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. President
    Nielsson’s access to Chamisa allows for an intimate look at the Catch-22 of establishing a democracy amid state-sanctioned violence and corruption, and the grit of those fighting for it.
  2. The Last Picture Show
    Peter Bogdanovich's fine second film, The Last Picture Show, adapted from Larry McMurtry's novel by McMurtry and Bogdanovich, has the effect of a lovely, leisurely, horizontal pan-shot across the life of Anarene, Tex., a small, shabby town on a plain so flat that to raise the eye even 10 degrees would be to see only an endless sky.
  3. Hard to Be a God
    Mr. German was just as stubborn in sticking to his personal vision (and revisions) as he was innovative in his storytelling, and he’s left behind a final opus that is hard to shake.
  4. Do the Right Thing
    A remarkable piece of work. [30 June 1989]
    • The New York Times
  5. Sita Sings the Blues
    And the ingenuity of “Sita” — is dazzling. Not busy, or overwhelming, or eye-popping. Just affecting, surprising and a lot of fun.
  6. The Decline of Western Civilization
    A shrewd and engrossing documentary even for audiences who have absolutely no patience for the music it includes.
  7. Werckmeister Harmonies
    Mysterious, poetic and allusive, The Werckmeister Harmonies beckons filmgoers who complain of the vapidity of Hollywood movie making and yearn for a film to ponder and debate.
    • 93 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Top Hat
    When Top Hat is letting Mr. Astaire perform his incomparable magic or teaming him with the increasingly dexterous Miss Rogers it is providing the most urbane fun that you will find anywhere on the screen.
  9. Brother's Keeper
    It's a rich slice of Americana that would seem to belong to an earlier, pre-television era, except that television comes to play a large part in Delbert's story. It's also about an aspect of life in rural America that's seldom seen by people who drive through it, and seldom if ever glimpsed in movies.
  10. Sankofa
    [Mr. Gerima's] film is ambitious in its depiction of slavery and accomplished in its visual command.
  11. Sam Now
    Reed’s initial overeager stylings fall back to reveal a mature reckoning with love, hurt, independence, and hard-won wisdom.
  12. Crumb
    It succeeds at showing how one man's psychic wounds contributed to an art that transmutes personal pain into garish visual satire.
  13. No Bears
    Panahi, whose courage and honesty are beyond doubt, has made a movie that calls those very qualities into question, a movie about its own ethical limits and aesthetic contradictions.
  14. 8½
    It has no more plot than a horse race, no more order than a pinball machine, and it bounces around on several levels of consciousness, dreams and memories as it details a man's rather casual psychoanalysis of himself. But it sets up a labyrinthine ego for the daring and thoughtful to explore, and it harbors some elegant treasures of wit and satire along the way.
  15. Yojimbo
    As in most Westerns, the dramatic penetration is not deep, and the plot complications are many and hard to follow in Japanese. Kurosawa is here showing more virtuosity than strength. Yojimbo is a long way (in the wrong direction) from his brilliant Rashomon.
  16. Spotlight
    Spotlight is a gripping detective story and a superlative newsroom drama, a solid procedural that tries to confront evil without sensationalism.
  17. The Band Wagon
    Joined with the equally nimble talents of Fred Astaire. Jack Buchanan and Cyd Charisse and some tunes from the sterling repertory of Arthur Schwartz and Howard Dietz, this literate and witty combination herein delivers a show that respectfully bids for recognition as one of the best musical films ever made.
  18. Late Spring (1949)
    Ozu's recognition of the wall of skin separating the mind of the character from the viewer is an integral part of his philosophy. It amounts to a profound respect for their privacy, for the mystery of their emotions. Because of this—not in spite of this—his films, of which Late Spring is one of the finest, are so moving.
  19. Ikiru
    If it weren't so confused in its story-telling, it would be one of the major postwar films from Japan. As it stands, it is a strangely fascinating and affecting film, up to a point—that being the point where it consigns its aged hero to the great beyond.
  20. Sunday's Illness
    The often-tense mother-daughter dance of recrimination and forgiveness is spectacularly acted.
  21. One More Time with Feeling
    Even in the throes of grief, Mr. Cave retains his mystique as a rock shaman.
  22. The Wizard of Oz
    A delightful piece of wonder-working which had the youngsters' eyes shining and brought a quietly amused gleam to the wiser ones of the oldsters.
    • 92 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Ride the High Country
    Take two cornbelt veterans like Mr. McCrea and Mr. Scott, give them a taut, tangy script (by N. B. Stone Jr.) a trim supporting cast and a good director (Sam Peckinpah), and you have the most disarming little horse opera in months.
  24. Memoria
    Every scene unfolds with quiet, meticulous clarity, but Weerasethakul’s luminous precision only deepens the mystery.
  25. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
    In his memoir Mr. Bauby performed a heroic feat of alchemy, turning horror into wisdom, and Mr. Schnabel, following his example and paying tribute to his accomplishment, has turned pity into joy.
    • 92 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Invasion of the Body Snatchers
    Almost 40 years later, Don Siegel's film about the pod people hasn't lost its chill. [02 Dec 1994, p.D18]
    • The New York Times
  27. Close-Up
    It is Mr. Sabzian's poignancy that makes "Close-Up" much more than a clever reflection on film-versus-life as an endless hall of mirrors.
  28. The Class
    Here Mr. Cantet -- whose earlier features include "Human Resources" and "Time Out," two other dramas about systems of power -- has done that rarest of things in movies about children: He has allowed them to talk.
  29. Platoon
    Possibly the best work of any kind about the Vietnam War since Michael Herr's vigorous and hallucinatory book "Dispatches."
  30. No Country for Old Men
    No Country for Old Men is purgatory for the squeamish and the easily spooked. For formalists -- those moviegoers sent into raptures by tight editing, nimble camera work and faultless sound design -- it’s pure heaven.
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