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. A Cure for Wellness
    You might feel like you’re in the company of a manic cinephile friend breathlessly recounting his favorite movie scenes in no particular order. You admire his devotion, his taste and his scholarship, but in the end the experience is probably more satisfying for him than it is for you. Still, the company isn’t bad.
  2. The Great Wall
    The Great Wall flirts with romance and bleats out a little propagandistic blather about the benefits of bilateral action, but the focus throughout remains on multitudes of shifting, surging bodies — human and beast, digital and not — that, as they ebb and flow, resemble a Chinese military pageant and a lavish Busby Berkeley number.
  3. The Island Funeral
    A road movie that’s as mesmerizing as it is tense.
  4. Eagles of Death Metal: Nos Amis (Our Friends)
    The vivid recollections of the attack by survivors, including Mr. Hughes, take over the film midway through, and the friendship story line never quite re-establishes itself.
  5. Stray Bullets
    Mr. Fessenden’s ambition is admirable, and there’s more than a little raw skill on display. If this, his first feature, isn’t always worth recommending, his talents are certainly worth encouraging.
  6. Don't Hang Up
    The writer, Joe Johnson, and directors, Damien Macé and Alexis Wajsbrot, have a few surprises, but not enough to make this anything other than a formulaic story of teenagers behaving badly and getting what’s coming to them.
  7. I Am Jane Doe
    Without these balancing voices, I Am Jane Doe coalesces into a steamroller of pain that squashes our ability to see beyond its wounded families.
  8. Land of Mine
    Mr. Zandvliet is less interested in the stark battle between good and evil than in the shifting ground of power and responsibility, and the way that every person carries the potential for decency and depravity.
  9. Sex Doll
    The movie doesn’t credit any source material, but it plays like a poorly dramatized magazine exposé.
  10. Fifty Shades Darker
    A professional with real credits, so I assume that [Mr. Foley's] not finally responsible for the ineptitude of Fifty Shades Darker, which ranges from continuity issues to unsurprisingly risible writing. There are also abrupt swings in tone, dead-end detours and flatline performances, including from Ms. Johnson.
  11. John Wick: Chapter 2
    The plot matters only inasmuch as it allows the returning director, Chad Stahelski, to stage his spectacular fight sequences in various stunning Roman locations, where they unfold with an almost erotic brutality.
  12. Speed Sisters
    Subtly rebellious and defiantly optimistic, “Speed Sisters” masks the sound of gunshots with the roar of revving engines. For these women, driving symbolizes a freedom they can otherwise only imagine.
  13. 1 Night
    The journey could be a bit more eventful, but the payoff is charming.
  14. Left on Purpose
    Arguments over whether the documentary’s existence honors Mr. Vishner’s wishes and spirit — and whether continuing to film was appropriate — lead in circles.
  15. A United Kingdom
    While her filmmaking style can sometimes come across as staid, [Ms. Asante's] sense of pace is always acute. The best reason to see A United Kingdom, however, is the performance by Mr. Oyelowo.
  16. Kedi
    The movie is replete with ingeniously constructed mini-narratives, including a turf war. The mesmerizing score by Kira Fontana, interspersed with well-chosen Turkish pop, is a real asset.
  17. The LEGO Batman Movie
    As gateway drugs go, The Lego Batman Movie is pretty irresistible. It’s silly without being truly strange or crossing over into absurdity. Along the way it pulls off a nifty balancing act: It gives the PG audience its own Batman movie (it’s a superhero starter kit) and takes swipes at the subgenre, mostly by gently mocking the seriousness that has become a deadening Warner Bros. default.
  18. Rings
    This film doesn’t find any fresh ways to make you jump out of your seat. Ms. Lutz is appealing, though, and fans of the franchise will probably be pleased with the elaboration. Too many horror sequels are content merely to recycle what worked the first time.
  19. Chapter & Verse
    The movie’s wide-screen framing, ruthless plot reversals and say-what-you-mean writing sometimes recall a master of socially conscious cinema from another era, Sam Fuller. But this is a picture with its own strong voice.
  20. Growing Up Smith
    The movie has a roughly equal number of clumsy moments and sweet ones.
  21. A Good American
    A Good American gets bogged down in details and personnel talk, but its subjects have an urgent narrative to tell.
  22. Eloise
    A horror movie of such ineptitude that it invites sympathy for even its least gifted participants.
