Variety's Scores

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For 17,847 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: 9,172 out of 17847
  2. Mixed: 7,036 out of 17847
  3. Negative: 1,639 out of 17847
17847 movie reviews
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  1. 10 Things I Hate About You
    10 Things doesn't take much time before ditching its pitch idea in favor of a mishmash of newer formulas, never quite settling on a cogent game plan or directorial tone.
  2. The Matrix
    An eye-popping but incoherent extravaganza of morphing and superhuman martial arts.
  3. Edtv
    A certain staleness hangs over the proceedings despite the best efforts of the cast and the fun-minded creative team.
  4. The Mod Squad
    Feels like the most shameless effort yet in the renewed exploitation of the youth market.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    A Walk on the Moon
    Despite strategic references to Joan Baez and pot, pic's sense of time and place feels synthetic.
  6. Forces of Nature
    An extremely enjoyable neo-screwball comedy about attractive opposites on the road.
  7. Ravenous
    Essentially approaches its subject seriously, but does take stabs both at horror and grotesque comedy, neither with much success.
  8. The King and I
    Broadway musical purists will shudder in horror, but parents will be whistling a happy tune that there's at least one acceptable pic out there for their kids.
  9. True Crime
    Eastwood's latest picture boasts tight storytelling, sharp acting and an eye for unexpected, enlivening detail.
    • 21 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Wing Commander: Space Will Never Be the Same
    Formulaic, humdrum and sometimes unintentionally laughable.
  11. The Deep End of the Ocean
    Michelle Pfeiffer and Treat Williams give such magnetic performances that they elevate the film way above its middlebrow sensibility and proclivity for neat resolutions.
  12. Trekkies
    A largely affectionate look at the weird and the wonderful subculture that's ensued and endured since the sci-fi series first beamed up in 1966.
  13. The Rage: Carrie 2
    As generic in every aspect as Brian De Palma's original was inventive.
    • 7 Metascore
    • 10 Critic Score
    Baby Geniuses
    A thoroughly misguided, unfunny film that proves you shouldn't beat a dead horse.
  15. The Corruptor
    It's to the filmmakers' credit that, as an actioner, The Corruptor is a character-driven movie, with several plot twists and turns involving the interactions among the gangs, cops, FBI and Internal Affairs.
  16. With Friends Like These...
    The perennially insecure world of two-bit character actors is humorously and knowingly explored in With Friends Like These.
  17. Analyze This
    The gradual dilution of fresh humor is further undercut by a queasy sense that the picture, in the end, is quietly endorsing all the psychoanalytical mumbo jumbo that it has been poking fun at all along.
  18. Cruel Intentions
    Nasty, profane and wickedly entertaining for the most part.
  19. Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
    Though Ritchie’s screenplay scores a 10 for sheer complexity and cleverness, it rates much lower down the scale for comprehensibility and audience involvement.
    • Variety
  20. The School of Flesh
    A skillful blend of fire and ice that subtly conveys the emotional extremes fraught in the relationship.
  21. 20 Dates
    Blurring the lines between cinema verite and fiction, writer-director Myles Berkowitz has created a winning entertainment.
  22. 200 Cigarettes
    Dismally unfunny...It's clear from the first few minutes that the performers are fighting an uphill battle against lame material, and the situation never improves as pic labors on.
    • 28 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Other Sister
    A sweet, at times cloying confection enlivened by strong performances in the central roles.
  24. 8MM
    A movie that keeps jumping the gate and finally unravels all over the floor.
  25. Office Space
    Imagine a live-action version of the "Dilbert" comic strip with a touch of Hal Hartley's deadpan absurdism, and you're ready for the frequently uproarious "Office Space."
  26. October Sky
    Immensely entertaining and unabashedly inspirational.
  27. Jawbreaker
    The strongest dimensions of this self-conscious but centerless film are four sexy actresses parading in colorful costumes and Amy Vincent's radiant lensing, which makes the picture seem hipper than it is.
