The New York Times' Scores

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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
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  1. Time of the Wolf
    You can feel frightened and disturbed by this movie without being especially moved by it.
  2. Blue Crush
    It's hard to resist being swept up in Blue Crush, not least because David Hennings's shimmery photography carries the breeze and spray of the island right into the theater. The movie is also the latest example of a subgenre that might be called feminexploitation.
  3. In America
    Thanks to Jim Sheridan's graceful, scrupulously sincere direction and the dry intelligence of his cast, In America is likely to pierce the defenses of all but the most dogmatically cynical viewers.
  4. The Devil's Advocate
    The film uses morphing and Rick Baker's monster effects strikingly, but it also keeps its gimmicks well tethered to reality.
  5. Secondhand Lions
    May be pure hokum, but at least it knows how to spin a yarn.
  6. Jesus, You Know
    Tells the truth where it counts most: in its unblinking exploration of one of the most private of human experiences.
  7. Around the World in 80 Days
    Despite its contemporary touches Around the World in 80 Days is a satisfying slice of old-fashioned storybook entertainment.
  8. Batman & Robin
    Joel Schumacher, director and ringmaster, piles on the flashy showmanship and keeps the film as big, bold, noisy and mindlessly overwhelming as possible.
  9. Come Undone
    Ultimately, Come Undone isn't a movie about homosexuality, depression or family dynamics. For a gay coming-out story, its sexual politics are extremely muted.
  10. The Game
    Mr. Douglas, who delivers a new shade of cruel elegance each time he plays another urbane monster, is the ideal star for this vigorously contrived thriller.
  11. Minority Report
    Though he can still deliver an amazing scare, Mr. Spielberg's interest now leans more toward exposition rather than the anticipatory. He is explaining the fun away.
  12. Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
    The punchy little flourishes that load this English gangster film with attitude are perfectly welcome, because there's no honest, substantial part of the movie they can hurt.
  13. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
    The dazzling, high-flying silliness is quite an achievement. The movie is better than it deserves to be, given its origins: a ride at Disneyland and Disney World.
  14. Scary Movie 3
    The franchise, which had begun to run out of steam in Part 2, has been given a shot of adrenaline with the replacement of the Wayans Brothers as the prime creative forces by Hollywood's original spoof-meister, David Zucker.
  15. Super Size Me
    Goes down easy and takes a while to digest, but its message is certainly worth the loss of your appetite.
  16. Unfaithful
    Ms. Lane has the role of her career in Connie, and her indelible (and ultimately sympathetic) performance is both archetypal and minutely detailed.
  17. The Take
    A stirring, idealistic documentary that examines the grass-roots cooperative movement in financially devastated Argentina, raises basic questions about economics, government and human nature.
  18. Dinosaur
    As luxuriant and intoxicating as a theme park ride; more remarkably, it feels like a real movie.
  19. Love & Basketball
    It's in the small touches that this movie comes alive, and it's rare that directors can pull off this kind of thing.
  20. The Powerpuff Girls
    What's really so appealing about the characters is their resemblance to everyday children. They're wildly energetic, competitive and (sometimes dangerously) impulsive. But they also learn from their mistakes, and their instincts are good. More power to them.
  21. Stander
    Loses some its bearings once it turns into a caper movie. The movie hardly bothers to explain the mechanics of the jailbreak or of the robberies themselves, which take place in a flurry of disguises and stickups that has a Keystone Kops flavor.
  22. Bowling for Columbine
    Disturbing, infuriating and often very funny film.
  23. Ed Wood
    If Ed Wood has a major failing, it's the lack of momentum. Wood's career had nowhere to go, and to some extent the film has the same problem.
  24. Friday Night Lights
    Uplifting and troubling, partly because it is more honest than most sports movies about the high cost and short life span of high school football glory.
  25. El Norte
    Not exactly a great film, but it's a very good one that, through the devices of fiction, manages to provoke a number of healthily contradictory feelings about the world we all inhabit at the moment.
  26. The Royal Tenenbaums
    At once endearing and unbearably show-offy, it seems to be the product of a sensibility formed by age-inappropriate reading.
