The New York Times' Scores

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For 20,335 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: 9,412 out of 20335
  2. Mixed: 8,455 out of 20335
  3. Negative: 2,468 out of 20335
20335 movie reviews
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  1. There Will Be Blood
    The film is above all a consummate work of art, one that transcends the historically fraught context of its making, and its pleasures are unapologetically aesthetic. It reveals, excites, disturbs, provokes, but the window it opens is to human consciousness itself.
  2. AVPR: Aliens vs Predator - Requiem
    It may not be classic sci-fi like the original “Alien,” which it has in its DNA, but it’s a perfectly respectable next step in the series.
  3. Persepolis
    Persepolis, austere as it may look, is full of warmth and surprise, alive with humor and a fierce independence of spirit.
  4. The Bucket List
    Fails its stars in fundamental ways. Mr. Nicholson has played wealthy rogues before (most recently in “Something’s Gotta Give”), but this particular bon vivant is unsalvageably repellent.
  5. The Great Debaters
    The wonder is that The Great Debaters transcends its own simplifying and manipulative ploys; it radiates nobility of spirit.
  6. The Water Horse
    Ffamily-friendly escapist fare that should enthrall, without insult, fantasy-minded viewers of any age.
  7. P.S. I Love You
    The film is not a beautiful object or a memorable cultural one, and yet it charms, however awkwardly. Ms. Swank’s ardent sincerity and naked emotionalism dovetail nicely with Mr. LaGravenese’s melodramatic excesses.
  8. Charlie Wilson's War
    More of a hoot than any picture dealing with the bloody, protracted fight between the Soviet Army and the Afghan mujahedeen has any right to be.
    • 48 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    National Treasure: Book of Secrets
    Like its predecessor, “National Treasure,” this sequel amounts to a bunch of crossword puzzle answers stitched together with explosions, chases and displays of intuitive reasoning that the “Twin Peaks” F.B.I. agent Dale Cooper would reject as too right-brained.
  10. Steep
    An undeniably impressive visual spectacle that follows the sport of extreme skiing.
  11. Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
    Something close to a masterpiece, a work of extreme -- I am tempted to say evil -- genius.
  12. Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story
    The film is more funny ha-ha than LOL; it’s a smarty-pants satire that mocks and embraces almost every cliché in the biography playbook.
  13. Flakes
    A business course on cutthroat capitalism disguised as a slacker comedy: That’s the kindest way to describe Michael Lehmann’s Flakes.
  14. Alvin and the Chipmunks
    Despite its shout-outs to the holiday season, this is essentially airplane fodder, not a perennial. Don’t hold your breath waiting for the sequel.
  15. I Am Legend
    There is something graceful and effortless about this performance (Mr. Smith's), which not only shows what it might feel like to be the last man on earth, but also demonstrates what it is to be a movie star.
  16. The Kite Runner
    Mr. Forster, who previously directed “Monster’s Ball” and “Finding Neverland,” has been soundly defeated by The Kite Runner. Despite the film’s far-flung locations (it was shot primarily in China), there is remarkably little of visual interest here; the setups are banal, and the scenes lack tension, which no amount of editing can provide.
    • 50 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Look
    An unsettling, rudely funny but not entirely credible feature.
  18. Youth Without Youth
    In this film Mr. Coppola blurs dreams and everyday life and suggests that through visual and narrative experimentation he has begun the search for new ways of making meaning, new holy places for him and for us. He may not have found them yet, but, then, he’s just waking up.
  19. Half Moon
    Fateful and funny, haunting and magical.
  20. The Perfect Holiday
    Watching the movie is like reaching into a Christmas stocking and pulling out handfuls of cheap plastic toys that are broken.
  21. Nanking
    What makes the film bearable is the knowledge that a few people did what they could to hold the line against humanity’s worst instincts. The voices in Nanking speak for the persistence of good in times and places where a moral crevice opens to reveal a vision of hell on earth.
  22. Atonement
    Atonement fails to be anything more than a decorous, heavily decorated and ultimately superficial reading of the book on which it is based.
    • 48 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Dirty Laundry
    Mr. Jamal’s direction ranges from clumsy to competent, and the film’s overwhelming desire to be loved blunts any edge it might have had.
  24. The Golden Compass
    Has many of the virtues of a faithful screen adaptation and many of the predictable flaws.
  25. Grace Is Gone
    Mr. Cusack demonstrates once again that he is Hollywood’s second-most-reliable nice guy, after Tom Hanks. Devoid of vanity, with no hidden agendas, he never strains to be likable. Good will, integrity and a native common sense ooze out of him.
    • 25 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Revolver
    By turns clever, impassioned, incoherent and silly.
  27. The Walker
    By the end of The Walker a movie that begins as a dazzling round of charades has deteriorated into a plodding game of Clue.
  28. 'Tis Autumn: The Search for Jackie Paris
    Part tribute, part musical mystery, ’Tis Autumn: The Search for Jackie Paris shines an overdue spotlight on a great who got away.
  29. Man in the Chair
    Man in the Chair has few surprises. Once its machinery is humming, it settles into a soothing fable of a last hurrah.
  30. Juno
    Juno respects the idiosyncrasies of its characters rather than exaggerating them or holding them up for ridicule.
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