The New York Times' Scores

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For 20,271 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 46% higher than the average critic
  • 5% same as the average critic
  • 49% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 4.2 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Movie review score: 61
Highest review score: 100 Short Cuts
Lowest review score: 0 Gummo
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 9,377 out of 20271
  2. Mixed: 8,430 out of 20271
  3. Negative: 2,464 out of 20271
20271 movie reviews
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  1. The Book of Eli
    The movie keeps you watching and generally engaged.
  2. Extraordinary Measures
    The storytelling and the visual style are rarely more than workmanlike, and the big scenes arrive punctually and are played with minimal nuance.
  3. It's Complicated
    Pleasurable, daffy if at times daft.
  4. This Is It
    The on-screen results are weird and watchable, by turns frustrating and entertaining, and predictably a little morbid.
  5. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
    If the filmmakers opt to make only light statements about junk food, obesity and solid waste, they at least leave the audience sated on a single serving of inspired lunacy.
  6. Armored
    An unabashed B movie: basic, brutal and sometimes clumsy, but far from dumb, and not bad at all.
  7. My Big Fat Greek Wedding
    An amiable, offhanded comedy about ethnic identity and last-chance romance.
  8. Twilight
    Though Edward and Bella reach certain heights in Twilight, notably during a charming scene that finds them leaping from piney treetop to treetop against the spectacular wilderness backdrop, the story’s moral undertow keeps dragging them down.
  9. Apocalypto
    Neither Mr. Gibson’s fans nor his detractors are likely to accuse him of excessive subtlety, and the effectiveness of Apocalypto is inseparable from its crudity. But the blunt characterizations and the emphatic emotional cues are also evidence of the director’s skill.
  10. I Can Do Bad All by Myself
    Mr. Perry has his moviemaking machine running smoothly, which is to say somewhat predictably.
  11. Saw VI
    Warm feelings are inspired by the reappearance of old friends, even those who had their faces ripped off or their intestines ejected several films ago.
  12. The Limits of Control
    A nondramatic work best appreciated as a pure image-and-sound event.
  13. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
    Much like its young hero, played by Daniel Radcliffe, the film has begun to show signs of stress around the edges, a bit of fatigue, or maybe that’s just my gnawing impatience.
  14. Gladiator
    Grandiose and silly.
  15. Coach Carter
    This may be the coach's story, but to the extent that Coach Carter is interesting rather than merely inspirational, it's because of the team.
  16. Beautiful Boxer
    A rare hybrid: an underdog sports picture that's also a transgender fairy tale.
  17. Arakimentari
    More of a sketch than a fully developed portrait.
  18. Emile
    While most films in which the angry past confronts the guilty present degenerate into mawkish reconciliations, Emile errs on the side of restraint.
  19. Hitch
    An average romantic comedy put together with enough professionalism to keep your cynicism momentarily at bay, featuring good-looking actors who also, in this case, seem like pretty nice people.
  20. Nabbeun namja
    If there is anything worth discovering in this sad slog of a story, it is the two fierce performances by Cho Je-Hyun and Seo Won, who play the lovers and turn the harsh drama into a showcase for their pained expressions.
  21. Naked Fame
    The spare, enjoyable Naked Fame, by the documentarian Chris Long, suggests that today's pornography performers enjoy better life options than those revisited in "Inside Deep Throat."
  22. Sexual Dependency
    In Sexual Dependency, the filmmaker Rodrigo Bellott flirts with the allowable limit of themes in one movie. His frenzied but clever first film juggles race, class, jingoism, homophobia, sexual attraction and rape.
  23. Face
    The director's attention to details of character and locale makes for a precise evocation of a New York seldom seen in feature films.
  24. The Upside of Anger
    A seriously flawed movie wrapped around two nearly perfect performances.
  25. Don't Move
    It is a beautifully made film - decorously composed, meticulously acted, cleanly photographed. But all of these qualities make it seem complacent and hypocritical when it wants to be honest and brave, and sentimental rather than emotionally daring.
  26. Ice Princess
    You can feel this niche-marketed tweener fantasy of athletic glory frantically trying to balance a decent sense of values against a market-savvy awareness.
