The A.V. Club's Scores

Select another publication »
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
view
per page
  1. Despicable Me
    Until the "creep + orphans = happy family" formula starts demanding abrupt, unconvincing character mutations, Despicable Me is a giddy joy.
  2. Winnebago Man
    Steinbauer's eagerness to draw information--and, let's face it, exclusive new clips--out of his recalcitrant subject borders on exploitation at times, but the smart, cagey Rebney has an agenda of his own that Steinbauer can't entirely control or define. The documentary gives him a forum to be his funny, irreducible self, which is a luxury the accidentally famous are rarely afforded.
  3. Alamar (To the Sea)
    There isn't much to Alamar--and González-Rubio sometimes seems to go out of his way to keep the film uncluttered by incident-but it's short and agreeable, and touching.
  4. Valhalla Rising
    Valhalla Rising has the misfortune of starting with its best chapter and steadily growing more ponderous from there, dragged down by a religious theme that's as thin as the filmmaking is relentlessly spare. Yet it's a beautiful head trip, too.
  5. Get Low
    Get Low is meant to be funny, heartwarming, and wise, and it is, for the most part--but in an overly familiar way.
  6. The Sicilian Girl
    She was simultaneously a pariah and a marked woman, and Amenta respectfully honors her quixotic, deeply lonely quest for justice.
  7. The Disappearance of Alice Creed
    A clever little contraption, even though it runs into the problem that a lot of twist-heavy suspense movies have: Once it's spooned out all its surprises about two-thirds of the way through, it loses a lot of its entertainment value.
  8. A Film Unfinished
    A Film Unfinished is affecting as a rare document of a terrible place and time, and those who lived there.
  9. Going the Distance
    Going The Distance could stand to color outside the lines a bit more, but it's perceptive about the problems of young people torn between pursuing love or their nascent career ambitions, and the witty script, by first-timer Geoff LaTulippe, is spiked with refreshing profanity.
  10. Paranormal Activity 2
    What was scary once is scary twice, like a carnival funhouse remodeled with a few new mirrors and spring-loaded spooks.
  11. Down Terrace
    When Down Terrace gets in a good groove, Wheatley and Hill's dialogue is both funny and pointed.
  12. The Milk of Sorrow
    The Milk Of Sorrow is lousy with allegory, and is often too heavy for its own good.
  13. The American
    He's (Corbijn) a patient, fastidious filmmaker with a great eye-ideal for his subject here-but his austerity doesn't entirely erase the suspicion that he doesn't have much on his mind. His film is a triumph, but it may be a triumph of style over substance.
  14. Howl
    The trouble with the film is that it often feels too respectable for its own good, preserving the facts of yesterday's rebellion while leaving it firmly in the past. Happily, Ginsberg's words still cut recklessly through the years.
  15. Jackass 3-D
    It's easily the most painful comedy of the year; in the sadomasochistic world of Knoxville and friends, that isn't criticism so much as high praise.
  16. The Company Men
    The cast doesn't treat The Company Men like a slideshow. They take something overly schematic and imbue it with real anxiety, shame, and humility.
  17. Due Date
    The situations sometimes feel contrived, but the characters never do, particularly because Galifianakis remains simultaneously charming and unrelentingly irritating.
  18. Somewhere
    It's all so uneasily compelling and quietly moving, it might be too much to ask her to sustain it through the conclusion.
  19. The Debt
    Madden's dark, moody, complex exploration of guilt and identity taps into a rich vein of moral ambiguity, but the filmmakers should know that in the face of unspeakable Nazi evil, the romantic problems of three little people don't amount to a hill of beans.
  20. The Virginity Hit
    Bennett never lets us forget that his character is in profound pain, even while attempting to perform oral sex on a transsexual blow-up doll. It's a daring, sweet performance that almost single-handedly elevates The Virginity Hit from a standard Superbad knock-off into a film that feels raw, painful, and real.
  21. I'm Still Here
    If this is a documentary, it's a profoundly embarrassing one, in which Affleck has exposed Phoenix's soul and found it shallow and damaged. If it's a mockumentary, though, its greatest value is in pointing out the media's gullibility, and reminding audiences that even in an age of limited privacy, they still have to question what they're told and even what they witness themselves. It's cruel either way, but riveting nonetheless.
  22. Ondine
    Ondine looks heavy and it ends up feeling a little slight, but between those two extremes there's a beguiling siren song of a movie about the way the unexpected has a way of intruding on even the most fatalistic lives.
  23. Tamara Drewe
    While Tamara Drew is enjoyable throughout-right up to its loony, loony ending-it's more than a little scattered.
  24. Morning Glory
    Patrick Wilson rounds out the cast as McAdams' love interest, but his presence seems necessary only to classify Morning Glory as a romantic comedy. The heart of the movie is really McAdams' wonderfully contentious relationship with Ford.
  25. Hatchet II
    Hatchet II is distinguished both by a funky, frisky sense of humor, and gore of great quality and quantity.
  26. Ip Man
    As a slice of history, Ip Man is disappointingly simplistic. Yip, Wong, and Yen never develop any real tension between Ip's true story and the exaggerated myth-making of a martial-arts movie. But as an exaggerated, myth-making martial-arts movie, Ip Man is often thrilling.
  27. Marwencol
    Jeff Malmberg's documentary Marwencol is at its best when it focuses on Hogancamp's little world, and lets the artist walk the viewer through his town's increasingly dense mythology.
  28. Night Catches Us
    For Washington, the wounds of the past are just beneath the surface, as close as the bullet holes under her kitchen wallpaper.
  29. Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer
    The film rescues the story from tabloid hell, and asks for a saner assessment of a deeply flawed man.
  30. Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale
    Slight but fun.
Page:

Top Trailers

See all »
See all trailers »