The New York Times' Scores

Select another publication »
For 20,312 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: 9,400 out of 20312
  2. Mixed: 8,446 out of 20312
  3. Negative: 2,466 out of 20312
20312 movie reviews
view
per page
  1. Vito Bonafacci
    Effectively a tutorial on some basic Catholic rituals, this isn't a great film - too many scenes are static or clumsily acted - but it is elevated by the touches of neorealist style in its small-bore focus and its soundtrack of classical compositions and Italian music from the 12th and 13th centuries.
  2. An Invisible Sign
    Cuter than a basket of puppies licking a litter of kittens, An Invisible Sign is an excruciatingly whimsical collision of adult themes and kid-friendly aesthetic.
  3. Caterpillar
    Shinobu Terajima, a major figure in Japan who won the best actress award at the 2010 Berlin film festival for Caterpillar, is effective as the wife, though Mr. Wakamatsu is more interested in scoring political and historical points than in shaping her character.
  4. The People vs. George Lucas
    Frenetic, paper-thin but entertaining documentary.
  5. Hobo with a Shotgun
    Only for those with a truly bottomless appetite for gore and fan-boy humor.
  6. Last Night
    Nominally a story about sex, lies and faithfulness, Last Night is more truly a cautionary tale about mousetrap narratives.
  7. Daydream Nation
    Daydream Nation hopscotches forward and backward and in and out of the surreal; its abrupt tangents are announced by chapter headings. In the most complicated sequence the film tracks three characters simultaneously. The cinematography is darkly lush in an ominous "Twin Peaks" mode.
  8. There Be Dragons
    Beyond the lugubrious pageantry, there is no sign of emotional or spiritual life in the film, only windy posturing.
  9. Passion Play
    You might reasonably assume that any movie starring Mr. Rourke and Mr. Murray would have to have something to recommend it. But aside from a haunting musical interlude, in which Mr. Rourke, with pathetic ineptitude, mimes playing a trumpet, Passion Play is barely palatable.
  10. Octubre
    With a visual style and a deadpan humor that owes an obvious debt to the Finnish director Aki Kaurismaki ("Drifting Clouds"), they hold their shots long enough for you to scan details, look deep into faces and think on how little (or much) it takes to be happy. Here a painted Jesus hovers on a chipped wall, but it's an unholy family of three that finds heaven on earth.
  11. Jumping the Broom
    Instead of being a wild mixture of tones, it has very little tone at all, and moments of dramatic or comic intensity erupt awkwardly and then fizzle out.
  12. Harvest
    During this meticulously written and exquisitely acted film, you come to sense the bonds and the wounds binding three generations of Monopolis, who definitely love one another, but with reservations.
  13. The Beaver
    Nasty, brutish and as cuddly as a crusty old sock fished out of a sewer, the beaver or the beav, as I like to think of him, owns the film.
  14. Something Borrowed
    The most dispiriting thing about Something Borrowed is that with a little more art, craft and wit it could have been a lot better, maybe even good.
  15. Thor
    The absolute and unbroken mediocrity of Thor is evidence of its success. This movie is not distinctively bad, it is axiomatically bad. And THAT is depressing. A howling turkey is at least something to laugh at, and maybe even something to see. But Thor is an example of the programmed triumph of commercial calculation over imagination.
  16. Red White & Blue
    Red White & Blue proves the director a bona fide storyteller with more tools in his arsenal than shock and awe.
  17. Hoodwinked Too! Hood VS. Evil
    While it seems there's no getting away from this marketing aesthetic, the resemblance at times to a video game is far, far too acute.
  18. We Go Way Back
    More successful at conjuring atmosphere than at plot, We Go Way Back is nicely acted but frustratingly slight.
  19. Prom
    There are new tweeners every year. To them, the characters and plot devices in this perfectly competent film might well seem fresh.
  20. That's What I Am
    Mr. Harris's depiction of a saintly, soft-spoken, bow-tie-wearing middle-school teacher lends the movie a moral weight it probably couldn't have summoned had another actor played the role.
  21. Earthwork
    Imagine spending an afternoon watching a bunch of vagrants putter around on an abandoned city lot, and you've pretty much nailed the viewing experience of Earthwork, a painfully dull account of a year in the life of the Kansas crop artist Stan Herd.
  22. Exporting Raymond
    It has the structure and some of the pleasures of a well-made sitcom or docu-reality show, despite the nervous-looking, unhappy guy at its center; it could have been called "Nobody Understands Phil."
    • 28 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Atlas Shrugged: Part I
    The resulting film, directed by Paul Johansson, feels rushed, amateurish and clumsy. It's not just the ideologies that feel oddly out of step with the present day, but the clothes, hairstyles and interiors.
  24. Sympathy for Delicious
    These characters may serve an obscure metaphorical agenda, but they make no psychological sense. And as the movie contemplates the rewards and perils of giving and receiving, it winds itself into stomach-turning knots.
  25. The Robber
    The Robber may have less on its mind than its sheen of seriousness would suggest, but the view is gorgeous.
  26. Lebanon, Pa.
    If Lebanon, Pa. is a tidy little indie with steady acting, it is too politically self-aware to transcend its well-mannered sense of fairness. But the performances by Ms. Kitson and Ms. Hurt give it spritzes of energy.
  27. 13 Assassins
    A stirring, unexpectedly moving story of love and blood.
  28. Fast Five
    In a free-for-all like this, where the laws of gravity and dictates of narrative logic are left to eat dust, it doesn't matter when anything takes place or why.
  29. Cave of Forgotten Dreams
    The 3-D is sometimes less than transporting, and the chanting voices in the composer Ernst Reijseger's new-agey score tended to remind me of my last spa massage. Yet what a small price to pay for such time traveling!
  30. The Arbor
    Like a Ken Loach drama stripped to bare bones, The Arbor springs to life in the bright bitterness of Dunbar's prose, showcased in alfresco performances of contentious scenes from the play.
Page:

Top Trailers

See all »
See all trailers »