  27. Dazed and Confused
    Dazed and Confused has an enjoyably playful spirit, one that amply compensates for its lack of structure.
  28. The Matrix
    The martial arts stunts that are its single strongest selling point.
  29. Alfie
    The comedy in Alfie is plentiful but bittersweet, and the character's bad behavior pleases more than it repels, principally because the star Jude Law's beauty and easy charm go a long way to softening the edges.
  30. Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius
    After Jimmy Neutron was over, I felt glassy-eyed and a little headachy. But the boy genius who accompanied me to the screening could not take his eyes off the screen. I think he's in his room right now, building a shrink ray to try out on his dad.
  31. Blade II
    Because of the movie's wonderful shamelessness, its mordantly funny chills and fights are huge turn-ons. A B picture in love with the zest of its comic-book origins, it embodies that medium's pulse-pounding spiritedness and silliness.
  32. Moonlight Mile
    Though its conclusion is too tidily therapeutic, and though elements of its story strain credibility, Moonlight Mile has an understated, lived-in quality and a wry, unforced sense of the absurd.
  33. Blood Work
    A wry exercise in geriatric uplift.
  34. Brother
    Mr. Kitano directed, edited and wrote Brother -- and his style of close-to-the-vest brutality travels extremely well.
  35. Kundun
    It's all very beautiful, not to mentioned high-minded. But the loftiness comes at a sacrifice.
  36. Can't Hardly Wait
    [The writers/directors] show easygoing humor and the wisdom to borrow well. Their film at various times recalls tenderhearted coming-of-age comedies from "American Graffiti" onward, with strong homage to the works of Cameron Crowe, Amy Heckerling and John Hughes.
  37. Pitch Black
    Shrewdly taps into the lurking primal terrors of anyone who ever had to sleep with a night light.
  38. The Scandal
    Given that Untold Scandal is, like its predecessor, an epic story of spreading displeasure, the director's ability to keep it from feeling petty is a major feat.
  39. Casino
    Of all the bravura visual effects in Martin Scorsese's dazzingly stylish Casino, it's a glimpse of ordinary people that delivers the greatest jolt.
  40. Bring It On
    It is Ms. Dunst who carries the movie and unifies its disparate elements. She's a terrific comic actress.
  41. Shrek 2
    Certainly Shrek 2 offers rambunctious fun, but there is also something dishonest about its blending of mockery and sentimentality. It lacks both the courage to be truly ugly and the heart to be genuinely beautiful.
  42. The Terminal
    Rarely have I been so acutely aware of a movie's softness and sentimentality, and rarely have I minded less. Some of the credit surely goes to Mr. Hanks...His performance is so easy and amiable that its nuances emerge only in retrospect.
  43. Behind Enemy Lines
    As intense an immersion in military ambience as a Hollywood movie could hope to provide in just over 90 minutes.
  44. The Others
    The icy reserve that sometimes stands in the way of Kidman's expressive gifts here becomes the foundation of her most emotionally layered performance to date.
  45. Dolls
    With some staggeringly beautiful photography of cherry blossoms and scarlet autumn leaves, Dolls is so enthralled with its own cinematography that it can't bear to edit itself, and during the autumn and winter segments of the bound beggars' journey, it almost reaches a standstill.
  46. Fahrenheit 9/11
    While Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 will be properly debated on the basis of its factual claims and cinematic techniques, it should first of all be appreciated as a high-spirited and unruly exercise in democratic self-expression.
  47. Saints and Soldiers
    Thanks to an impressive cast of largely unknown actors, this small-scale, meticulously researched film tells its story with quiet conviction.
  48. American Pimp
    What we are left with is a mildly entertaining "man on the street" gloss, seasoned with fragments from blaxploitation movies and music by Isaac Hayes, Marvin Gaye and others.
  49. The Keys to the House
    The kind of quietly unassuming tear-jerker that works its way into your heart despite the occasional cries of protest emanating from your head.
  50. Così ridevano
    The movie is powerfully acted. Mr. Lo Verso's passionate, fiery-eyed Giovanni is an incandescent star turn by an actor with world class charisma.
