The New York Times' Scores

Select another publication »
For 20,280 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: 9,381 out of 20280
  2. Mixed: 8,435 out of 20280
  3. Negative: 2,464 out of 20280
20280 movie reviews
view
per page
  1. Food, Inc. 2
    You might devour less after watching Food, Inc. 2, and what you eat will probably be healthier.
  2. Le Samouraï
    Delon is fine and the movie has the cool delicacy and preci sion one ordinarily associates with something no more philosophical than a Swiss watch. Melville, however, is a philosopher and “The Godson” is as much parable as fascinating melodrama.
  3. Grand Theft Hamlet
    It’s surprisingly moving, more a testament to the human drive toward community and connection in even the most unexpected of spaces.
  4. In Flames
    Kahn manages to assemble the story in a way that escapes feeling like a series of object lessons.
  5. MoviePass, MovieCrash
    Surprisingly, the film goes much further than expected. Streaming services are loaded with documentaries about scammy internet-era companies, but “MoviePass, MovieCrash” finds the barely told story in all the juicy facts.
  6. Indigo Girls: It's Only Life After All
    The film is especially good about contextualizing the band’s emergence in the midst of condescension (at best) from the mainstream media.
  7. Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy
    Almost a quarter of a century in, the Bridget Jones movies are coalescing into an evocative portrayal of a character coming to terms with both her imperfections and her strengths in real time.
  8. The Harder They Fall
    It's a brutal and disagreeable story, probably a little far-fetched, and without Mr. Schulberg's warmest character—the wistful widow who bestowed her favors on busted pugs. But with all the arcana of the fight game that Mr. Yordan and Mr. Robson have put into it—along with their bruising, brutish fight scenes—it makes for a lively, stinging film.
  9. Summer Solstice
    A triumph of sensitivity.
  10. The Apprentice
    The only news here — and, really, the greatest surprise — is how thoroughly this ribald, at times predictably unflattering movie humanizes its protagonist, a classic American striver.
  11. The Girl with the Needle
    The Girl With the Needle is most intriguing when it lingers in its disturbing fictions, which come to life with exceptional style.
  12. Motel Destino
    The payoff feels somewhat slight, but the foreplay — the will-they-or-won’t-they and the will-he-find-out — builds up with energy and flare. Maybe climaxes are overrated, anyway.
  13. Not a Pretty Picture
    Made nearly half a century ago and long hiding in plain sight, Martha Coolidge’s “Not a Pretty Picture” is at once an autobiographical documentary, a Pirandellian psychodrama, an acting exercise, a personal exorcism and a powerful political tract.
  14. Christmas Eve in Miller's Point
    "Miller’s Point” is a Christmas movie more invested in atmosphere, and the qualities of wintry light, than in holiday cheer — and that somehow makes it all the more warm.
  15. The Great Lillian Hall
    Like many of the best golden-age melodramas, this HBO film fully commits to both unabashed emotion and a complicated female lead, a role filled by Jessica Lange with a finely tuned mix of showmanship and nuance.
  16. Let the Canary Sing
    This violent franchise has rarely felt so assured, so relaxed and knowingly funny. If Bad Boys: Ride or Die means that Smith, post-slap, will remain a bad boy for life, there are worse punishments to endure.
  17. Outstanding: A Comedy Revolution
    Throughout the film, Hurwitz showcases comedy as more than just a source of laughter, but of healing, catharsis and as an agent for queer liberation, particularly during the Stonewall riots in 1969 and, later, the AIDS epidemic.
  18. Griffin in Summer
    A winking ode to queer youth who still dream — too fiercely, too soon — amid self-discovery and family disruption, Griffin in Summer gives aching shape to a child’s need for order in a world that defies their understanding.
  19. How to Come Alive With Norman Mailer
    I expect every viewer of How to Come Alive With Norman Mailer will have some quibble with it, but it’s an accomplishment nonetheless — a model for how to reimagine a standard documentary structure to accommodate a multifaceted subject without smoothing over the rough spots and slapping on a halo.
  20. Hummingbirds
    Hummingbirds is pretty tight filmmaking at less than 80 minutes, and the laid-back presentation makes the political commentary register strongly from the periphery.
  21. Burden of Dreams
    One of the most candid, most fascinating portraits ever made of a motion picture director at work.
  22. Swan Song
    The story here is about more than just the ballet: It’s about the people who are stepping into the spotlight.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    One of Our Aircraft Is Missing
    One of Our Aircraft Is Missing is a tremendously exciting melodrama. Its motors never miss a beat.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    I Know Where I'm Going!