  23. Oklahoma City
    Oklahoma City suggests that conspiracy theories today have consequences for tomorrow — a message with terrifying implications in an age of fake news.
  24. War on Everyone
    Mr. McDonagh’s palette and spleen remain mostly intact, but here he’s neglected to include a story or point.
  25. Youth in Oregon
    A depressing slog that could have been so much more.
  26. Dark Night
    Until its climax, which clearly seeks to be congratulated on its restraint, Dark Night is not much more than an arty bore.
  27. This Is Everything: Gigi Gorgeous
    Adam Wescott and Scott Fisher, Ms. Lazzarato’s management team, are executive producers for the film, and to a great extent “This Is Everything” seems to follow an agenda set by them in tandem with the movie’s subject, which is largely commendable in its pitch for acceptance and against bigotry.
  28. Sophie and the Rising Sun
    The gently nostalgic mood and sleepy pacing effectively erase the movie’s necessary edge.
  29. The Space Between Us
    The movie is consistently tougher to resist than it might seem.
  30. I Am Not Your Negro
    Though its principal figure, the novelist, playwright and essayist James Baldwin, is a man who has been dead for nearly 30 years, you would be hard-pressed to find a movie that speaks to the present moment with greater clarity and force, insisting on uncomfortable truths and drawing stark lessons from the shadows of history.
  31. The Comedian
    The director, Taylor Hackford, never makes any of this pop, which isn’t a surprise given the material.
  32. Mr. Gaga
    A more finely focused treatment would have made a much better summation of, or introduction to, Mr. Naharin’s work.
  33. The Lure
    We are not exactly in the present and not precisely in the past, but in a dreamy cinematic space where distinctions of genre and tone are pleasantly (and sometimes shockingly) blurred.
  34. Raees
    Avoiding flabby subplots, Mr. Dholakia keeps Raees taut and suspenseful, even at two and a half hours, though it probably has a song too many
  35. S Is for Stanley
    For Kubrick enthusiasts, this picture will provide a fun and sometimes moving fix.
  36. The Daughter
    The characters don’t have conversations so much as helpfully recite their back stories, and the long-buried secret is soon so obvious that the movie’s last-act hysteria feels forced and a little ridiculous.
  37. The Age of Consequences
    The information here is compelling and frightening, but the movie is ham-handed.
  38. Midsummer in Newtown
    Some tragedies defy conventional representation. Unlike the play it documents, this documentary shows few signs of thinking outside the box.
  39. Kung Fu Yoga
    A lively closing dance sequence, after an earnest, underwhelming climax, pays affectionate tribute to Bollywood production numbers. But you won’t find Mr. Chan’s customary bloopers over the closing credits.
  40. Resident Evil: The Final Chapter
    The movie percolates enough that even when, at its climax, it shamelessly recycles a grisly punch line from 1987’s “RoboCop,” it’s kind of endearing, not least because Mr. Anderson and company make it work.
  41. Paris 05:59: Théo & Hugo
    Light on plot yet heavy on chemistry, Paris 05:59 is at times a little precious. But the two leads are so believably besotted that their occasional immaturity doesn’t rankle.
  42. I Am Michael
    While intellectually laudable, Mr. Kelly’s determined objectivity is so distancing that it takes an inherently intriguing story (based on a 2011 article in The New York Times Magazine) and sucks the life out of it.
  43. Behemoth
    Behemoth proceeds placidly, making it easy to become lulled. Its haunting power grows in retrospect — as if you’ve returned from a journey and can’t believe what you’ve seen.
  44. The Salesman
    With exquisite patience and attention to detail, Asghar Farhadi, the writer and director, builds a solid and suspenseful plot out of ordinary incidents, and packs it with rich and resonant ideas.
  45. Lost in Florence
    The story may not stay with you, but don’t be surprised if you come away with a strong desire to visit Florence.
  46. Gold
    [McConaughey's] wild, abrasive and improbably delicate performance is what makes Gold watchable, even if the rest of the movie doesn’t supply sufficient reason to keep watching.
  47. A Dog's Purpose
    You don’t need an animal-rights group’s boycott to give you permission to avoid A Dog’s Purpose. You can skip it just because it’s clumsily manipulative dreck.
  48. The Founder
    Ray remains an unanswered, not especially compelling, question, but Mr. Keaton comes close to making you believe there’s soul to go with the fries and freneticism.
