Variety's Scores

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For 17,760 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 52% higher than the average critic
  • 4% same as the average critic
  • 44% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 2.3 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Movie review score: 63
Highest review score: 100 IMAX: Hubble 3D
Lowest review score: 0 Divorce: The Musical
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 9,121 out of 17760
  2. Mixed: 7,003 out of 17760
  3. Negative: 1,636 out of 17760
17760 movie reviews
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  1. Stealth
    Aiming to join the Jerry Bruckheimer/Michael Bay school of American movie war games, Stealth is just too dumb to make the grade.
  2. The Aristocrats
    A raucous insider documentary that invites the viewer to share a secret held exclusively by comics for untold generations.
  3. Edgar G. Ulmer - The Man Off-screen
    A definitive docu on the elusive Edgar G. Ulmer is a practical impossibility, which is why Michael Palm chooses to highlight questions rather than facts. But Edgar G. Ulmer -- the Man Off-Screen neither fully illuminates the tales nor finely sifts through the evidence to discover the truths behind the myth-making.
  4. Oyster Farmer
    A small, carefully composed film that rejoices in the parochial lingo and mores of its richly textured characters.
  5. Tony Takitani
    Ultimately, this is a striking-looking film -- consciously recalling the paintings of Edward Hopper in its architectural use of space -- which, like its protag, is a little short on real feeling.
  6. Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress
    A visually lush and very Westernized vision of life in a remote Chinese village in the early 1970s.
  7. Melancholian 3 huonetta
    Walloping gut punch The 3 Rooms of Melancholia offers a harrowing docu look at war and militarism's wounds, as seen through the eyes of Russian and Chechen children.
  8. Yat luk che
    An utterly charming retro romancer set against a background of '70s movie going. Full of lovely touches and well-etched performances, and flawed only by a bland male lead.
  9. The Devil's Rejects
    If you can stomach the violence -- and despite the R rating, that's a big if -- it's hard to deny that Zombie has made exactly the movie he set out to make, guaranteed to satiate his considerable fan base and sicken just about everyone else.
  10. Hustle & Flow
    Director Craig Brewer has given his second feature film a vibrant pulse amplified by an outstanding cast led by Terrence Howard.
  11. The Island
    Frenetic actioner about refugees from a genetic cloning plant starts off intriguingly, burns up its ideas in the first hour and pads out the rest with joltingly repetitive action sequences.
  12. Bad News Bears
    The new Bad News Bears has adopted a somewhat raunchier tone but delivers enough laughs to go the distance.
  13. 9 Songs
    A touching, often poetic, sometimes achingly real snapshot of a brief encounter related almost entirely through the bedroom.
  14. The Edukators
    Ambling drama shows an exasperating lack of economy and a weakness for diatribe dialogue, but becomes progressively more involving after a laborious start.
  15. Last Days
    Result is dead-on depiction of the hedonistic rock lifestyle, punctuated by sequences of haunting beauty but also quasi-religious imagery that borders on tacky.
  16. Monumental: David Brower's Fight for Wild America
    Stylish and substantial enough to prompt even a couch potato to action, Kelly Duane's Monumental: David Brower's Fight for Wild America delivers a stirring and visually dense account of the life and times of Brower.
  17. Yau doh lung fu bong
    A disjointed story of self-discovery, courage and redemption somewhat incongruously billed as a salute to Akira Kurosawa.
  18. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
    Entertaining and fabulously imaginative in many ways, this second bigscreen rendition of the late author's modest morality tale on the wages of unbridled excess sports excesses of its own.
  19. Wedding Crashers
    Despite flashes of nudity, crudity and mockery of women's raging hormones at the first sight of a trousseau, at its core it's just a big pushover with the heart of a chick flick.
  20. Happy Endings
    A protracted parade of woefully familiar motifs from the Amerindie playbook, Happy Endings comes off like an undernourished Paul Thomas Anderson wannabe.
  21. The Reception
    Superb emotional thesping complements script's measured restraint.
  22. The Warrior
    Tendency to go for art rather than action, and a leisurely pace that isn't bolstered by much dialogue or food for thought.
  23. God's Sandbox
    The serious subject of forced female circumcision becomes the stuff of predictable melodrama in God's Sandbox.
  24. On the Outs
    Skillfully entwines stories of three young women drifting in and out of a Jersey City juvenile detention center.
  25. Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus
    Ultimately, pic feels very much like a romanticized, outsider's view of the South that willfully seeks out the culture's strangest, most weirdo aspects for other outsiders' gleeful delectation.
  26. Murderball
    A blast and a half -- as entertaining as mainstream American docus get.
  27. Dark Water
    Well-crafted but thoroughly unsuspenseful.
  28. Fantastic Four
    A wildly uneven, sporadically slapdash action-adventure that amuses in fits and starts.
  29. The Beautiful Country
    Standout performance is by Nolte who, in the final 20 minutes, draws on a deep reservoir of playing broken romantic heroes to portray Binh's father. The subtle, resonant scenes between the two men are worth the price of admission.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Saraband
    A bitter but finally moving story about lost love, hatred between generations and a curious kind of liberation, Saraband officially closes one of the most prestigious and influential careers in the history of cinema.