  28. Blast from the Past
    A time-warp comedy that starts out kinda "Pleasantville" and gets pretty Tepidsville, Blast From the Past expends scant imagination or style on a fun premise that seems an open invitation to both.
  29. Message in a Bottle
    Dreary, lachrymose and incredibly poky tear-jerker that makes its audience wait and wait and wait until nearly the last second for its jerking.
  30. My Favorite Martian
    Martian is loud, busy and altogether pointless. Worse, it’s simply not as engaging as the show that inspired it.
  31. Simply Irresistible
    Much like a botched souffle that fails to rise, Simply Irresistible is a bland confection that remains doggedly earthbound while attempting flights of romantic fantasy.
  32. Payback
    Not an embarrassment, but it's not distinguished, either.
  33. She's All That
    While there are a few good jokes and sight gags along the way, the main impression left by She's All That is how numbingly consistent its lack of originality is.
    • 26 Metascore
    • 10 Critic Score
    Gloria
    A travesty trying to be a Sharon Stone vehicle, this wooden crime yarn easily qualifies as the most tired, unexciting mob movie in recent memory.
  35. Children of Heaven
    Much humor and suspense is wrung from incidents that would be minuscule from anything but a child’s p.o.v., many repeated until they become ingenious running gags.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Playing by Heart
    A stellar cast and articulate script notwithstanding, pic fails to connect emotionally with its audience, which perhaps says more about the difficulty of making empathetic attachments than writer-director Willard Carroll intended.
  37. Virus
    Curtis and Pacula are thoroughly convincing in thinly written roles.
  38. Varsity Blues
    An unappetizing mix of raucously vulgar comedy and teen-angst melodrama.
    • 41 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    At First Sight
    Although it's notoriously difficult to play a romance involving one partner's disability or illness without resorting to sentimentality, Kilmer acquits himself admirably.
  40. The Thin Red Line
    Like a Rousseau painting splattered with carnage of warfare.
  41. Forever Mine
    Paul Schrader hits a low water mark with Forever Mine, a strenuously straight-faced film noir wanna-be that edges perilously close to self-parody.
  42. Affliction
    The pervasive chill, ugly feelings and downward spiral of the narrative make this a work that requires an equally sober, serious-minded attitude on the part of the viewer.
  43. Hilary and Jackie
    Eye-grabbing performances from Emily Watson and Rachel Griffiths, who portray celebrated British cellist Jacqueline Du Pre and her older sister, Hilary, distinguish this ambitious but flawed biography.
  44. The Faculty
    Results may not be Nobel Prize material, but they're zesty and cogent.
  45. Stepmom
    Everything about the film suggests that its makers consider it a deep, emotionally probing drama, but it's merely a soap opera with elevated production values and a sterling cast.
  46. A Civil Action
    A solid and intelligent legal thriller that may be too complex in its issues, and too low-key and unexciting in its style, for today's market demands.
  47. Patch Adams
    Shamelessly sappy and emotionally manipulative, Patch Adams is an aggressively heartwarming comedy-drama that may be roasted by critics but embraced by ticketbuyers.
    • 51 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Mighty Joe Young
    Mighty Joe Young is wholesome, well-crafted family fare like Hollywood used to make.
  49. Down in the Delta
    Poet Maya Angelou's debut feature directing effort is a solid and affecting piece of work.
  50. The Theory of Flight
    A risky idea only occasionally gets both wheels off the ground in "The Theory of Flight," a sometimes wryly amusing, oftimes dramatically awkward story
    • 58 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    You've Got Mail
    The most successful version yet of this familiar premise.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Prince of Egypt
    At once rich in historic and character detail and full of eye-popping tableaux, this new spin on the Moses saga sometimes out-DeMilles DeMille's 1956 live-action epic, "The Ten Commandments."
