiers confuses bravery for faith.
  18. Shall We Dance
    Chelsom has transformed a low-key charmer into an overblown shtick-com whose idea of restraint only extends to forgoing wacky sound effects, a laugh track, and amplified rim-shots every time a character delivers a wisecrack.
  19. Team America: World Police
    Years from now, Team America will better convey the political character of 2004 than a stack of Time magazines. Staying funny helps even more.
  20. The Scandal
    Sumptuously photographed in bright primary colors, with equally immaculate period clothing and design, Untold Scandal lacks some of the emotional and thematic depth of previous adaptations, but it has the refreshing candor and explicitness that marks the current wave of Korean cinema.
  21. Vera Drake
    The issue may be polarizing, but Vera Drake resonates with such seriousness and truth that it transcends the narrow limitations of polemic.
  22. Around the Bend
    There are good ideas in Around The Bend, but they're presented in outline form, as the bare, dry bones of what could have been a living body.
  23. Vodka Lemon
    A dark-humored film about devastation, which makes Vodka Lemon's final rush into comedy in the truest sense all the more refreshing. Even in the wasteland, there might be humor other than the gallows kind.
  24. Go Further
    Like much of Mann's work, it's an unabashed love letter to the counterculture. But this time out, Mann has made an unintentionally vicious satire of the fuzzyheaded self-intoxication and impracticality of the progressive left, a film that's far more scathing than anything Tom Wolfe could dream up.
  25. Silent Water
    Converts relevant contemporary history into intimate personal drama.
  26. Stage Beauty
    As historical speculation, it's clever enough. As a film, it glows with flop-sweat.
  27. Friday Night Lights
    When Friday Night Lights gets to the big games, the time it's spent creates an atmosphere thick with tension, one akin to the real-world experience of watching a favorite team play for its life.
  28. Primer
    A brainteaser of the first order, Primer ranks among the best of recent thrillers such as "Memento" or "The Matrix," which rupture the fabric of reality and radically destabilize the narrative in kind.
  29. Raise Your Voice
    Dreadful.
  30. Tarnation
    Caouette's shattering Tarnation represents a landmark in personal filmmaking: It finally realizes the digital dream of a raw, unsanctioned glimpse into the soul.
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