The Guardian's Scores

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For 6,571 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 41% higher than the average critic
  • 5% same as the average critic
  • 54% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 2.1 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Movie review score: 63
Highest review score: 100 London Road
Lowest review score: 0 Melania
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 2,490 out of 6571
  2. Mixed: 3,762 out of 6571
  3. Negative: 319 out of 6571
6571 movie reviews
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  1. Oslo, August 31st
    An intelligent and resonant work from Norwegian director Joachim Trier, a movie that yields up its meanings and implications slowly.
  2. Moonrise Kingdom
    A very charming, beautifully wrought, if somehow depthless film - eccentric but heartfelt, and thought through to the tiniest, quirkiest detail in the classic Anderson style.
  3. The Samaritan
    A clotted, knotted, twisty noir that is, unfortunately, short on the required atmosphere.
  4. Jeff Who Lives at Home
    The film is watchable and often funny, but still seems encumbered with a kind of Sundance-indie self-consciousness, and I wondered if, in the end, it was doing anything more than the far more unassuming and gag-packed Harold & Kumar movies.
  5. The Dictator
    The Dictator isn't going to win awards and it isn't as hip as Borat. Big goofy outrageous laughs is what it has to offer.
  6. Dark Shadows
    This really is a reasonably, moderately, whelmingly good film.
  7. Bonsái
    Jiménez's drama is crisply imprinted; another fine recent Chilean effort.
  8. Patience (After Sebald)
    In keeping with the spirit of Sebald's writing, Gee's film is teasing, elegant and perhaps inevitably unresolved: an invitation as opposed to a destination.
  9. Silent House
    It's still atmospheric enough, and like the original, has a quasi-theatrical event status. But it feels like a copy.
  10. American Reunion
    Inevitably, the guys wind up sentimentally telling each other they should do this every year. Please no.
  11. Goodbye First Love
    This is a fluent, confident and deeply felt movie: unmistakably, if not exactly nakedly, autobiographical.
  12. Tonight You're Mine
    A jaw-droppingly self-indulgent, shallow, smug if mercifully brief feature with a plot that looks like the outline for a pop video.
  13. Mother's Day
    An ingenious idea for a suspense thriller – or maybe even an old-fashioned, "Wait Until Dark"-style stage play – turns out instead to be the pretext for a crass, over-long and tiresome splatter nightmare.
  14. The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
    It is oddly like an Agatha Christie thriller with all the pasteboard characters, 2D backstories and foreign locale, but no murder.
  15. A Little Bit of Heaven
    This film is one long biopsy of pure horror: the tumours of sentimentality and bad acting metastasise everywhere, and Bernal, in particular, is horrendously bad.
  16. The Avengers
    It's fun to watch Whedon pitch his heroes against each other. Child's play, maybe, but entertaining all the same.
  17. Elles
    Binoche rises above the lubricious material by giving a thoroughly detailed and committed performance as the journalist.
  18. Salmon Fishing in the Yemen
    It feels as if you've seen it many times before. Bill Nighy isn't in it, for example, and yet afterwards I had an intense memory of Bill Nighy being in it, the way amputees can feel their toes itching.
  19. Lockout
    Pearce has fun; world-weary in the style of a 15-year-old told one too many times to tidy his room – but shoddy special effects and the surface-level sass of the president's daughter leave this one spinning in low orbit.
  20. Marley
    What results is an immensely detailed overview of Marley's life and times, from the hillside Jamaican shack where he grew up to the snowy Bavarian clinic where he spent his last weeks in a fruitless attempt to cure the cancer that killed him in 1981, aged 36.
  21. The Cabin in the Woods
    However smart and sophisticated this film is, it may disappoint those who, in their hearts, would still like to be genuinely scared.
  22. The Lady
    One of those agonisingly well-intentioned films whose heart is in the right place, but everything else is wrong.
  23. Headhunters
    The film doesn't merit chinstroking: it's stuffed with Troma-style riffs around schlock, gore and human effluvia, bookended by Shallow Grave-like sections full of cynical machinations. The parts barely relate, never mind work together.