  51. The Merchant of Venice
    Btter-than-average screen Shakespeare: intelligent without being showily clever, and motivated more by genuine fascination with the play's language and ideas than by a desire to cannibalize its author's cultural prestige.
  52. Meet the Parents
    This is a high-concept comedy, and none of the jokes are forced, which makes Meet the Parents a singular achievement.
  53. Hero
    Filled with meticulous set pieces, including a showdown between Snow and Moon set among swirls of golden-yellow leaves, Hero is easy on the eyes, but it's too segmented to gather much momentum and too art-directed to convey much urgency.
  54. Ella Enchanted
    The messages blend seamlessly into the fantasy and comedy in what is surely one of the best films for older children in quite some time.
  55. Infernal Affairs
    The sophistication of the stylized minimalism here in Infernal Affairs is dazzling.
  56. Kill Bill: Vol. 1
    Mr. Tarantino is an irrepressible showoff, recklessly flaunting his formal skills as a choreographer of high-concept violence, but he is also an unabashed cinephile, and the sincerity of his enthusiasm gives this messy, uneven spectacle an odd, feverish integrity.
  57. The Lizzie McGuire Movie
    The picture unfolds as a light romantic comedy that adults will probably find familiar but tolerable, while their age-appropriate offspring will be transported to new heights of cinematic enchantment.
  58. Baadasssss!
    Mario Van Peebles, of course, inhabits a very different world from that of his father: a world that his father, in some small way, helped to create. It is his awareness of this paradox, of the progressive import of his father's film and of the repressive import of his father's personality, that informs this modest but interesting work.
  59. Camp
    A crude but irresistibly effervescent movie cut from the same sequined cloth as "Fame," Camp couldn't be better timed to ride the coattails of "Chicago" to cult popularity.
  60. Coffee and Cigarettes
    The implication that beauty and meaning can be found in odd places at unlikely, idle moments resonates through this lovely film.
  61. Elf
    A charming, silly family Christmas movie more likely to spread real joy than migraine, indigestion and sugar shock. The movie succeeds because it at once restrains its sticky, gooey good cheer and wildly overdoes it.
  62. Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
    The ultimate touch of ghoulish humor is when we see the bomb actually going off, dropped on some point in Russia, and a jazzy sound track comes in with a cheerful melodic rendition of "We'll Meet Again Some Sunny Day." Somehow, to me, it isn't funny. It is malefic and sick.
  63. In Good Company
    In Good Company lacks both the emotional sting and the bright pop-culture snap of "About a Boy," as well as Mr. Hornby's carefully cultivated irony, but it makes for an agreeable solo directing debut.
  64. Mean Girls
    The director, Mark Waters, working with a smart casting team, has assembled a superb group of players. Scene by scene you can't help being impressed by Mean Girls; it's like a group of sketches linked by a theme, with some playing much better than others.
  65. Osmosis Jones
    Often very smart about being silly.
  66. Ray
    While not a great movie, is a very good movie about greatness, in which celebrating the achievement of one major artist becomes the occasion for the emergence of another.
  67. Secret Things
    There is no denying the force of Mr. Brisseau's bizarre imagination and the personal conviction he brings to it.
  68. Shower
    Uplifting, witty.
  69. Benji: Off the Leash!
    After a summer of computer-generated blockbusters, the amiably low-tech Benji: Off the Leash! seems like a breath of fresh air.
  70. Garden State
    Small, smart, off-kilter comedy.
  71. Resident Evil: Apocalypse
    Mr. Anderson's screenplay provides a steady series of inventive action situations, and the director, Alexander Witt, makes the most of them. His work is fast, funny, smart and highly satisfying in terms of visceral impact.
  72. 8 Mile
    What Mr. Hanson has done with 8 Mile is make a pop movie instead of a movie about pop. There's nothing disreputable about this.
  73. Forrest Gump
    Has the elements of an emotionally gripping story. Yet is feels less like a romance than like a coffee-table book celebrating the magic of special effect. [6 July 1994, p. C9]
  74. Ginger Snaps
    Because the characters are so well established -- Ms. Perkins is particularly good as the shy, resentful Brigitte -- the film can have fun with its own premises without turning into an empty camp exercise.
