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. Don Juan DeMarco
    It benefits not only from Mr. Brando's peculiar presence, but also from Johnny Depp, who again proves himself a brilliantly intuitive young actor with strong ties to the Brando legacy. The movie is cheesy, but its stars certainly are not.
  2. Rob Roy
    Rob Roy is best watched for local color and for its hearty, hot-blooded stars.
  3. A Goofy Movie
    A Goofy Movie is engaging in its mild-mannered way, but the story is too rambling and emotionally diffuse for the title character to come fully alive.
  4. Jefferson in Paris
    Overshadowed by its own ambition and not-quite-ironic pageantry, Jefferson in Paris doesn't quite come to life.
  5. Tommy Boy
    Their best moments are some throwaway routines; they weep in the car as they sing along to the Carpenters' "Superstar." More often, the movie goes for stale, obvious sight gags like Tommy's slow destruction of Richard's precious car. As mismatched-buddy teams go, Felix and Oscar have nothing to worry about here.
  6. Tank Girl
    Since this is thoroughly tongue in cheek, Tank Girl has a likable brashness, even when breathless, pointless plotting threatens to eclipse the movie's charms. Chief among its strong points is Lori Petty, a buzz-cut fashion plate in a Prozac necklace, who brings the necessary gusto to Tank Girl's flippancy.
  7. Dolores Claiborne
    Written as a book-length harangue from its heroine's point of view, and directed efficiently by Taylor Hackford, Dolores Claiborne has become a vivid film that revolves around Ms. Bates's powerhouse of a performance.
  8. Major Payne
    Major Payne takes about an hour and 10 minutes before it wallows in sappiness. That's not a bad record for a formula family comedy in which the ending is clear from the start.
  9. Exotica
    Exotica may not be as perfectly formed as some of Mr. Egoyan's earlier work. Because Thomas's subplot is not as intriguing as the scenes in the club, the stories take too long to merge. But the flaws are minor. Mr. Egoyan continues to build an important, uncompromising career.
  10. Candyman: Farewell to the Flesh
    Fortunately, Candyman isn't powerful enough to do much harm. The credits are more intriguing than the film.
  11. Circle of Friends
    Another nice thing about Circle of Friends is that it escapes a happily-ever-after scenario to provide more bite and toughness than it first promises.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The World of Jacques Demy
    [Varda's] film slides in and out of [Demy's] career and personal life with a French sensibility that puts no great stock in exact chronological order or clearly announced shifts from one film to the next. At times this is annoying, but it pays to keep up, or if necessary back up a bit, to get the measure of an elegantly romantic filmmaker with a strong feel for nostalgia and chance. [09 Dec 2003, p.E1]
    • The New York Times
  13. Muriel's Wedding
    Muriel's Wedding runs into trouble when it looks for poignancy too openly, working better at giddy moments than in its occasional sad ones. Most of the time, Mr. Hogan keeps his story light and surprising.
  14. Outbreak
    The effort to turn Outbreak into an action picture insures that little of it will be believable, regardless of how much scientific data has been woven into the story. The film's shallowness also contributes to the impression that no problem is too thorny to be solved by movie heroics.
  15. The Mangler
    It is not a compliment to suggest that a demonically possessed piece of machinery embarked on a bloodthirsty rampage has more personality than most of the flesh-and-blood characters in The Mangler, a horror movie based on a Stephen King story.
  16. Once Were Warriors
    A brutally effective family drama. Rough around the edges and crudely obvious at times, it still presents a raw, disturbing story of domestic strife.
  17. The Brady Bunch Movie
    The movie manages to be painless and pointless in equal measure.
  18. Heavyweights
    Heavyweights is really two movies in one, and they don't mesh.
  19. Just Cause
    Just Cause has been directed so antiseptically that it lacks all sense of lifelike detail. Despite good looks and some ostentatious technical polish, it offers a textbook example of direction (by Arne Glimcher) that's utterly out of sync with its subject matter.
  20. Billy Madison
    It succeeds as a reasonably smart no-brainer. If you've ever had a yen to relive the third grade, this must be the next best thing.
  21. The Quick and the Dead
    Ms. Stone's presence nicely underscores the genre-bending tactics of Sam Raimi, the cult director now doing his best to reinvent the B-movie in a spirit of self-referential glee. Mr. Raimi is limited by a sketch mentality, which means his jokes tend to be over long before his films end. But his tastes for visual mischief and crazy, ill-advised homage can still make for sly, sporadic fun.
  22. Shallow Grave
    A sky-high level of misanthropy overwhelms his film in ways that prove more sour than droll, despite the presence of skillful actors and a bizarrely enveloping plot.
  23. Boys on the Side
    What matters more is that Ms. Goldberg, along with her co-stars Mary-Louise Parker and Drew Barrymore, is so sharp, funny and wholehearted that this film creates an unexpected groundswell of real emotion.
  24. In the Mouth of Madness
    In the Mouth of Madness has enough menace and novelty to please fans of Mr. Carpenter's horror films (among them The Fog, Christine and Halloween) without the wider interest of an enchanting parable like Starman, which he also directed. Still, this is a film with the temerity to think big, if only for the magnitude of the wickedness it invokes.
  25. The Secret of Roan Inish
    What prevents "The Secret of Roan Inish" from evaporating into cuteness or from being smothered in mystical overkill is the director's firmly human perspective.
  26. Before Sunrise
    What Mr. Linklater does best here is to come up with conversational gambits that have just the right fancifulness to suit this situation.
  27. Highlander: The Final Dimension
    An incoherent mess.
  28. Legends of the Fall
    These are performances that lost too much in the editing room, smothered by music and overshadowed by a picture-postcard vision of the American West.
  29. Nobody's Fool
    If Nobody's Fool is often heartbreaking in its sense of loss, it is also hopeful in the strength of its emotions and the sheer beauty of its performances.
  30. Tales from the Crypt: Demon Knight
    What "Tales From the Crypt" does best is sustain a look and tone that bring a comic-book's broad strokes into the realm of a live-action movie without seeming too mannered or arty. The film's gooey monsters with their electric green eyes and ferocious voracity are among the more convincing zombie demons to be found in a recent horror film.
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