The Observer (UK)'s Scores

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For 1,640 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 46% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 51% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 3.3 points higher than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Movie review score: 68
Highest review score: 100 Enys Men
Lowest review score: 20 Book Club: The Next Chapter
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 893 out of 1640
  2. Mixed: 714 out of 1640
  3. Negative: 33 out of 1640
1640 movie reviews
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    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Alice in the Cities
    Yella Rottlander is unforgettable as Alice. [06 Jan 2008, p.16]
    • The Observer (UK)
  2. Girl Picture
    There are moments – Mimmi biting back her emotions as Emma dances for her alone at night – that tingle with discovery and promise.
  3. Avengers: Endgame
    The final battle is giddily cathartic, but the catharsis arises from prioritising character development over plot and spectacle. This, I imagine, will be the Avengers’ legacy.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Harder They Fall
    Inspired by the suspect career of a prewar Italian boxer, it's rather good, but inferior to the novel by Budd Schulberg, the expert on the fight game and Oscar-winner for On the Waterfront. [04 Jan 2009, p.06]
    • The Observer (UK)
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    On Dangerous Ground
    A noir classic by the distinguished team of producer John Houseman and director Nicholas Ray. [06 Jan 2013, p.43]
    • The Observer (UK)
  6. The Sisters Brothers
    The film’s sometimes tiresome sense of humour is laddish in its embrace of viscera (blood, boils, vomit and live spiders all feature), but as the narrative trots (or, rather, plods) along, its men are revealed to be endearingly less so.
  7. I'm Your Man
    It asks pertinent questions about loneliness and a world in which algorithms can know us better than our human partners ever will.
  8. The Eight Mountains
    Sweeping and novelistic in scope, the film, adapted from an Italian bestseller by Paolo Cognetti, combines the earthy, rooted grit of Jack London with the vivid emotional landscapes of Elena Ferrante.
  9. A Love Song
    There’s a sparseness and stillness to Max Walker-Silverman’s storytelling that is filled by Dickey’s terrific, lived-in performance and the brief spark of connection between two lonely people.
  10. Barbarian
    It’s one of the most bracingly effective chillers of the year.
  11. Only You
    Vividly rendered, and filled with tangible yearning, it strikes a balance between romantic passion and mundane domesticity, as the skin-prickling attraction of new love is tested by the day-to-day tribulations of real life.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Moby Dick
    Gregory Peck's dignified Ahab is, like his leg, somewhat wooden, but the cast is splendid (not least Orson Welles's guest spot as Father Mapple), and Oswald Morris's experimental colour photography (based on old whaling prints) is commendable. [29 May 2005, p.79]
    • The Observer (UK)
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    All That Heaven Allows
    A sharply observed indictment of 1950s country club conformity. [07 Jul 2013, p.45]
    • The Observer (UK)
  14. 1917
    For all the steel-trap visceral efficiency, it’s the more low-key moments that really pack a punch – those moments when we’re confronted with the simple human cost of war.
  15. The Substance
    The Substance not only offers a female perspective on women’s bodies, but also argues that things only start to get properly messy once fertility is a dim memory.
  16. High Life
    The gravitational pull of sex, death and the void is palpable.
  17. Nosferatu
    There’s something about the macabre sensuality and mossy, crepuscular gloom of this retelling of the vampire legend that leaves a mark on the audience. It’s not so much a viewing experience as a kind of haunting.
  18. Crock of Gold: A Few Rounds with Shane MacGowan
    Temple has always used archive material playfully; here, it’s particularly riotous, like a chaotic patchwork quilt tacked together by one of Shane’s drunk aunties.
  19. The Personal History of David Copperfield
    Astutely amplifying the absurdist – and remarkably modernist – elements of his source, Iannucci and co-writer Simon Blackwell conjure a surreal cinematic odyssey that is as accessible as it is intelligent and unexpected.
  20. Fancy Dance
    While Fancy Dance has a tendency to labour its points a little too emphatically, Gladstone and Deroy-Olson are both phenomenal; their connection, played out in shared glances and urgent wordless messages, is palpable, persuasive and vital.
  21. Till
    An awards-worthy performance from Danielle Deadwyler (who stole the show in 2021’s The Harder They Fall) lends a passionate heart to this solidly engrossing and still contemporary historical drama set in 1955 and dedicated “to the life and legacy of Mamie Till-Mobley”.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Magnificent Obsession
    Less magnificent than the Ambersons or the Seven perhaps, but a minor classic nonetheless. [26 Mar 2006, p.14]
    • The Observer (UK)
  23. Asia
    This impressive Israeli feature debut from Ruthy Pribar stars a mesmerising Shira Haas.
  24. Nope
    The film too often seems to be heading somewhere extraordinary, only to disappear into an ambitious conceptual hole that, while occasionally startling, is ultimately less than the sum of its parts.
  25. Longlegs
    There’s an unexpected elegance to this window into unimaginable evil.
  26. Every Body
    Heartbreaking as this story is, the picture’s peppy energy results in a film that is celebratory and defiantly upbeat.
  27. You Will Die At Twenty
    Sudanese film-maker Amjad Abu Alala’s radiant drama dares to wonder if death could inspire courage rather than fear.
  28. Women Talking
    An atmosphere of empathy, reason and wit pervades Polley’s film, underwritten by an emancipatory urgency (“that day we learned to vote”) that drives the narrative even in its darkest moments.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Masque of the Red Death
    Marvellous, macabre horror story from Corman's Edgar Allan Poe series. Vincent Price is a diabolical delight, his 12th-century Italian tyrant Prince Prospero a worthy model for Machiavelli. [21 Feb 2004, p.53]
    • The Observer (UK)
  30. Silver Dollar Road
    Peck’s film – which, with its themes of race and failures of American justice, has a kinship with Ava DuVernay’s 13th and Garrett Bradley’s Time – is both infuriating and also unexpectedly uplifting in its celebration of family unity.
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