  75. Ratcatcher
    The power of Ratcatcher comes from its hushed lyricism and Ms. Ramsay's talent for conveying emotional complexity.
  76. Ocean's Twelve
    Enjoyable, unabashedly trivial caper flick.
  77. Two Brothers
    Yes, it's all terribly hokey. But once you accept the premise as a conceit that allows the director, Jean-Jacques Annaud, to offer an intimate, utopian vision of the animal kingdom, Two Brothers succeeds as an inspirational pastorale and passionate moral brief for animal rights and preservation.
  78. The Woodsman
    What is more remarkable is that he (Bacon)has found a way, without the slightest hint of vanity or ostentation, to convey the inner life of a man who is almost entirely shut down.
  79. Hotel Rwanda
    A political thriller based on fact that hammers every button on the emotional console.
  80. From Dusk Till Dawn
    Mr. Rodriguez demonstrates his talents more clearly than ever -- he's visually inventive, quick-witted and a fabulous editor -- while still hampering himself with sophomoric material.
  81. Beavis and Butt-Head Do America
    Nastily amusing
  82. Beautiful Girls
    Has warmth and good cheer. The film is loosely focused, but its ensemble cast is as affable as anything on television these days.
  83. Superman
    Superman is good, clean, simple-minded fun, though it's a movie whose limited appeal is built in.
  84. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
    A comedy that can't quite support its tragic conclusion, which is too schematic to be honestly moving, but it is acted with such a sense of life that one responds to its demonstration of humanity if not to its programmed metaphors.
  85. The Rock
    Seldom is it clearer that a film is nothing more than high-gloss jokey escapism, or that when visual cliches are this relentless they become weirdly fascinating in their own right.
  86. Booty Call
    This contemporary sex farce, directed by Jeff Pollack, has the attention span of a hyperactive child, but its bawdy sexual humor rarely flags.
  87. Brassed Off
    Brassed Off is shamelessly manipulative and sentimental, but in an agreeably familiar way.
  88. Cube
    Cube, the story in question, proves surprisingly gripping, in the best ''Twilight Zone'' tradition.
  89. Scent of a Woman
    The good thing is that the principals and film makers make the absolute most of a conventional opportunity.
  90. The Substance of Fire
    The film, to its credit, never tries to pluck your heartstrings. As it follows the Geldharts around New York, they are figures in a meditative dialogue on human values that reaches no easy conclusions.
  91. The First Wives Club
    The film is played as witchy, all-star vamping with a lethal sting. What makes its premise especially funny is that, at heart, it's no laughing matter.
  92. Stealing Beauty
    This film maker's supremely tactile, sensual style and his taste for exoticism are captivatingly on display in Stealing Beauty, even if the film's philosophizing sometimes lacks the intellectual heft of a cotton puff.
  93. Videodrome
    Though Videodrome finally grows grotesque and a little confused, it begins very well and sustains its cleverness for a long while.
  94. Kicking and Screaming
    The film succeeds in finding something sweetly romantic and visually fresh in Grover's flashback memories of Jane, along with allowing Grover plenty of room for wisecracks.
  95. Heavy
    Though Heavy begins beautifully, it isn't always able to sustain its balance between narrative subtlety and inertia.
  96. Indecent Proposal
    Mr. Lyne's films may not cast any new light on the human condition, but they do keep you glued to the screen.
  97. The Pelican Brief
    The story, neatly compressed, unfolds in dependable and photogenic ways. And it is coaxed along by Mr. Pakula's considerable skills as a brisk, methodical film maker.
  98. The Flintstones
    The greatest lost opportunity in The Flintstones is that its writers (more than 30) are so faithful to the 60's television series that they failed to add enough updated pop-culture references. The few included are among the film's best jokes.
  99. Mortal Kombat
    The movie's extensive martial arts sequences, in which combatants bounce off each other doing triple handsprings, suggest a slightly more earthbound version of the aerial ballets in Hong Kong action-adventure films.
  100. Wayne's World
    The film tends to be funny when confining itself to short sketches or dopey television-based humor, flat when pretending to be anything more.
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