The A.V. Club's Scores

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For 10,419 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: 5,574 out of 10419
  2. Mixed: 3,737 out of 10419
  3. Negative: 1,108 out of 10419
10419 movie reviews
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  1. Words and Pictures
    Words And Pictures is supposed to be divided, as equally as its title, between these two characters. But Owen’s performance as a man who values his own faux-sophistication even as he goes to seed overpowers Binoche, leaving the movie lopsided.
  2. The Angriest Man in Brooklyn
    As broad as Williams goes in these scenes, it’s not really his fault. He’s acting out a screenplay, credited to Daniel Taplitz, that’s peppered with bad writerly flourishes.
  3. Cold in July
    As entertaining as it is to watch Cold In July drift, the film has to eventually pick a lane — and that’s where this otherwise accomplished suspense picture runs into the ditch.
  4. The Dance of Reality
    As a close look at Jodorowsky’s work reveals, the line between “cult artist” and “cult leader” can be blurry. The line only gets blurrier with The Dance Of Reality, Jodorowsky’s first movie in 23 years, and the best thing he’s done, film-wise, since "The Holy Mountain."
  5. X-Men: Days of Future Past
    For better or worse, X-Men: Days Of Future Past is the first Marvel movie to truly embrace comics-style storytelling.
  6. Blended
    The movie feels like a throwback; it brings to mind the blandly crappy movies Sandler made 10 years ago, rather than the brazenly crappy movies he makes today. In that sense, it’s a double disappointment, neither consistently funny nor endurance-testing.
  7. The Immigrant
    The visual and thematic palette immediately brings to mind Michael Cimino’s once-maligned "Heaven’s Gate" — except that The Immigrant accomplishes more in two hours than Heaven’s Gate did in nearly four.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    A People Uncounted
    Hopefully, A People Uncounted will inspire many more projects that illuminate the history and modern-day reality of the Roma, at least as a corrective to what’s been propagated through reality TV.
  9. SX_Tape
    Viewers will readily accept monsters, but the idea that someone would keep filming while evading said monsters — well, that’s taking it too far.
  10. A Night in Old Mexico
    Here’s a film that knowingly and transparently exists for little reason other than to let the 83-year-old actor bow out in a blaze of glory. And though A Night In Old Mexico won’t be Duvall’s last screen performance, it’s as fitting a farewell as he’s likely to get.
  11. Ai Weiwei: The Fake Case
    It’s curious that The Fake Case works best as a dark comedy, with one particularly memorable scene finding Ai sneaking up on a couple of newlyweds as they have their wedding photos taken and snapping a few of his own.
  12. Chinese Puzzle
    It’s the best of the trilogy, though that’s not saying much; Xavier and his gal pals have mellowed somewhat with age, and Klapisch seems much more energized by New York than he was by his previous locales.
  13. Million Dollar Arm
    Million Dollar Arm is the kind of sports movie that crams everything subject-specific into quick-cut montages to make room for maudlin drama and fish-out-of-water comedy — a baseball flick where no one is actually shown playing baseball.
  14. Godzilla
    This Godzilla doesn’t tap into deeper cultural anxieties the way its 60-year-old ancestor did. Nor does it engender much dramatic investment in its hero... Yet as pure popcorn entertainment, Godzilla delivers plenty of goosebumps.
  15. Horses of God
    Aided by three-dimensional performances that exude a convincing mixture of bitterness, selfishness, desperation, and hate, Ayouch film casts a sharp gaze on tragedy, and the larger socio-economic issues that beget fanaticism.
  16. Farmland
    A little of this debunking is cute (“I got nothing against bib overalls or straw hanging out of your mouth,” one of the subjects clarifies about the myths he wants to dispel); the rest of it feels defensive.
  17. Belle
    This effectively turns a story about race into a story about rank.
  18. All Cheerleaders Die
    In other words, what starts as a glorified "Pretty Little Liars" episode eventually evolves (devolves?) into a flippant hybrid of "The Craft" and "I Know What You Did Last Summer."
    • 25 Metascore
    • 25 Critic Score
    Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return
    Formidable as the cast list looks on paper, the voice acting reeks of cash grabs, and the performances are way off.
  20. Palo Alto
    In distancing itself from its disaffected characters, Palo Alto evokes only more emptiness — and emptiness has a habit of being dull.
  21. Fed Up
    Like most mediocre documentaries these days, Fed Up alternates between regurgitated facts (often presented in snazzy animated interludes), talking-head interviews, and a “human angle” involving a few regular folks who are struggling with the problem in question.
  22. Stage Fright
    Stage Fright has a weakness for predictability; it practically revels in it.
  23. Moms' Night Out
    The film never seems hectoring or preachy. Unfortunately, it never seems funny either, coming across like a sanitized remake of some raunchier laughfest.
  24. Chef
    For anyone who’s followed Favreau’s career since the mid-’90s, the temptation to read Chef as veiled autobiography will be overpowering.
  25. Neighbors
    Trouble is, Neighbors rarely exploits its generational war of attrition for big laughs or true insight. And despite a couple of puerile gags, it often feels as domesticated (and fatigued) as its main characters.
  26. Devil's Knot
    Devil’s Knot is an inert exercise, visually and dramatically on par with "Drew Peterson: Untouchable."
  27. God's Pocket
    The performance, one of Hoffman’s last, is unostentatious, but sensitive. Hoffman inhabited lifelong losers better than any other actor.
  28. The Double
    Judicious editing helps to maintain the illusion of two actors, though the quick-speaking Wasikowska, as the twins’ flighty, mercurial object of desire, in some ways has the subtlest task—and often steals scenes from her co-star(s).
  29. Wolf Creek 2
    McLean puts the pedal to the metal from the start, forgoing suspense in favor of instant, gruesome gratification.
  30. The Sacrament
    Because the film is meant to resemble documentary footage, West is forced to effectively “play dumb,” disguising his craftsmanship behind a lot of intentionally cruddy handheld camerawork. Still, that’d be less of a problem if the material he was gracelessly filming weren’t such run-of-the-mill claptrap.
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