  31. Chronicles
    Starts out bracingly but gradually loses focus. Ecuadorian writer-director Sebastian Cordero's screenplay trades in underdeveloped conflicts and blank characters, hinting far too early at the killer's probable identity.
  32. Steve + Sky
    Promising frosh helmer Felix van Groeningen exhibits a fresh eye, though his script is full of too many self-consciously Tarantino-ish verbal digressions that serve to distract from the story, and self-conscious quirks he mistakes for character development.
  33. A Sidewalk Astronomer
    Entertaining, painlessly educational documentary.
  34. Rebound
    Scores a few chuckles while following a familiar game plan.
  35. The Beat That My Heart Skipped
    Stands reasonably well on its own as an urgent, updated genre meditation on nurture vs. nature.
  36. Undead
    Precociously inventive horror pic that combines brain-eating zombies with outer space aliens.
  37. The World
    While the film feels overlong at two hours 20 minutes, there's a seductive stillness to its enveloping mood.
  38. Twist of Faith
    A powerful and damning look at the long-term impact of sexual abuse.
  39. Almost Brothers
    Unfortunately, Murat's decision to jump back and forth in time makes the film hard to follow for even the most committed viewer.
  40. War of the Worlds
    A gritty, intense and supremely accomplished sci-fier.
  41. Tropical Malady
    Takes the viewer on a mysterious and sporadically fascinating trip into the darkness of the human heart and Thai legend.
  42. This Revolution
    The street action is vivid, but the dramatics are distinctly not, lending the film an unintended sense of fakery.
  43. A Decent Factory
    Fascinating case study of the moral quagmire of globalism.
  44. Bewitched
    Nora Ephron's attempt to reconceive the standard TV-to-bigscreen adaptation goes bizarrely haywire here, spinning out of control like a runaway broomstick.
  45. Land of the Dead
    George A. Romero shows 'em how it's done in Land of the Dead, resurrecting his legendary franchise with top-flight visuals, terrific genre smarts and tantalizing layers of implication.
  46. Rize
    Eye-popping lensing and an appreciation of social complexities combine for an entirely satisfying experience.
  47. Yes
    Ultimately has nothing of any real depth or profundity to say, but a thousand self-consciously complex ways of saying it.
  48. Dallas 362
    Has a relaxed poeticism to it; it's a sweetly naive, adolescent Hemingway fantasy with a star-making performance by Shawn Hatosy and good ones from everyone else (including Caan).
  49. Lila Says
    Easy on the eye but light on originality.
  50. The Last Mogul
    A refreshingly honest film about the life and times of Hollywood uber-power player Lew Wasserman.
  51. Memories of Murder
    A powerful, slow-burning portrait of human fallibility.
  52. March of the Penguins
    Sometimes harrowing, sometimes hokey, sometimes heartwarming nature documentary.
  53. Herbie Fully Loaded
    A pleasingly retro recycling of "The Love Bug."
  54. The Deal
    Never entirely convincing yet always watchable.
  55. Pure
    The film belongs to Eden, who creates a winning personality out of a combination of vulnerability, resourcefulness, toughness and fragility. It's an outstanding juvenile performance.
  56. The Perfect Man
    For most part, The Perfect Man is too bland to merit anything more censorious than a stifled yawn.
  57. The Great Water
    Extraordinary perfs by a mostly young cast likely will be cancelled out by the grim subject.
  58. Heights
    An entertaining ensembler marbled with wit and heartache.
  59. Me and You and Everyone We Know
    Brings a fresh perspective to age-old human dilemmas.
  60. My Summer of Love
    Direction, performances and lensing blend into an immensely satisfying, if almost uncategorizable, whole in Pawel Pawlikowski's My Summer of Love.
  61. The Talent Given Us
    Brutally truthful, funny and touching in nearly equal measure.
  62. Ethan Mao
    Messy admixtures of drama and mockery crucially undermine pic's serious message.
  63. King of the Corner
    Lacks the stylistic attention to psychological distress that might have lent it maximum impact. Instead, the pic is amiable, kinda charming, visually routine, and incisive in individual sequences.
  64. Batman Begins
    Ambitious, well made but not exactly rousing.
  65. J.S.A.: Joint Security Area
    Despite its merits, is neither an art movie nor an out-and-out, propulsive actioner like "Shiri."
  66. Wheel of Time
    Taken strictly as a docu about a key Buddhist ritual, Wheel of Time is a perfectly pleasant, educational film, featuring pretty pictures, exotic locations and interview footage with the Dalai Lama himself. As a Werner Herzog film, it's flat and disappointing.
  67. Mr. & Mrs. Smith
    An exhaustingly elaborate romantic fantasy actioner.
  68. The Honeymooners
    Just funny enough to mollify purists and amuse the uninitiated.