  27. Mondovino
    Smart, sincere and sloppy film.
  28. Lipstick & Dynamite, Piss & Vinegar: The First Ladies of Wrestling
    This visually stylish work, with its vintage glamour photos, film and television clips, and snippets from a 1951 B-movie, "Racket Girls," is more of a scrapbook than a coherent history of the sport during its rough-and-tumble infancy.
  29. Dust to Glory
    There is occasionally some gorgeous scenery, and the challenge of driving through silt is mildly interesting.
  30. Fever Pitch
    Still, despite the visual clumsiness and the production's tattered seams, I found myself rooting for this movie anyway, partly because Lindsey and Ben make a nice fit, as do the actors playing them, partly because the Farrellys bring so much heart to their movies, and partly because Ms. Barrymore inspires more goodwill than any other young actress I can think of working today in American movies.
  31. The Friend
    Some may be offended by this film's use of Sept. 11 as a plot device, but ultimately The Friend is less concerned with the politics of terror than with its psychology.
  32. It's All Gone Pete Tong
    The British comic turned actor (Paul Kaye) appears in almost every scene and he carries that weight admirably. He manages the very neat trick of keeping you interested in a character who doesn't merit our affection but earns it nonetheless.
  33. A Lot Like Love
    Isn't half bad and every so often is pretty good, filled with real sentiment, worked-through performances and a story textured enough to sometimes feel a lot like life.
  34. Save the Green Planet!
    At once a sick comedy, a bile-raising thriller and a genre pastiche, Save the Green Planet is a welter of conflicting tones, dissonant moods and warring intentions.
  35. Double Dare
    Thin but pleasantly diverting documentary
  36. Ladies in Lavender.
    The cinematic equivalent of a visit from a cherished but increasingly dithery maiden aunt.
  37. Fighting Tommy Riley
    Despite its flaws, the film gets across some genuine melancholy, played up by a sobbing Irish fiddle.
  38. The Great Role
    Mr. Coyote, who appears to be playing Steven Spielberg and steals every scene he is in.
  39. A Wake in Providence
    Lovingly shot on location in the Italian neighborhoods of Providence, this comfortably predictable film has its pleasures, most notably a dryly funny Adrienne Barbeau as the brothers' hip, hard-drinking Aunt Lidia.
  40. Mojados: Through the Night
    Manages to capture firsthand the danger, fatigue and sheer tedium of an arduous illegal border crossing from Mexico without ever becoming tedious itself.
  41. Saving Face
    Everything that happens in the last half-hour betrays the canny, hardheaded perspective of what came before.
  42. The Deal
    It's when The Deal leaves the corporate offices behind that the story turns into a bogus, convoluted mess. Once the Russian mafia, personified by Angie Harmon playing an evil seductress with a terrible Russian accent, rears its head, the ballgame is over.
  43. Deep Blue
    Much of what the filmmakers and their team of cinematographers capture is undeniably remarkable, but their overt attachment to certain scenes can make watching a chore.
  44. The Honeymooners
    Superfluous though it may be, The Honeymooners is not so bad.
  45. Heights
    Like the film, the characters mean well and look good. But they're so deeply immersed in their own heads that they can't see the world for their needs.
  46. Dallas 362
    Mr. Caan's debut film is not quite a whole thing, but it offers up enough promising fragments to make his sophomore effort worth watching for.
  47. Steve + Sky
    A mere slip of a movie, a wan character study of people who add up to little more than a series of studied quirks.
  48. Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus
    Occasionally, this richly lyrical movie passes over the line separating sympathetic exploration from freak-show condescension.
  49. Wedding Crashers
    Reasonably enjoyable until its guys are forced to grow up. Because bad behavior is usually more fun to watch than good, the movie is especially fine during the preliminaries.
  50. November
    In the same way that a crossword puzzle tickles the mind without asking to be taken as literature, November plays games for the sake of game-playing. It also has a pretentious streak.
  51. Edgar G. Ulmer - The Man Off-screen
    In the main, Mr. Palm sticks to the usual biopic formula: a chronological account of a heroic individual told through talking heads, still photographs and film clips. Mr. Palm's principal deviation from this formula is that some of the interviews take place in moving cars.