  24. Post Mortem
    With its pale, washed-out colour palette, its eerily slow, almost somnambulist pacing and occasionally bizarre emotional demonstrations, Post Mortem is strangely gripping.
  25. Damsels in Distress
    If it's possible for a picture to be at once ideal and imperfect, then Damsels fits the bill.
  26. Tatsumi
    The slightly slushy tone of celebration rather obtusely fails to engage with the nihilist, pessimist nature of Tatsumi's work. Anyway, an intriguing event.
  27. We Have a Pope
    Nanni Moretti's new film is occasionally amusing, but is also a frustrating and directionless experience.
  28. Mirror Mirror
    It's evasive and feeble; Julia Roberts is not a properly funny or satisfying villain, and yet neither is she the interestingly flawed, even sympathetic figure she might have been if the film had kept the all-important question she asks the mirror.
  29. Iron Sky
    It's not terrible, by any means: just not nearly as funny or cruel as its killer premise suggests.
  30. Tiny Furniture
    Dunham, who pads through much of this extremely well-written, often funny and very touching film in the semi-nude, doesn't give a damn about any of it.
  31. Into the Abyss
    It is a sombre, thoughtful, restrained and often powerful piece of work.
  32. This Is Not a Film
    This Is Not a Film is a compelling personal document, a quietly passionate statement of artistic intent, and an uncompromising testament to his belief in cinema.
  33. The Pirates! Band of Misfits
    It is effortlessly and unassumingly funny – and terrifically smart.
  34. Wrath of the Titans
    Bill Nighy and Toby Kebbell liven things up in the supporting cast.
  35. The Island President
    Could Nasheed be the political Prospero to save the island – and the planet? Well, now he is out of power, and the Copenhagen summit was a disappointment. Perhaps his advocacy will help to bring the climate change issue back into political fashion.
  36. Intruders
    This is really very humdrum stuff compared to the electric strangeness of "Intact."
  37. Goon
    Brutal, bloody and presided over by a portrait of Her Majesty the Queen, the Canadian ice hockey in this movie is a cross between Rollerball and a prison riot: harking back to the robust certainties of Paul Newman's 1977 bonecruncher "Slap Shot."
  38. Act of Valor
    The gimmick behind this excruciating propagandist movie about the US special forces' war on terror is that it features not actors but actual Navy Seals.
  39. The Kid with a Bike
    The film is unafraid of emotion, unafraid of plunging into basic human ideas: the need for trust, and the search for love.
  40. The Deep Blue Sea
    Rachel Weisz performs with enormous intelligence and restraint.
  41. John Carter
    Dejah, with her seen-it-all-before smirk, is not a very sympathetic heroine, and Kitsch is stolid and dull. And as for the red planet, the answer to David Bowie's famous question is no. What a sadd'ning bore it is.
  42. The Decoy Bride
    It's indulgent, but Macdonald's performance is attractive and relaxed.
  43. Contraband
    It's a thriller in which the twists become so absurd that it becomes a kind of caper, but without the humour.
  44. We Bought a Zoo
    It's a bit sucrose, especially at the beginning, but this traditional, sweet-natured family film will tug on the heartstrings.
  45. In Darkness
    There is release at the end of this fine film, but no euphoria; just a sense of having come through a period of evil, the memory of whose darkness will never entirely lift.
  46. Bill Cunningham New York
    He lived until recently in bohemian chaos in one of the "artist apartments" in Carnegie Hall, and cares nothing for money or vanity. That's real class.
  47. Once Upon a Time in Anatolia
    With his two early features, "Distant" (2002) and "Climates" (2006), Ceylan has showed himself a superb film-maker. This is his greatest so far.
  48. The Raven
    It runs out of steam in the final 10 minutes, but there's some gruesome drama and Cusack is on decent form.
  49. 21 Jump Street
    In its outrageous way, 21 Jump Street has real laughs.
  50. The Hunger Games
    The Hunger Games is that rarest of beasts: a Hollywood action blockbuster that is smart, taut and knotty. Ably filleted from the Suzanne Collins bestseller, it's a compelling, lightly satirical tale.