    This simple story line is developed with considerable imagination, wit and emotional insight into a thoroughly en-joyable and exhilarating romantic experience.
  25. The Killer
    The direction is energetic, incorporating frantic flashbacks and resourceful split-screen perspectives, and the plot adds several new twists not found in the first movie. Rest assured, this may be a remake, but it’s not a retread.
  26. Babygirl
    For her part, Kidman takes “Babygirl” to its breaking point with a performance that risks your laughter and which — as she dismantles her character’s perfection piece by piece — exposes a raw vulnerability that can be shocking. It’s the rawest thing in this movie, and it’s bliss.
  27. Mapantsula
    Mr. Mogotlane makes Panic much more than a symbol, treating him as a raffish, amusingly overconfident figure at first and a visibly shaken man as the film progresses, until at last he utters the single syllable that encapsulates the film's final point.
  28. A Complete Unknown
    Chalamet proves an ideal conduit in A Complete Unknown because the music and its maker have such power. As with any great cover band, it’s the original material that carries you through the night.
  29. Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes
    It’s not just a fascinating glimpse into a woman who spent her whole life in the spotlight. It’s a chronicle of a moment when everything changed, and a sobering reminder that we often think we know who public figures are, but we rarely really understand.
  30. House
    A midnight movie in lysergic spirit and vibe, this was a film made for late-night screening and screaming.
  31. Sirocco and the Kingdom of the Winds
    The film’s many whimsies don’t detract from the resonant themes at the fable’s core, about the transformative qualities of grief and the indelible bond between sisters.
  32. Goodrich
    Keaton’s an old pro at getting audiences to love a well-intentioned jerk, and the script gets good chuckles out of his inconsiderate attempts at generosity.
  33. Hamnet
    Buckley’s performance is ferocious and astounding, starting off strong and somehow picking up power as the movie goes along.
  34. Road to Bali
    Quite simply, "Road to Bali" is a whoopingly hilarious film, full of pure crazy situations and deliciously discourteous gags, all played with evident relish and split-second timing by the team.
  35. Love
    The director Dag Johan Haugerud’s gently humanistic drama is one of those films that feels akin to a prism, refracting its theme into the array of colors it contains.
  36. Pavements
    The low-key and never very mainstream Pavement seems like the last band that would get this treatment, and that’s the joke. But it also makes the band the perfect subject for what Pavements is slyly doing, and quite brilliantly, too.
  37. Father's Little Dividend
    It is not very often that the sequel to a successful film turns out to be even half as successful or rewarding as the original picture was. But we've got to hand it to Metro: its sequel to "Father of the Bride" is so close that we'll willingly concede it to the humor and charm of that former film.
  38. 40 Acres
    There’s a tense beauty to 40 Acres. Deadwyler’s forceful energy fills the frame; through her rigid stature and her cleareyed speech, she lends power and humor to this lovingly stern mother.
  39. Trafic
    For all of the laughter in "Traffic," there are moments when the banal utilitarianism of the super-highway is seen as a work of extraordinary art.
  40. Blink
    Blink keeps escaping any pat framing to tap into a deeper ache.
  41. The Last Republican
    The combative camaraderie that Pink and Kinzinger demonstrate respects both of them as humans — without softening their stances one bit. I hope to see more films like this one in the years to come.
  42. After the Thin Man
    In a changing age it is completely heartening to discover that the Charles family-Nick, the amateur sleuth, Nora, his understanding but frequently underfoot wife, and Asta, the hydrant fancier—has weathered successfully the well-known vicissitudes of time.
  43. Harvest
    Harvest, which takes place over one week’s time, is gorgeous and strange and a bit winding, though not unpleasantly so.
  44. Youth (Homecoming)
    We’re drawn into their world, and that’s what makes the “Youth” movies so appealing: the takes are very long, and we get to dwell inside the frame.
  45. Knife in the Water
    Using his naturalistic camera as though it were an outsized microscope set up to observe the odd behavior of three people completely isolated for 24 hours aboard a weekend pleasure boat, Mr. Polanski evolves a cryptic drama that has wry humor, a thread of suspense, a dash of ugly and corruscating evil — and also a measure of tedium because of the purposeful monotony of its pace.
  46. Fanatical: The Catfishing of Tegan and Sara
    “Fanatical” is both a truly appalling story and a peek into something darker and more sinister about the way social groups form and evolve — and devolve, too — when the internet mediates it all.
  47. High Tide
    With his exceptionally lived-in performance, Pigossi brings Lourenço’s heartbreaking emotions to life, making even the script’s contrivances feel natural.
  48. Candy Mountain
    Candy Mountain...seems to be a small, quirky film, but it easily assumes the weight, ambition and success that many larger films aim for and miss.
