The New York Times' Scores

For 20,323 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:
20323 movie reviews
  1. Its ideological leanings are evident and unsurprising, but more screen time for Mr. Nader's pre-2000 (or pre-post-2000) adversaries would have made a richer film.
  2. Like most films of this type, Room 314 demands a great deal from its performers, not all of whom withstand the intense scrutiny. Fortunately, the action is bookended by four of the best.
  3. Uninvolving and cliché-ridden (even shape-shifters, it seems, deserve a falling-in-love montage), Blood & Chocolate is "Romeo and Juliet" with fewer manners and more exotic dentition.
  4. Although I find the term "chick flick" odious, I imagine that Columbia Pictures regards Catch and Release as exactly that, although there are signs that Ms. Grant was reaching for something more layered and subtle than the usual fairy-tale formula
  5. The humor is coarse and occasionally funny. The archly bombastic score, by Edward Sheamur, is the only thing you might call witty. But happily, Jennifer Coolidge and Fred Willard show up, as the White Bitch and Aslo the Lion, to add some easy, demented class.
  6. A Viagra suppository for compulsive action fetishists and a movie that may not only be dumb in itself, but also the cause of dumbness in others.
  7. Archetypes and symbols solemnly parade through Seraphim Falls, a handsome, old-fashioned western of few words and heavy meanings that unfolds with the sanctimonious grandeur of a biblical allegory.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    While Shockproof”will inspire more groans than gasps, it's essential viewing for fans of Mr. Fuller and Mr. Sirk.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    May be a mixed bag, but it is so impressive in so many ways that it demands to be taken seriously. It's a black comedy about a returning Iraq war veteran named Jesús (Joe Arquette) that aims for an absurd, satirical tone (think "Dr. Strangelove" by way of "Coming Home") but rarely hits the mark.
  8. A limp sci-fi comedy with fewer laughs than a meeting of Abductees Anonymous.
  9. A heartbreaking and meticulous documentary about life inside a blue-jeans factory in China.
  10. If it tells, in Mr. Ludin’s words, "a typical German story," the movie also offers an unusually matter-of-fact picture of the private and public effects of ordinary evil.
    • 28 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    The movie genuflects toward pop depth in a scene where Grace sprawls on a motel bed watching Alfred Hitchcock’s "Birds," another thriller about implacable, undefined evil, but there’s a difference between refusing to give viewers the answers and having nothing to say. For all its death-metal vigor, The Hitcher falls into the latter camp.
  11. There is something slightly magical about the lighting, almost as if this were a fantasy land from which Vanya might actually make an escape. This sense of unreality, of magical thinking and wishing, carries the story and Vanya through a remarkable journey.
  12. The movie is at once a giddy mixture of farce, satire and opera buffa and a closely observed drama of social dislocation and cultural confusion.
  13. While the film’s desperately sad finale indicates that Philippe Garrel knows the truth of '68 better than most and might have suffered a crisis in faith in the years since, this magnificent film is itself proof that all was not lost.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    In the end, the characters seem less archetypal than vague, and aside from its sophisticated presentation, Alone With Her doesn't differ all that much from its template: the late-’80s and early-’90s Fill-In-the-Blanks-From-Hell movies that followed in the wake of "Fatal Attraction," many of whose elements (including the heroine’s inquisitive, doomed best friend) Mr. Nicholas revives almost verbatim.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Mr. Jacobs's approach is descended from a long line of minimalist filmmakers, from Jacques Tati ("Monsieur Hulot's Holiday") up through Jim Jarmusch ("Mystery Train"), but The GoodTimesKid dances, like Diaz, in its own sweet style. It doesn't get to the point because getting there is the point.
  14. The cretins rule in Alpha Dog, which has much the same entertainment value you get from watching monkeys fling scat at one another in a zoo or reading the latest issue of Star magazine. Of course a little of that nasty stuff may land on you, but such are the perils of voyeurism.
  15. The screenplay, by John Brancato and Michael Ferris, tosses out a few chewy bits of B-movie wit, most of them supplied by Mr. Jones, who expresses the ambivalence of an African-American visiting the motherland through a series of bitter jokes.
  16. A strange and at times strangely compelling mix of black fraternity recruitment video and inspirational tale about a hip-hop boy in a stepping world.
  17. Handsomely photographed and inspirational, but not cloyingly so, it is the rare contemporary documentary that doesn't leave a residue of cynicism and outrage.
  18. The intoxicating madness of Tears of the Black Tiger is in the end too willed, too deliberate, to be entirely divine.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The filmmakers have loftier goals, though, and in the end their existential tabloid style justifies itself. Abduction isn't about what happened, but about the painful introspection that is sparked by not knowing.
  19. Given a rich, multidimensional role, Mr. Bachchan ably seizes on its abundant opportunities.
  20. Thought-provoking rather than deeply philosophical, Ever Since the World Ended features many engaging performances and several outstanding ones.
  21. As ever, Mr. Chabrol’s style is delicate and precise. Comedy of Power is not his deepest or most ambitious film, and its stance of knowing resignation in the face of corruption can feel a little glib. But Ms. Huppert's ferocity compensates for the director's detachment; no French actress is as riveting to watch once the gloves come off.
    • 28 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    This is another tired kidsploitation product.
  22. In Freedom Writers Hilary Swank uses neediness to fine effect in a film with a strong emotional tug and smartly laid foundation.
  23. Cedric the Entertainer's artless performance deadens what could have been a much funnier comedy.

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