  53. The General
    Rarely has a veteran filmmaker rejuvenated his career to such startling effect as John Boorman with The General, a fresh-off-the-slab biopic of maverick Irish crime lord Martin Cahill that both challenges and entertains the audience at a variety of levels, as well as reviving the vitality of the helmer's earliest, mid-'60s pics.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    A Simple Plan
    The key differences are in emphasis and tone: “Fargo” is deadpan noir; A Simple Plan, with Bill Paxton and Billy Bob Thornton as Mutt and Jeff siblings, is a more robust Midwestern Gothic that owes as much to Poe as Chandler.
  55. Star Trek: Insurrection
    Even though Frakes is back, Star Trek: Insurrection plays less like a stand-alone sci-fi adventure than like an expanded episode of "Star Trek: The Next Generation."
    • 87 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Shakespeare in Love
    Exquisitely acted, tightly directed and impressively assembled.
  57. Rushmore
    Wickedly funny.
  58. Jack Frost
    Jack Frost is a slickly packaged and engagingly sentimental fantasy-comedy that stands out as one of the season's most pleasant surprises. Pic offers a shrewdly balanced mix of humor, high concept and heart tugging, along with some amusingly impressive special effects.
  59. Little Voice
    A small picture with a big heart.
    • 47 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Psycho
    A faithful-unto-slavish remake of the 1960 Hitchcock classic, pic contains nothing to outrage or offend partisans of the original, yet neither does it stand to add much to their appreciation.
    • 45 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Home Fries
    While plot elements don't add up, film's energy level remains high, and oddball ensemble brings to mind a classic of this type, Jonathan Demme's "Citizens Band."
  62. Very Bad Things
    Basically a very conventional movie gussied up with a few jaw-dropping moments. Unlike genuinely amoral pics such as "Heathers" or "Shallow Grave," it never seems really comfortable with its characters' actions.
  63. A Bug's Life
    Entertaining in a very showbizzy way.
  64. Babe: Pig in the City
    Babe: Pig in the City is tour de force filmmaking that masks its achievement in a good ripping yarn.
  65. Waking Ned Devine
    Bannen and the gawky Kelly, whose screen chemistry is vital to the film's success, make a delightful pair of stumbling shysters, and Jones' script weaves a sizable tapestry of other characters to flesh out the village.
  66. Celebrity
    The spectacle of Kenneth Branagh and Judy Davis doing over-the-top Woody Allen impersonations creates a neurotic energy meltdown in Celebrity, a once-over-lightly rehash of mostly stale Allen themes and motifs.
  67. Central Station
    Montenegro carries the film su-perbly with her portrait of gritty strength being worn down to a state of tattered vulnerability, while newcomer de Oliveira, a shoeshine boy who won the role over 1,500 other aspirants, is engagingly natural and happily doesn't beg for viewer sympathy.
  68. The Rugrats Movie
    Aimed squarely at moppets with minuscule attention spans, “The Rugrats Movie” is a fast and frenetic animated feature that should delight young aficionados of the long-running Nickelodeon TV series.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    August 32nd on Earth
    An appealing though ultimately slight drama about a young woman who is thrown into an emotional tizzy after surviving a bad car crash.
  70. Enemy of the State
    Sporadically entertaining, though it lacks the kind of political urgency and emotional resonance so crucial to many similarly themed '70s movies.
  71. Meet Joe Black
    What might have been an effective fantasy if handled with sophistication and insouciance is instead weighed down by ponderous pacing, overstuffed production values and an instance of miscasting.
  72. I Still Know What You Did Last Summer
    Purists will find the pic's obviousness disappointing, but there's no question that the film delivers a sufficient shock quotient to satisfy its youthful target audience.
  73. Velvet Goldmine
    A constantly imaginative, stylistically lively but dramatically inert chronicle of cultural and sexual rebellion.
  74. The Siege
    A potentially provocative idea is played out to diminishing returns.