  51. 2073
    2073 is certainly a relevant shout of rage against the authoritarian forces despoiling our democracy and our environment – and the bland and complaisant naivety that’s letting it happen.
  52. The Lost King
    It’s a fascinating story but the resulting film insists on a kooky relatability that isn’t really there. A misfire.
  53. A Sexplanation
    In fashioning a call for better sex education in the American school system, Liu is an enjoyably charismatic guide, as his doubts and questions about the birds and the bees mirror many of our own.
  54. The Desperate Hour
    Before things go south, there’s an effectively clammy escalation of panic as Watts leaps from call to call . . . But the script, from Chris Sparling . . . isn’t quite ingenious enough to find ways to involve her in the drama.
  55. The Worst Person in the World
    Trier has taken on one of the most difficult genres imaginable, the romantic drama, and combined it with another very tricky style – the coming-of-ager – to craft something gloriously sweet and beguiling.
  56. 7 Prisoners
    With a Brechtian approach that compels the viewer to question both their own ethical assumptions and tacit complicity in a worldwide consumerist culture that exploits people all over the planet, 7 Prisoners is deeply uncomfortable but utterly compelling viewing.
  57. Profile
    Profile is a pretty conventional thriller with pretty conventional stereotypes.
  58. The Keeper
    It’s a really watchable film, more substantial than most sports movies and many postwar dramas.
  59. Burden
    This movie is about as subtle as a sledgehammer, with no shortage of cringeworthy moments and an uninteresting lead performance.
  60. Ophelia
    This film looks absolutely gorgeous, but apart from its production design it is basically a disaster.
  61. Mary Magdalene
    The performances of Mara and Phoenix are careful and respectful, though with nothing like the lightning-flash of energy and scorn that they have given to secular roles in the past.
  62. American Renegades
    There is a spectacular scene in which someone drives a tank off a bridge, and JK Simmons gives the film some ballast as the guys’ scowling commanding officer, but the rest of the time this resembles a TV movie of egregious averageness.
  63. Infinite Football
    Infinite Football is an austere 70-minute experience, but the eccentric idealism of Laurențiu Ginghină lingers in the mind.
    • 88 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Shirkers
    This is so much more than a film about a film, it’s about young women breaking the rules set in a conservative country - the process of doing that was a lot more powerful than finishing the actual film.
  65. Wildlife
    It is a quiet, subtle story and, as is so often the case when an actor takes their first trip behind the camera, a showcase for terrific performances.
  66. The Kindergarten Teacher
    The Kindergarten Teacher is probably the only movie about poetry with an ending as tense as any thriller.
  67. The Happy Prince
    This film is a deeply felt, tremendously acted tribute to courage.
  68. Loving Pablo
    The film places a greater focus on the notion of unwilling complicity than most in the gangster genre, but still struggles to produce much original insight.
  69. Colette
    Wash Westmoreland’s Colette is exhilarating, funny, inspiring and (remember: corsets!) gorgeous, too.
  70. The Children Act
    The Children Act is concerned with love, intimacy and moral responsibility and it is refreshing to see a movie which sets itself standards of this sort. But there is also something a little too neat in the way all these things are wrapped up. Emma Thompson’s performance, so elegant and vulnerable, carries the picture.
  71. Lizzie
    [A] gripping, well-acted and sharply-written low-budget drama.
  72. Museo
    Museum is an oddly genial, garrulous film in many ways – rather like Güeros – and it doesn’t behave quite like a heist thriller, nor exactly like a coming-of-age comedy.
  73. Juliet, Naked
    It’s unfortunate that Byrne’s offering such a tremendous performance in a film that is, to put it as bluntly as possible, so very dumb.
  74. A Prayer Before Dawn
    No one would accuse it of breaking new ground, or finding fascinating new paths across its well-worn prison yard. But Sauvaire’s drama is lean and trim and unwavering in its task.
  75. The Miseducation of Cameron Post
    This is a gripping and sad drama that puts a tremendous amount of faith in its performers and audience, and for all the emotion and tenderness in the rest of this year’s Sundance crop, this is the first film that left me a complete broken-down mess by the end.