  49. The Sacrifice
    It may not be your glass of tea; it's a tall glass, through which events are seen murkily. Those who stay with it, however, may find rewards in burst after burst of beauty and even a glimmer of meaning.
  50. Martha
    “Martha” feels like a far more comprehensible key to Stewart — who has been the subject of speculation, fascination, jokes that turn cruel and plenty of schadenfreude — than half a century of media attention has managed to find.
  51. One Of Them Days
    Lamont and Singleton effortlessly mix the silly with the sincere, and although “One of Them Days” favors razzing over heart-to-hearts, our belief in this pairing never wavers. For that, hats off to SZA and especially Palmer, who lights up the screen with starry zeal.
  52. Companion
    The film’s satire is barn-door broad, its humor sidelong and sharp enough to take the edge off the gore.
  53. Crossing Delancey
    What makes Crossing Delancey so appealing is the warm and leisurely way it arrives at its inevitable conclusion. All the different aspects of Izzy's busy, contradiction-filled life are carefully drawn, giving the film a realistic, well-populated feeling and a nicely wry view of the modern world.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Mata Hari
    George Fitzmaurice, the director, has told his story in an intelligent and restrained fashion.
  55. Nature of the Crime
    This quiet and affecting documentary is at once an argument for reform and a soul-searching question: Should the guiding principle of criminal justice be retribution or rehabilitation?
  56. There's Still Tomorrow
    There’s Still Tomorrow is set in Rome after World War I, but it unfolds with timeless verve and romanticism.
  57. Paint Me a Road Out of Here
    Paint Me a Road Out Of Here is not a biographical film about Ringgold, even though you’ll learn a lot about her biography from it. The film has bigger aspirations, connecting art, prisons, activism and an expansive life.
  58. Riefenstahl
    Veiel’s documentary is a welcome addition to the historically grounded rebukes to Riefenstahl and her apologists, including bad feminists.
  59. Swept Away
    Swept Away is less a film about ideas than about previous commitments, for which neither character can be held completely accountable. The enormous appeal of the comedy has to do with the way, briefly, each character, is able to overcome those commitments.
  60. Sanjuro
    This is a mischievous, sly, good-humored presentation of a crusty old samurai caught between two groups of plain incompetents, with a playful satiric point.
  61. Julie Keeps Quiet
    It’s a film that maintains that Julie’s story is available only when she’s ready to tell it.
  62. Architecton
    Architecton is as gorgeous as it is grave. The score (by Evgueni Galperine) and sound design (by Aleksandr Dudarev) contribute mightily to the film’s heavy lifting.
  63. Lurker
    It takes its time at first, but once it really gets going, Lurker is snaky and disconcerting and smart.
  64. The Wedding Banquet
    The Wedding Banquet is so charming, and then so unexpectedly moving, that its strengths eventually outweigh the bits of mess.
  65. The Wedding Banquet
    It is the unusual film comedy in which the humor springs as much from character as from situation.
  66. Zodiac Killer Project
    The truth is that Shackleton isn’t settling for one mode; he’s working in a bunch of them at once, mixing affection and critique. Just like any true fan would.
  67. Folktales
    There is poetry as well as deep affection in their close-ups of people and dogs, and lessons for any age in the way students tumble off their sleds and get right back up.
  68. A Woman of Paris: A Drama of Fate
    The film is not only a treasure in itself—witty, sophisticated an often beautifully funny, though it means to be “serious,” as Chaplin says—it's also a rare opportunity to see what Chaplin is like as a filmmaker when he is not contemplating his own image.
  69. André Is an Idiot
    He can’t be irreverent about his impending death forever, but it’s oddly uplifting to see him so committed to trying — while encouraging every viewer to get a colonoscopy.
  70. Coexistence, My Ass!
    The film leaves the impression that, sadly, comedy may be one of the only paths to peace left in the region.
  71. Final Destination: Bloodlines
    There’s not much more a “Final Destination” fan could ask for, but “Bloodlines” — which at times feel more like a dark satire than a straightforward horror movie — reminds us we’re powerless against the world’s morbid whims. Best we can do is laugh about it.
  72. Lili
    [Caron] helps "Lili" to be a lovely and beguiling little film, touched with the magic of romance and the shimmer of masquerade.
  73. An Unfinished Film
    Life gets in the way of art all the time, and art can be made out of life. What matters, the movie suggests, is hanging onto one another for dear life.
  74. Ne Zha 2
    The writer-director Jiao Zi uses equally expansive storytelling and visuals to deliver an epic, fantastical hero story about power hierarchies and the fall of institutions.