  49. The Sunshine Makers
    Whether together or apart, Mr. Sand and Mr. Scully seemed to be operating on a similar wavelength, and the movie gets a lot of mileage from their sometimes excellent, at times hair-raising, occasionally puckishly funny and altogether wild adventures.
  50. Staying Vertical
    Something about the strangeness of the people and the harsh indifference of the nature that surrounds them feels real, even if realism in the conventional sense may be the last thing on the filmmaker’s mind.
  51. The Red Turtle
    The Red Turtle practices a minor, gentle magic. It wants you to smile and say, “Ahh,” rather than gasp and say, “Wow.” But somehow the understatement can feel a bit overdone, as if the film were hovering over you, awaiting an expression of admiration.
  52. Split
    Split is lurid and ludicrous, and sometimes more than a little icky in its prurient, maudlin interest in the abuse of children. It’s also absorbing and sometimes slyly funny.
  53. Antarctica: Ice and Sky
    The movie is both heady (there are real thrills in the stories of exploration) and sobering (Mr. Lorius’s findings are convincing). This is a cogent, accessible cinematic delineation of an increasingly crucial problem.
  54. My Father Die
    Bathed in a funk of testosterone, and heaving with homophobia and misogyny, My Father Die is a trashy jewel.
  55. Saving Banksy
    [A] fascinating documentary.
  56. Starless Dreams
    If Starless Dreams inspires conflicted feelings in viewers, it may be by design. It’s hard not to want to flee, and it’s hard to look away.
  57. They Call Us Monsters
    They Call Us Monsters doesn’t shy from the consequences of the violence the prisoners were accused of (we meet a paralyzed victim of a shooting), even as it suggests that the system...proceeds almost mechanically.
  58. We Are the Flesh
    We Are the Flesh, its abundance of repellent imagery notwithstanding, has an air of the academic about it.
  59. Trespass Against Us
    Though thematically vague, thinly plotted and without a reliably sympathetic soul to cling to, the movie has a mutinous energy and an absurd, knockabout charm.
  60. xXx: Return of Xander Cage
    Characters are simply triggers for the overwrought action sequences, though between the Edward Scissorhands editing and occasional wobbling background, even those are less than distinct.
  61. Leonard Cohen: Bird on a Wire
    The movie is a worthy time capsule and a must for Cohen devotees. Its occasional meanderings into artiness, which take the form of interpolation of outside footage (war atrocities and home movies, mainly) are emblematic of the time it was made and mercifully brief.
  62. Strike a Pose
    Beyond the personal stories, the movie frames the tour and Truth or Dare as landmarks in the push for gay rights and awareness, and makes a convincing case.
  63. Sleepless
    Sleepless, directed by Baran bo Odar, sets a low bar for itself, and then trips over it.
  64. Claire in Motion
    Ms. Robinson and Ms. Howell have kitted out their movie handsomely, but there’s not enough story here or enough anything else, namely a persuasive psychological portrait of Claire, to make up for that lack.
  65. The Son of Joseph
    The Son of Joseph can be trying in its whimsy, yet it builds to a lovely finale that evokes the Bible, the French Resistance and the surreal.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
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    [A] riveting documentary.
  67. Ma
    Alternately sexy and silly, galvanic and gentle, MA is best enjoyed as a slide show of visual blessings and, sometimes, bafflements.
  68. 100 Streets
    The threads may not all be original, but they’re kept nicely distinct. Rather than awkwardly intertwining, they merely brush up against one another.
  69. Bad Kids of Crestview Academy
    Bad Kids of Crestview Academy traffics in exploitation movie flourishes.
  70. Alone in Berlin
    Adapted from Hans Fallada’s 1947 novel (and based on a true story), Alone in Berlin is dour and flavorless.
  71. Vince Giordano: There's a Future in the Past
    This movie, directed and produced by Dave Davidson and Amber Edwards, digs deeply enough into Mr. Giordano’s world to convey the drudgery and headaches of being a bandleader.
  72. Monster Trucks
    It’s an eco-fable devoid of didactic overkill, delivered with energy, winking mischief, unobtrusive effects and a skilled cast.
  73. The Bye Bye Man
    Jonathan Penner’s sharp script (from a story by Robert Damon Schneck) and Stacy Title’s assured direction keep the heat on, and there’s some resourceful misdirection that deepens the story and intensifies the scares.
