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. Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End
    What started out as a fleet one-off swashbuckler with novel supernatural elements has become loaded and graceless, with each new entry barreling across the goal line like William "The Refrigerator" Perry.
  2. Angel-A
    At heart, it's just the latest from one-man industry Luc Besson, so even though it looks like art, it plays like schlock.
  3. Paprika
    A film so joyfully insane that it feels like Kon is overcompensating.
  4. Amu
    The flat, pat talk is symptomatic of Amu's overriding problem: It has no sense of personal style.
  5. Steel City
    For the most part, they live life convincingly, in a refreshingly inward-looking, well-made film that's smart enough to stay small, and leave the car crashes to the big summer action movies.
  6. The Boss of It All
    The Boss Of It All, though clever as a piece of genre deconstruction, isn't terribly funny.
  7. Shrek the Third
    Shrek The Third instead goes for less: fewer jokes, less energy, and toned-down characters.
  8. Flanders
    Once again, Dumont cycles through the pet themes of films like "L'Humanité" and "Twentynine Palms," but their repetition is beginning to seem like shtick.
  9. Severance
    Severance still seems a few rewrites away from living up to its potential, but it's remarkable how much just a modicum of wit can spice up the standard backwoods slice-and-dice. Scaring people with a horror film is easy; entertaining them takes a little skill.
  10. Fay Grim
    Sadly, there's a thin line between goofing irreverently on the maddeningly convoluted nature of spy thrillers and actually being a muddled mess, and Fay Grim crosses it constantly during its deadly second hour.
  11. Private Property
    Like many French films of its kind, Private Property remains content to simply observe a situation without tidying up the narrative, which in this case leaves some big questions unanswered. But Lafosse knows that problems that beg for a resolution sometimes don't get one.
  12. Hollywood Dreams
    It's unclear whether Frederick's an awful actress or a tremendous one pretending to be awful, but either way, it's hard to pity her nasal, pushy, babyish Iowa girl.
  13. Once
    In its own subdued, mellow way, Once is just about perfect.
  14. 28 Weeks Later
    Under Fresnadillo's assured direction, 28 Weeks Later blurs the line between genre entertainment and a photojournalist's shots of the next urban catastrophe.
    • 17 Metascore
    • 16 Critic Score
    Delta Farce
    The worst thing about Delta Farce is its overall feeling of contempt--for the filmmaking process, for common decency, and, most despicably, for the audience.
  16. Georgia Rule
    Garry Marshall has too much confidence that he can match the weighty issues here with the light comedy. He can't. Or at least he can't with this cast.
  17. The Hip Hop Project
    Project provides an unmistakably one-sided view of rap as God's gift to the poor, angry, black, and young, but given the beating rap has taken in the press lately (please Oprah, don't hurt 'em!), the film's pro-rap cheerleading couldn't be more timely or necessary.
  18. The Salon
    So sanctimonious and sincere in its pandering.
  19. Chalk
    Chalk pays homage to the kind of teachers students never forget, which makes it all the more perverse that it's so stubbornly, albeit affably, forgettable.
  20. The Ex
    It never comes close to being funny.
  21. Provoked: A True Story
    There's a noble cause buried under all the clumsy speeches, blatant manipulations, and foreordained conflicts, but the thudding lack of subtlety proves exhausting.
  22. ShowBusiness: The Road to Broadway
    ShowBusiness is a smart, highly entertaining piece of cinema-reportage, but it never quite rises to the level of penetrating insight or emotional catharsis.
  23. Day Night Day Night
    Loktev's efforts to universalize this story by avoiding specifics ends up making Day Night Day Night broad and blank, reducing the lead character to one more generic nutcase for us to fear and pity.
  24. I Don't Want to Sleep Alone
    The film ends so beautifully that it's easy to forgive the dead passages that preceded it and hope it carries over into his next movie.
  25. Brand Upon the Brain!
    Coming after the inspired trifecta of "Dracula: Pages From A Virgin's Diary," "Cowards Bend The Knee," and "The Saddest Music In The World," Brand feels a little like boilerplate Maddin rather than a fresh burst of inspiration.
  26. Away from Her
    Has its heartbreaking moments and its surprise giggles, particularly thanks to Ron Hewat's minor role as a former hockey play-by-play announcer now narrating his nursing-home life.
  27. Spider-Man 3
    So Spider-Man 3's action is superb and its theme fairly weighty. Then why does it feel a letdown from its predecessor? Nearly all the blame rests with director Sam Raimi, who's taken the success of some light slapstick moments in Spider-Man 2 as a cue to get even sillier.
  28. Lucky You
    Curiously lifeless, Lucky You feels like poker without stakes; it goes through the motions with nothing to play for.
  29. Civic Duty
    Shooting in digital video, director Jeff Renfroe needlessly amps up the proceedings with jittery camerawork, jump cuts, and other technical hiccups meant to disorient the audience.
  30. L'iceberg
    The film is striking and often charming, and any movie that places three tall, lanky types aboard a miniature boat named "Titanique" can't be slammed too much. But in the end, it's easier to admire than to love.
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