  52. Oyster Farmer
    This darkly humorous, sometimes even raunchy film mostly eludes a typical cutesy, feel-good formula.
  53. The Skeleton Key
    One of the most enjoyably inane movies of the season, this faux Southern Gothic offers an embarrassment of geek pleasures.
  54. The Baxter
    In the end, The Baxter is a Baxter of a movie: well meaning and mildly likable, but unlikely to sweep you off your feet.
  55. Formula 17
    More interested in romance than sex, Formula 17 swoons with youthful innocence.
  56. Transporter 2
    Purely shallow but never dull, the film wisely pushes the limits of absurdity to the extreme, making it easier to submit to its sheer camp.
  57. Margaret Cho: Assassin
    Though specializing in confrontational, caustic and often raunchy humor, Ms. Cho has a relaxed and playful stage presence.
  58. HellBent
    Because more time is dedicated to crafting authentic, sympathetic characters than the average horror movie, it's easier to overlook the film's often-corny dialogue and so-so special effects.
  59. The Future of Food
    Quietly inflammatory film.
  60. Cry_Wolf
    First-time screenwriters Jeff Wadlow and Beau Bauman prove more adept at staging mind games than creating chills and thrills for the audience.
  61. Just Like Heaven
    It's not heaven, exactly, but after the purgatory of the late summer movie season, it may be close enough.
  62. Separate Lies
    The movie is so busy constructing its labyrinthine plot that it often forgets to plumb the souls of its characters.
  63. Dorian Blues
    With some gentle humor that will delight the "Napoleon Dynamite" set, Dorian Blues lights a natural little footpath between two ways of living.
  64. Magnificent Desolation: Walking on the Moon 3D
    The film is an unabashed promotion for space exploration.
  65. Going Shopping
    Going Shopping, like Mr. Jaglom's other movies, has enough smart, knowing touches and enough easy spontaneity among its well-chosen actors to make you wish it added up to more than what it turns out to be: a flighty, motor-mouthed cinematic divertissement.
  66. Little Manhattan
    Small-scale, perfectly acted family film.
  67. The War Within
    The War Within succeeds only as a thriller with some wartime overtones, rather than as a character study that thrills.
  68. Once Upon a Time in the West (re-release)
    The biggest, longest, most expensive Leone Western to date, and, in many ways, the most absurd... Granting the fact that it is quite bad, Once Upon the Time in the West is almost always interesting, wobbling, as it does, between being an epic lampoon and a serious hommage to the men who created the dreams of Leone's childhood. (Review of Original Release)
  69. Never Been Thawed
    Propelled by astute, straight-faced performances, it succeeds in stirring up some maniacal laughs.
  70. Zombie Honeymoon
    Leisurely paced and never truly engaging or frightening (beyond the fear commitment-phobes may experience), this low-budget film, shot on high-definition video, looks cheap, but makes up for it in part with solid performances (especially Ms. Coogan's) and capable direction by Dave Gebroe, whose script is infused with some wickedly funny lines.
  71. North Country
    That the film works as well as it does, delivering a tough first hour only to disintegrate like a wet newspaper, testifies to the skill of the filmmakers as well as to the constraints brought on them by an industry that insists on slapping a pretty bow on even the foulest truth.
  72. The President's Last Bang
    Tight, sober and strangely comical.
  73. Dreamer: Inspired by a True Story
    Follows a formula, but the formula, when applied with skill and intelligence, as it is here, is pretty much foolproof.
  74. White King, Red Rubber, Black Death
    Although too compressed by half, the film manages to recreate what, at one point, the hectoring narrator will call an "archaeology of repression."
  75. The Roost
    The Roost proceeds with such youthful enthusiasm that its rawness is more charming than annoying.
  76. Prime
    All of this makes the movie pleasant, but not very memorable - a pale mirror image of "Shopgirl," which touches on some similar themes.
  77. The Weather Man
    Neither the screenplay nor the direction has the requisite depth to turn the banality of one unremarkable life into the stuff of Chekhov, much less of Mr. Payne.
  78. Sarah Silverman: Jesus Is Magic
    Ms. Silverman is a skilled performer, and Jesus Is Magic is occasionally very funny, but don't be fooled: naughty as she may seem, she's playing it safe.