  76. The Third Murder
    The Third Murder is a captivating puzzle.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Robin Williams: Come Inside My Mind
    This desire to pull punches in presenting his darker side beyond occasional lip service makes for a viewing experience where we often feel we aren’t getting the whole picture for fear of offending the recently deceased.
  78. Sorry to Bother You
    Despite being about serious matters (labor relations, systematic oppression, racial microaggressions), Sorry to Bother You is slight and raggedy, but when it leans into its surreal, midnight movie instincts it proves engaging and amusing.
  79. Dark River
    Wilson and Stanley are both excellent performers and they are the mainstays of a valuable piece of work, but I felt the ending was contrived and a bit grandiloquent. However, the visual style and fluency of the film are obvious.
  80. Damsel
    Damsel doesn’t go quite where we think it will, but then, surprise detours are rather to be expected in this kind of anti-quest story, and the film sometimes comes across – for all its grotesque, scabrous or surreal touches – as a little more benign than it might have been.
  81. The Catcher Was a Spy
    The film isn’t a home run, but with Rudd in the lead in something so out of the ordinary for him, it’s fair to call a ground rule double.
  82. The Tale
    I want more people to see The Tale because it’s such an innovative, honest and important film. It is a landmark, and Laura Dern is absolutely extraordinary. But I know for certain I’ll never watch it again.
  83. Mary Shelley
    Shelley’s mistreatment by the literary elite because of her gender is a compelling, uniquely frustrating element and the film deprives us of the suitably grand exploration that it deserves.
  84. First Reformed
    First Reformed is a deeply felt, deeply thought picture; impressive in its seriousness and often gripping in the way it frames itself as a debate and a sermon.
  85. On Chesil Beach
    It is a tender and valuable film, well acted, with a shrewd eye for how naive you can be in your early 20s, how impatient, how pompous, how tragicomically un-self-aware.
  86. Disobedience
    This is richly satisfying and powerfully acted work.
  87. Borg vs. McEnroe
    This tennis film feels like a two-hour baseline rally, and it’s not just the rackets that are made of wood.
  88. Zama
    [Martel's] film is haunted, haunting and admittedly prone to the occasional longueur insofar as it runs to its own peculiar rhythm; maybe even its own primal logic.
  89. Lean on Pete
    Lean on Pete is at its potent, stirring best during the opening furlough, when it focuses on this makeshift hobo family as it criss-crosses the Pacific Northwest from one racetrack to the next.
  90. The Death of Stalin
    The Death Of Stalin is superbly cast, and acted with icy and ruthless force by an A-list lineup. There are no weak links. Each has a plum role; each squeezes every gorgeous horrible drop.
  91. Mom and Dad
    This is an unrepentant midnight movie, dirty and violent and best enjoyed with a steady supply of alcohol.
  92. Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool
    It’s a beguiling story and Bell and Bening are tremendous as the star-crossed lovers.
  93. Hostiles
    A flawed, but interesting drama.
  94. Foxtrot
    A nightmarish triptych of loss, waste and grief that is nonetheless arranged with such visionary boldness that it dares us to look away.
  95. I, Tonya
    This is a broad, frequently cartoonish romp that plays like a less effective mishmash of To Die For and Fargo. The blunt, unashamed crudeness does provide some laughs but the tonal shifts are often uncomfortably handled.
  96. Brawl in Cell Block 99
    Zahler’s film is entertaining, incorrigible and borderline incoherent – it is the violent drunk at the party, liable to lash out.
  97. Mystery Road
    The whole thing might have been improved by slightly nippier pacing, but the slow-burn action pays off with a spectacular climactic gun-fight, where the distances are so vast it takes half a second for bullets to find their marks.
  98. The White Ribbon
    The White Ribbon is a ghost story without a ghost, a whodunnit without a denouement, a historical parable without a lesson, and for two and a half hours, this unforgettably disturbing and mysterious film leads its viewers alongside an abyss of anxiety.
  99. The Chaser
    It's atmospheric but derivative, and I didn't find the denouement's Christian imagery convincing.
  100. Avatar
    The sheer laborious silliness of Avatar feels like harder work the second time around and its essential problem is more prominent. [2022 re-release]
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