  69. High Tension
    Deftly juggles gore and suspense, and punchline holds an intellectual frisson or two for fans of gender-role speculation, but basically this is one more horror pic on the distinguished road already trodden by "Texas Chain Saw Massacre," "Maniac" and the like.
  70. The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl 3-D
    There's little chance of grabbing teens (or even many tweens) during summertime playdates. Still, small fry will be enchanted by this rambunctious action-adventure.
  71. Howl's Moving Castle
    The tireless volley of ideas and inventions make this a delight that should connect with kids and adults in both dubbed and original-language versions.
    • 52 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Wild Side
    Sex frequently disguises itself as friendship and love in Wild Side, a morbid and self-important homosexual "Jules & Jim" for the new millennium.
  73. The Bridge of San Luis Rey
    The stellar cast can do little to paper over the cracks in an awkward, unevenly-paced script that is composed of a series of sometimes-attractive scenes with little emotional undertow.
  74. 5x2
    Excellent perfs and writer-director Francois Ozon's sure, unfussy way with the camera add up to a viewing experience whose richness depends in large part on how much the viewer reads into the human templates on display.
  75. Paternal Instinct
    Endearing nature of the personalities involved makes a fine argument for weighing parental suitability on terms more profound than the prospective parents sexual orientation.
  76. Café Lumière
    Hou fans will find what they're looking for; others will wonder when the action starts.
  77. Chrystal
    Respectable piece of work is reasonably involving if not compelling.
  78. McLibel
    An alarming if ultimately inspiring David-and-Goliath parable for today.
  79. The Keeper: The Legend of Omar Khayyam
    Lofty ambitions and unaffected sincerity are not quite enough to sustain The Keeper: The Legend of Omar Khayyam, a reverentially pokey drama that plays less like a conventional movie than a lengthy series of hagiographic historical tableaux.
  80. Cinderella Man
    An exquisite ode to a working-class hero, Cinderella Man takes the almost impossibly perfect elements of the saga of underdog boxer James J. Braddock and fills it with emotional gravitas, wrenching danger and a panoramic sense of American life during the Great Depression.
  81. Lords of Dogtown
    It's a wipeout once the pic skids into melodrama and an overly schematic sense of how success tore the group apart.
  82. Rock School
    Irresistibly entertaining and full of unique character portraits.
  83. Apres Vous (After You)
    Elegantly written, well-thesped comedy is too hermetic and bittersweet to be laugh-out-loud funny, but sustains a fairly successful ratio of uncomfortable situations to amusing solutions.
  84. Deep Blue
    Jaw-dropping, sumptuous visuals, a lush George Fenton score, state-of-the-art technology and some of the oddest creatures ever seen without recourse to artificial stimulants.
  85. Milwaukee, Minnesota
    It's a fantastic-looking picture in search of a decent script.
  86. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants
    Mixes satisfying dollops of fun, tears, travel, romance and lesson-learning in a handsome package whose two hours pass faster than many a grownup entertainment.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The White Diamond
    Herzog's eye for the weird sometimes makes the docu feel strained, but engaging characters imbue the pic with depth and emotional appeal.
  88. Or
    Consistently engaging, non-judgmental and cumulatively powerful two-hander marks a noteworthy feature debut for Israeli helmer Keren Yedaya.
    • 46 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    A Wake in Providence
    Zesty indie comedy from Rhode Island is a winner, with ethnic humor easily mixing with universal truths about dealing with families.
  90. The Longest Yard
    Sandler impressively assumes the Reynolds role here, with strong support by Reynolds himself and a slightly restrained but frequently hilarious Chris Rock.
  91. Madagascar
    Pleasant, if mediocre family fare.
  92. Bomb the System
    A richly textured drama with an angry poetic edge that gets inside the obsessive subculture of New York graffiti artists, Bomb the System signals the arrival of a talented filmmaker in NYU film graduate Adam Bhala Lough.
  93. The Ninth Day
    A thoughtfully written drama of ideas with vivid performances by August Diehl and Ulrich Matthes.
  94. A League of Ordinary Gentlemen
    Chris Browne's sense of humor captures perfectly the contradictions, absurdities and drama at the intersection of class, media, money and sports without dissing any of his player/subjects.
  95. The Fearless Freaks
    Will please devotees without attracting many, if any, new converts.
  96. Saving Face
    The film's appealing characters and amusing situations prevail over its general shortage of energy.
  97. A Common Thread
    Thoughtful cross-generational portrait is full of familiar building blocks rendered fresh by first time feature helmer Eleonore Faucher.
  98. Genesis
    Eye-poppingly intimate footage of various critters evolving from the fetal stage or eating, strolling, fighting and courting that can only be obtained via infinite patience with special equipment in exotic locations.
  99. Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist
    Result is hardly a diabolical failure, if not quite a heavenly masterpiece. Schrader's intelligent, quietly subversive pic emphasizes spiritual agony over horror ecstasy, while paying occasional lip-service to the need for scares.
  100. Fixing Frank
    Full of bold dramatic strokes and complex character shadings.
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