The Observer (UK)'s Scores

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For 1,641 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 3.1 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: 894 out of 1641
  2. Mixed: 714 out of 1641
  3. Negative: 33 out of 1641
1641 movie reviews
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  1. Chemical Hearts
    Heavy-handed symbolism aside, this is a decent little drama which digs into the bewildering limbo state between childhood and the adult world – a time in which everything hurts, heads are full of hormones and time stretches out interminably.
  2. Bill & Ted Face the Music
    This slapdash movie, with its big-hearted, puppyish positivity, might not save the world but it will surely lift the spirits.
  3. West Side Story
    Where Spielberg and screenwriter Tony Kushner’s version comes into its own is in the moments where it dares to find its own distinct voice – nowhere more so than in placing Somewhere in the hands of Rita Moreno.
  4. Munich: The Edge of War
    MacKay is muted; his character is teased for his reserve, a quality he shares with the film. Niewöhner gives the sparkier performance, as a passionate German nationalist whose loyalty has flipped.
  5. The King
    What we get is closer to early Vegas Elvis – a little bloated and befuddled, and not as light on his feet as he needs to be.
  6. Ailey
    Film-maker Jamila Wignot pays particular attention to the specificity of Ailey’s black influences: the church, blues music and his southern upbringing, all of which informed his best-known work, Revelations (1960).
  7. Fall
    While the pace falters a little – there are only so many ways you can almost fall off a tower, after all – the tension is unrelenting.
  8. Monsters and Men
    Inevitably, some chapters work better than others but it’s an interesting, sideways look at how violence can serve as a catalyst rather than a climax and how it can change – and galvanise – a community.
  9. The Forgiven
    Lorne Balfe’s sparsely used music leaves plenty of open spaces for the drama to breathe, as if inviting the audience to fill in the blanks with an internal accompaniment (tragic? Comedic? Ironic?) of their own choosing.
  10. Glass
    The metaphors are messy (trauma makes people extraordinary?) and the pacing’s off, but it’s fun to see the individual films’ universes crossing over.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Indian Runner
    In the character of Joe, David Morse and Penn have created an authentic hero of everyday life, and in a generally well acted picture, Charles Bronson as the boys' father reveals for the first time in some years his more vulnerable side and demonstrates what a fine actor he is. [01 Dec 1991, p.60]
    • The Observer (UK)
  12. The Forever Purge
    The cartoonish tone of the relentless violence feels at odds with the otherwise sombre, apocalyptic mood.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Husbands
    Highly uneven, painfully drawn-out, deeply sincere, wildly misogynistic and at times agonisingly tedious. It is also intermittently brilliant, with moments of piercing honesty. There is, however, not a single memorable line of dialogue or anything that might pass for wit.
    • 51 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Dead Reckoning
    Director Cromwell lays on the expressionist style of tilted cameras, graphic shadows and sinister silhouettes with some relish. [31 Jul 2011, p.47]
    • The Observer (UK)
  15. The Spy Who Dumped Me
    Director Susanna Fogel handles the action set pieces with gusto but fails to make the chick-chat bonding moments seem like anything more than padding.
  16. After the Wedding
    This story of motherhood and moral conundrums, of privilege and philanthropy and “worthy causes” is one whose dramatic twists and soapy reveals feel at odds with the cultivated tone of serious, muted elegance.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Bodies Bodies Bodies
    By the end, I was fond of every single brat, dead or alive.
  18. France
    France is watchable, if not subtle, but the picture labours its message with an overstretched running time and an oddly anticlimactic structure.
  19. Brittany Runs A Marathon
    There’s a note of truth in Bell’s finely tuned performance as a character whose insecurities have calcified over the years, hardening her to genuine goodwill, which she frequently misreads as pity.
  20. The Children Act
    There is no questioning the angular complexity of the central character study, with all its unexpected harmonics and discords.
  21. Sorry We Missed You
    Time and again, scenes of back-breaking struggle end with the screen fading to black, as if the film itself is simply too tired to go on or hanging its head in empathetic shame.
  22. Clara Sola
    This atmospheric debut from Costa Rican-Swedish director Nathalie Álvarez Mesén combines mud, moss and mysticism to arresting effect.
  23. The Penguin Lessons
    Peter Cattaneo (The Full Monty) directs, just about striking a balance between the fluffy sentimentality of the story and its hard-edged political backdrop.
  24. Copilot
    The director treats the film as an empathy exercise, hoping to complicate and humanise a terrorist. Yet this is undermined by the obvious red flags that she plants in each section. Saeed’s flight path becomes a foregone conclusion.
  25. Hilma
    This handsome biopic by Lasse Hallström, with his daughter Tora Hallström in the role of the younger Hilma, attempts to redress the balance.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Vice Versa
    Judge Reinhold and Fred Savage are pleasant enough as the father and son who swap roles, but the result is less funny and less stylish than Peter Ustinov's period version of 1947 which starred Roger Livesey and Anthony Newley. [14 Dec 2003, p.8]
    • The Observer (UK)
  27. Copshop
    Alexis Louder holds her own as the heroine of (and sole woman in) Joe Carnahan’s lean, mean, 70s-inspired action thriller.
  28. Blinded by the Light
    It is gleefully dorky, hopelessly earnest, sincere, quite possibly to a fault. It unfolds as a series of Springsteen-soundtracked set pieces, each shamelessly engineered to maximise catharsis, cheering and possibly weeping from the audience.
  29. Sing 2
    While there are no surprises whatsoever here, the perky charm remains.
  30. Hustle
    This is quality film-making, with enough that’s distinctive – Dan Deacon’s score is a pulsing, panicky jolt of energy – to appeal beyond basketball fans.
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