  75. The Ice Tower
    The Ice Tower is ultimately too glacial and secretive to fully satisfy. The real magic here lies in Jonathan Ricquebourg’s dazzlingly chilly images, and two leads as compelling as the fantasy that set them in motion.
  76. Kontinental '25
    It’s a sneak attack of a movie, one that invites your laughter, even as it jabs you in the ribs.
  77. We Beat the Dream Team
    It’s rare to see a documentary airing out a long-running beef as beautifully, good-naturedly and enjoyably as this one.
  78. The Story of Louis Pasteur
    Pasteur's life is warm and vital, of itself. It has lost none of that warmth through Mr. Muni's sensitive characterization, through the gifted direction of William Dieterle and the talents of a perfect cast.
  79. CHAOS: The Manson Murders
    This isn’t just about fringe cults on ranches anymore: It’s about social groups, theories about the world, the bubble you float around in on the internet, the candidate you believe in an election.
    • 88 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
    Fredric March is the stellar performer in this blood-curdling shadow venture.
  81. Jean de Florette
    Jean de Florette has the delicacy or something freshly observed. It's so good that one needn't be ashamed of escaping into its idealized if harsh and rocky world.
  82. Take Out
    Take Out is the season’s freshest, most sympathetic movie about making your way in modern-day Manhattan with a little help from your friends.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Here Comes Mr. Jordan
    However you look at it, "Here Comes Mr. Jordan" is rollicking entertainment.
  84. Henry Fonda for President
    The movie convincingly posits that Fonda was, cinematically, the embodiment of America itself. Horwath has gathered a vast amount of archival material from film, television, radio and more to make his case.
  85. Love Hotel
    [Somai’s] exquisite visual compositions (of lonely bedrooms, concrete piers, and nocturnal courtyards) infuse even the film’s racy images with a somber sense of longing and introspection, finding beauty and humanity in the midst of the macabre.
  86. Tornado
    The movie quickly establishes itself as a revenge narrative, and each bad guy goes down in a way designed to suit the viewer’s justified bloodlust.
  87. Midnight
    One of the liveliest, gayest, wittiest and naughtiest comedies of a long hard season.
  88. Harvey
    If you're for warm and gentle whimsey, for a charmingly fanciful farce and for a little touch of pathos anent the fateful evanescence of man's dreams, then the movie version of "Harvey" is definitely for you.
  89. Thelonious Monk: Straight, No Chaser
    The film reminds us again and again that Monk was as important a jazz composer as he was a pianist.
  90. Pangolin: Kulu's Journey
    The result is a movie so sweet and soothing you’ll be forced to admit that sometimes the universe — or, in this case, Netflix — gives you exactly what you need.
  91. The Old Guard 2
    The film, directed by Victoria Mahoney, is a sure-footed romp that tightens the screws, most immediately by flexing a bigger cast and broadening the lore of the original comic book series.
  92. The Chronology of Water
    Imogen Poots’s fantastically expressive performance as the adult Lidia transforms this movie (the feature directing debut of Kristen Stewart) from punishing to mesmerizing.
  93. A Private Life
    The intrigue is far-fetched and surprising — this is one movie you can’t write in your head — and delivered with increasing winks and charm.
  94. Highest 2 Lowest
    Washington’s most successfully sustained sparring partner is Jeffrey Wright, who plays Paul, the family’s chauffeur. He comes into focus through his beliefs, his attire and salient details (including a banner for the Five Percenters, an offshoot of the Nation of Islam), though primarily through Wright’s discreet, moving performance.
  95. Deep Cover
    The ensemble is packed with seasoned acting professionals across the board, who more than sell their drunk scenes and deliver more than a few laughs on their way to redemption.
  96. Jane Austen Wrecked My Life
    Jane Austen Wrecked My Life is both pleasantly diverting and sneakily wise.
  97. Deaf President Now!
    Deaf President Now! skillfully draws the lines for all viewers. It’s not just a story about a moment in history: It’s also about the ways the movement for deaf education led to the broader disability rights arguments, and how everyone’s rights depend on everyone else’s.
  98. Desert of Namibia
    What clinches the portrait is the sure-handed direction and Kana’s organic performance of a daunting character. Dramatically, Yamanaka finds unpredictable ways into and out of scenes, and she has an eye for the poignant details amid the angst.
  99. Sound of Falling
    Here is a movie whose atavistic excursion through time transfixes, even as its psychology remains as fuzzy as a photograph smeared by motion.
  100. Urchin
    Urchin doesn’t break the mold, but it’s a confident, quietly affecting drama that strikes above the standard character study.
Page:

Top Trailers

See all »
See all trailers »