  79. Mrs Palfrey at The Claremont
    The unabashedly sentimental film is a juicy morsel for the great British actress Dame Joan Plowright, who endows Mrs. Palfrey with stoic charm and decency.
  80. Mrs Henderson Presents
    Watching this reasonably funny, professionally assembled calculation is a little like snuggling up in front of the television with a mug of hot cocoa and a warm blanket. Those who prefer their drinks and recreation spiked would do well to look elsewhere.
  81. Fun with Dick and Jane
    Mr. Carrey is such an attention hog that most actresses have a hard time holding on to their corner of the screen when he's onboard, especially in broader comedies. But Ms. Leoni never cedes her ground. Both performers exude such acute neediness - there's a touch of Jerry Lewis and Lucille Ball in their mutual frenzy - that not to love them even a little would seem cruel.
  82. The White Countess
    With its tentative pace, fussy, pieced-together structure and stuffy emotional climate, The White Countess never develops any narrative stamina.
  83. The Promise
    The Promise occupies a curious landscape somewhere between opera and cartoon.
  84. Glory Road
    Glory Road is satisfying less for its virtuosity than for its sincerity, and also because it will acquaint audiences with a remarkable episode that had ramifications far beyond the basketball court.
  85. Tristan and Isolde
    Just as there is something undeniably pleasant about an entertainment like Tristan & Isolde that delivers exactly what it promises, no less, no more.
  86. April's Shower
    Yet despite the absurdities and predictable outcome, April's Shower is enjoyable, primarily for its refreshingly volatile approach to sexual orientation.
  87. Go for Zucker
    It's the rare German movie calling itself a comedy that is actually funny, even if only in bits and pieces.
  88. Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World
    Front-loaded with inspired gags, and the first half-hour is both sneakily and explosively funny, raising expectations that are never quite met.
  89. Blossoms of Fire
    It's easy to be seduced by this film's warmhearted, if slightly utopian, vision.
  90. Dai si gin
    It's a slam-dunk of an opener in a film filled with terrifically choreographed action and very little on its mind.
  91. Little Jerusalem
    For the first full hour, as we're guided inside privacies of culture and consciousness, Ms. Albou sustains her rich and gently intoxicating mode of storytelling, a feat all the more admirable in light of the overly schematic script.
  92. The Second Chance
    Startlingly direct if unavoidably preachy, The Second Chance takes aim at Christianity's racial divide and the corporatization of faith. Its message is simple: being a Christian requires more than just dropping a check in the collection plate every Sunday morning.
  93. Aquamarine
    Ms. Paxton isn't quite as magnetic as a movie mermaid ought to be, but the two buddies are a treat to watch, especially Ms. Roberts, showing the genes of her Aunt Julia.
  94. Failure to Launch
    The movie has only the most tenuous connection with reality. But the same could be said of classic 30's screwball comedies in which the treacherous feints and ploys of the mating game are transmuted into witty, romantically charged repartee.
  95. Evil
    The movie is as blunt as its title. It portrays such behavior as "evil" without offering any deep insights or revelations, beyond handing out the plot equivalent of a lollipop at the end of the movie as compensation for the vicarious anguish.
  96. Take My Eyes
    The director, Iciar Bollain, who wrote the screenplay with Alicia Luna, invests Antonio with humanity, which would be more impressive if she had paid more attention to exploring the darker recesses of Pilar's inner life.
  97. Iluzija
    Mr. Ristovski's story (written with Grace Lea Troje) feels a bit underdeveloped, partly because he uses too many lingering, silent shots of Marko and doesn't give the boy much of a voice.
  98. Don't Trip ... He Ain't Through with Me Yet
    The film's first half, at least, is full of good comedy, no matter what the crowd.
  99. ATL
    The fun here is in seeing a new batch of rappers try acting, and some of them turn out to be eminently watchable.
  100. Lucky Number Slevin
    From its sly, amused performances to its surreal comic book gloss to its artfully nervous camerawork, Lucky Number Slevin sustains the blasé tone and look of a smart-aleck thriller that buries its heart under layers of attitude.
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