  74. Everybody Knows... Elizabeth Murray
    [A] cogent, fascinating portrait of the artist.
  75. One Piece Film: Gold
    If you’re a boy between, say, 8 and 12 and wired to the hilt on Coca-Cola, the shrill, exhausting “Gold” might be for you. But only if.
  76. Underworld: Blood Wars
    This film is so heavy with exposition that you would think that the director, Anna Foerster, and the screenwriter, Cory Goodman, had set out to complete a dissertation instead of a sequel.
  77. German Concentration Camps Factual Survey
    This restoration of German Concentration Camps Factual Survey is an extraordinary act of cinematic reclamation and historiography.
  78. A Different American Dream
    Mr. Brook and Ms. Wells are in a sense not documenting a controversy at all; they are capturing an endemic, heartbreaking defeatism.
  79. Between Us
    Stingingly attuned to the tension between long-term love and last-minute misgivings, Between Us makes a familiar situation feel remarkably fresh.
  80. Arsenal
    Despite solid acting (including John Cusack as a plainclothes detective), Arsenal is hobbled mainly by its director’s histrionic tendencies.
  81. Accidental Courtesy: Daryl Davis, Race & America
    Mr. Davis, speaking to Faith Morris of the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, poses a knotty question about how far his cause of eliminating race hate has yet to go. Her reply: “How long is this documentary going to be?”
  82. The Ardennes
    Even though, in retrospect, The Ardennes feels a little obvious and secondhand, it unfolds with enough speed and wit to hold your attention.
  83. Railroad Tigers
    It’s heartening to see Mr. Chan, who plays the avuncular leader of the guerrillas, demonstrating that he’s still game, but you wish his energy were being expended in more consistently enjoyable pictures.
  84. Master
    Slick production values can’t disguise the lack of imagination.
  85. Dr. Feelgood: Dealer or Healer?
    Embracing a structure that implicitly acknowledges the complexity of the issue, Ms. Marson nevertheless contributes to the film’s general fuzziness by failing to clarify the legal and moral guidelines that govern these kinds of prescriptions.
  86. 20th Century Women
    20th Century Women is a memory movie, one in which people are conjured up to bump against the larger world, exuberantly and uneasily.
  87. Paterson
    With visual precision and emotional restraint — and aided by Mr. Driver’s tamped-down, sober and gently endearing performance — Mr. Jarmusch creates that rarest portrait of the artist: the one who’s happy being hard at work.
  88. Ocean Waves (1993)
    In its sensitivity and attention to detail, Ocean Waves makes itself into something special, and kind of magical, and so proves very much a Ghibli gem.
  89. Dangal
    As goosed as the drama gets...the uplift feels earned, or at least tough to resist.
  90. Silence
    The film’s solemnity is seductive — as is Mr. Scorsese’s art — especially in light of the triviality and primitiveness of many movies, even if its moments of greatness also make its failures seem more pronounced.
  91. I, Daniel Blake
    What makes the pain of this film bearable is Daniel’s unquenchable decency, courage and perseverance.
  92. Toni Erdmann
    Toni Erdmann, proceeding in a perfectly straightforward manner, from one awkward, heartfelt, hilarious scene to the next, wraps itself around some of the thorniest complexities of contemporary reality.
  93. Live by Night
    Live by Night is a messy, unfocused movie about ambition, lost ideals, corrupt men and a thief whose idea of life on his own terms means pulling the trigger.
  94. Hidden Figures
    From one scene to the next, you may know more or less what is coming, but it is never less than delightful to watch these actors at work.
  95. A Monster Calls
    If you prefer to view dying as a natural part of life, a step in a cycle, this film will feel discordant and perhaps counterproductive. But visually it will certainly stick with you, and your children.
  96. Why Him?
    Why Him? is trite, crass and insultingly moronic.
  97. The Autopsy of Jane Doe
    Gruesome without being gory, The Autopsy of Jane Doe achieves real scares with a minimum of special effects.
  98. Julieta
    Julieta is scrupulous, compassionate and surprising, even if it does not always quite communicate the full gravity and sweep of the feelings it engages.
  99. Passengers
    Passengers increasingly succumbs to timidity and begins shrinking into a bland science-fiction adventure whose feats of daring and skill feel stale and secondhand.
  100. Sing
    The aggregate effect is like aesthetic insulin shock, albeit from an artificial sweetener.
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