    • 41 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Waterboy
    This yahoos-on-the-bayou farce is neither inventive nor outrageous enough.
  76. Elizabeth
    Superior historical soap opera that shrewdly sidesteps all the cliches of British costume drama with its bold, often modern approach.
  77. Gods and Monsters
    Doesn’t always convince, particularly in the last lap. But it’s an engrossing, unusual, imaginatively executed bit of psychological gamesmanship nonetheless.
  78. Belly
    The film is never boring -- there's no question that filmmaker Hype Williams has the fancy moves -- but the rhythmic, stylistic repetition becomes tedious, and serves to keep the audience removed from the story.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Living Out Loud
    This feminist comedy shot through with fantasies about the travails of newly single womanhood strikes some rich chords, but doesn't quite put together a complete tune.
  80. Vampires
    The pleasures are modest but consistent in John Carpenter's Vampires, a part-Western, part-horror flick that doesn't aim too high but nails the range it occupies.
  81. American History X
    Jolting, superbly acted film.
  82. Life Is Beautiful
    Sluggish, uneven and lacking in rhythm, it nonetheless has enough pathos and winning humor.
  83. Pleasantville
    Ingeniously conceived and impressively executed, Pleasantville is a provocative, complex and surprisingly anti-nostalgic parable.
  84. Apt Pupil
    A creepy, well-acted story of contagious evil, Apt Pupil has more than enough chilling dramatic scenes to rivet the attention but suffers from some hokey contrivances and underlying insufficiencies of motivation.
  85. Orgazmo
    Massively inventive and spiked with perversely wicked humor.
  86. The Cruise
    There is unquestionably enough lively material here to snare one’s attention but, even at just 76 minutes, many will feel that this cruise has gone on plenty long enough.
  87. The Last Days
    A hard-hitting, well-organized documentary grounded in the stories of five Hungarian Jews who lived through the Holocaust.
  88. Happiness
    Baker does an amazingly sensitive job with the ticklish part and is joined in this by Read, who is superlative as his inquisitive young son.
  89. Beloved
    At nearly three hours, however, it rather overstays its welcome, trying the patience even as it sustains intrigue regarding its final revelations.
  90. Practical Magic
    Part comedy, part family drama, part romance, part special-effects mystery-adventure, and not entirely satisfying on any of these levels, this hodgepodge suffers from the conflicting sensibilities of its three credited scripters: Robin Swicord, who has done good work before, Akiva Goldsman, who has not, and Adam Brooks.
  91. Bride of Chucky
    After an eight-year series hiatus, Bride of Chucky emerges with recharged batteries and a mordantly funny edge that's attuned to the dawning millennium. [19 Oct 1998]
    • Variety
  92. Holy Man
    Complex issues of ambition and consumerism taken to televangelic levels aren't truly addressed or resolved but simply tied up in a box with the message that love conquers all.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Celebration
    A propulsively inventive but uneven family comedy-cum-melodrama.
  94. Slam
    The fervent performances by the central duo, real-life poets Williams and Sohn (who wrote their own material), are impeccable, clearly stemming from their deep moral commitment to their work.
  95. Flowers of Shanghai
    Gorgeously mounted, but butt-numbingly slow.
  96. What Dreams May Come
    A heaping serving of metaphysical gobbledygook wrapped in a physically striking package.
  97. A Night at the Roxbury
    The track record of SNL-drawn movies is dire ("It's Pat," "Stuart Saves His Family," "Blues Brothers 2000"), and this one stands just a peg higher, as an amiable, if flyweight, di-version.
  98. Antz
    A dazzling delight.
  99. Clay Pigeons
    Visual flourishes (handsomely lensed by Eric Edwards on Utah locales standing in for Montana) are polished but derivative, with too many time-lapse sky views, reminiscent of Van Sant's "My Own Private Idaho."
  100. Ronin
    A pleasurable throwback to the sort of gritty, low-tech international thriller that was a staple of the 1960s.
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