The A.V. Club's Scores

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For 10,414 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: 5,571 out of 10414
  2. Mixed: 3,736 out of 10414
  3. Negative: 1,107 out of 10414
10414 movie reviews
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  1. What Would Jesus Buy?
    It's neither conceptually bold nor slyly satirical when Billy dresses up as a Southern evangelical and sings made-up hymns about "the shopacalypse."
  2. Southland Tales
    The further Kelly bends his funhouse mirror, the more he loses sight of what it was supposed to reflect. By the end, the image has twisted beyond coherence.
  3. No Country for Old Men
    The ultimate vision here is of a hard world in which civilization is the aberration, and the things we fear are always waiting for an excuse to make life normal again.
  4. Fred Claus
    Leave it to Giamatti to bring gravitas to the fat guy in the red suit; he's naturally the straight man in the sibling duo, but whenever Fred Claus goes for the heartstrings, he's the only one capable of plucking in tune.
  5. Lions for Lambs
    All talk and zero characterization, it doesn't even feel like a real movie.
  6. The Life of Reilly
    Spellbinding.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 67 Critic Score
    Steal a Pencil for Me
    There's incredible feeling behind Steal A Pencil For Me--enough to sustain two lives throughout unimaginable hardship--but the film doesn't bring much of it to the surface.
  8. Fat Girls
    In the words of his own character, this young filmmaker hasn't found his "inner fat girl."
  9. American Gangster
    Only Washington stands out; he's charming, intense, and charismatic as ever.
  10. Bee Movie
    It's good to have Seinfeld back, even in this watered-down form.
  11. Darfur Now
    It's a heartbreaking tale, a sliver of a tragic history still unfolding, but one that Braun largely leaves others to document.
  12. Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten
    Temple introduces viewers to Strummer the punster, Strummer the womanizer, and Strummer the poseur, whom his mates could only really talk to when no one else was around.
  13. Martian Child
    It's hard to say what, aside from novelty, is gained by having the boy believe he's from Mars, because the core emotion in the film comes from the simple, common premise of an adoptive father and son trying to forge a life together.
  14. Before the Devil Knows You're Dead
    Ultimately, the film is just a smart caper picture with some good performances, but at times it's VERY smart, and Hoffman's performance in particular is one of the most natural and unexpectedly affecting that he's given in years.
  15. Bella
    The emotions at play in Bella are no doubt heartfelt--and must have resonated with a few hundred people, anyway--but they're so cut-and-dried that the mawkish script virtually writes itself.
  16. Dan in Real Life
    Novelist-turned-writer/director Peter Hedges follows up his "Pieces Of April" debut with a comedy that's at once overstuffed and surprisingly subtle.
  17. Jimmy Carter Man from Plains
    These may be the qualities of a great man, but they're not exactly the stuff of a great documentary subject, especially given how hard Carter works to defuse the emotions stirred up by his book.
  18. Music Within
    Sheen is often the saving grace of Music Within, thanks to an aggressively profane wit that gives an otherwise tapioca-bland story a little edge.
  19. Rails & Ties
    Nobody feels anything they're not explicitly told to feel. Not even the audience.
  20. Saw IV
    Fans know exactly what they're in for, while everyone else knows to stay far away. Everyone can agree, however, that this is probably the worst date movie ever. For non-sadists, at least.
  21. Slipstream
    The result is either one of the most self-indulgent vanity projects in the history of the Hollywood star system, or a rare revealing look at a distinguished actor who usually keeps his real self out of the spotlight.
  22. Mr. Untouchable
    If Barnes ultimately emerges as a heartless, duplicitous villain, he's nevertheless got the devil's slippery, seductive charm.
  23. 30 Days of Night
    Which is more interesting: Vampires fighting over the potential long-term blowback of their Alaskan buffet, or a couple of exes bonding under duress? Seems like an easy decision, but 30 Days Of Night makes the wrong choice.
  24. The Comebacks
    Adhering to few solid comedic principles, The Comebacks swings wildly between lame movie references and slapstick, slightly less lame funny names (such as Aseel Tare, the running back who couldn't possibly be injured) and Airplane!-style spoof, and a few mildly amusing stabs at irony.
  25. Gone Baby Gone
    Though its procedural goes a little soft in the middle, Gone Baby Gone quietly accumulates in power, leading to one of the more subtly devastating final shots in recent memory.
  26. Rendition
    With a cast this stacked, the performances are predictably strong (particularly from Sarsgaard, whose slow-burning role recalls his work in Shattered Glass), but the first impression they make is the same as the last.
  27. Reservation Road
    It's a relentlessly downbeat, well-acted melodrama that's easy to admire, but intentionally impossible to enjoy.
  28. Things We Lost in the Fire
    Well-acted yet strangely inert, Fire explores the messy human emotions of grief, but it'd be a lot more resonant if the guy everyone's mourning weren't so fatally perfect, so unforgivably superhuman.
  29. Wristcutters: A Love Story
    For a film about suicide, Wristcutters is agreeably loopy and game. Dukic is bitterly funny rather than maudlin, and his carefully plotted grunge chic, in addition to being cheap, lends the film a great deal of Jim Jarmusch grime to go with its unmistakable Jim Jarmusch quirk.
  30. The Ten Commandments
    It fails on every conceivable level.
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