Variety's Scores

Select another publication »
For 17,779 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 2.4 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: 9,134 out of 17779
  2. Mixed: 7,009 out of 17779
  3. Negative: 1,636 out of 17779
17779 movie reviews
view
per page
  1. Delhi Safari
    The picture all too obviously recycles bits and pieces from "Madagascar," "The Lion King" and other made-in-America toons. Unfortunately, much gets lost in the translation.
  2. Allegiance
    The picture's assorted characters, though credible, feel wearisomely one-dimensional, while the pumped-up action, unfolding in a single day, basically consists of an extended game of hide-and-seek.
  3. Let My People Go!
    Let My People Go! offers an unholy alliance of camp and farce that both celebrates and mocks gay and Jewish stereotypes.
  4. Spring Breakers
    Just about every charge of social negligence leveled at Spring Breakers can be countered with an arch claim of intent, which makes it at once playful and wearying; enjoyment is contingent on how little you're willing to fight it.
  5. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales
    The franchise has lost a bit of its luster with every successive installment, but never has a “Pirates” film felt this inessential, this depressingly pro forma.
  6. Machete Kills
    As violent as its predecessor yet noticeably duller and less outrageous, Machete Kills is dragged to the finish line entirely by its director’s madcap energy and an absurd cast of major stars in strange cameos.
  7. Emperor
    Emperor’s bloodless presentation fails on a fundamental dramatic level, playing like the fancy version of a junior-high educational filmstrip, down to the false suspense of Alex Heffes’ corny ticking-clock score.
  8. Grudge Match
    Essentially recasting “Grumpy Old Men” with the senescent specters of Rocky Balboa and Jake LaMotta, the result is sporadically amusing, with some chucklesome sight gags and crowdpleasing supporting turns from Alan Arkin and Kevin Hart, yet it’s all so overcooked that it defeats its own purpose.
  9. Muppets Most Wanted
    Muppets Most Wanted looks and sounds eager to please but immediately feels like a more slapdash, aimless affair, trying — and mostly failing — to turn its stalled creativity into some sort of self-referential joke.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Back to the Future Part II
    The energy and heart which Robert Zemeckis and story-writing partner Bob Gale (who takes solo screenplay credit this time) poured into the ingenious story of part one is diverted into narrative mechanics and camera wizardry in Future II.
  11. Planes
    Diverting in bits and pieces, but absent the heart, soul and ingenuity one associates with the best of Disney animation, the endlessly merchandisable picture could very well soar at the box office, but it won’t stick the landing where word of mouth is concerned.
  12. Saving Lincoln
    The script, while largely historically accurate, is undermined by stilted dialogue, and the picture is laced with ill-fitting parts that wind up literally all over the matte. The result is a film better suited to classrooms than theaters.
  13. The Numbers Station
    Sentencing a sad-looking John Cusack and a hard-working Malin Akerman to roughly 90 minutes of solitary confinement in a poorly lit underground bunker, this glum, juiceless spy thriller is a by-the-numbers affair indeed, unlikely to find an audience on any frequency.
  14. Red Flag
    There's a reason creepy character actors seldom play lead, and Karpovsky's amusingly off-kilter quality is better suited to the background, while Prediger (as the stranger he desperately wants to ditch, lest his ex-g.f. discover his infidelity) has the makings of an indie star.
  15. The Reluctant Fundamentalist
    Mira Nair’s latest immigrant saga saddles itself with a laborious narrative structure and half-baked thriller elements in a misguided attempt to open up what should be an intimate, introspective story.
  16. Hunky Dory
    The picture draws only slight entertainment value from the spectacle of youngsters warbling 1970s pop tunes, like a retro version of “High School Musical” with less charm.
  17. Transcendence
    There are intriguing, half-formed ideas afoot in Transcendence, but the script and Pfister’s heavy, humorless direction tend to reduce everything to simplistic standoffs between good and evil.
  18. Jupiter Ascending
    While the Wachowskis have always put their greatest emphasis on aesthetics, they allow the visual impulse to get the best of them here, investing so much attention in creating unique fashions, technology, architecture and design that they’ve blinded themselves to the huge logical gaps in their own story.
  19. Salinger
    It’s difficult to get past the film’s restless, ill-fittingly bombastic style.
    • 44 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Superman III
    Superman III emerges as a surprisingly soft-cored disappointment. Putting its emphasis on broad comedy at the expense of ingenious plotting and technical wizardry, it has virtually none of the mythic or cosmic sensibility that marked its predecessors.
    • Variety
  21. Antiviral
    Icky though it is, Antiviral never builds the sort of character investment or narrative momentum that would allow its visceral horrors to seriously disturb, rather than seeming like choice gross-out moments lovingly designed for maximum viewer recoil.
  22. Scatter My Ashes at Bergdorf's
    This scattershot documentary — an undiluted advertisement for this temple of high-end consumerism — jumps skittishly from subject to subject, disjointed and repetitive for all but dyed-in-the-wool fashionistas.
  23. Arthur Newman
    Firth and Blunt make a strange couple, and Ariola a musicvideo helmer making his feature debut, should have devoted more time to making the chemistry work than to sustaining the melancholy mood.
  24. Stranded
    Another blandly competent, thoroughly forgettable low-budget sci-fier assembled from the stray parts of other, better movies.
  25. Drinking Buddies
    Relative to the major brands, the intimate, handcrafted approach should yield more flavor. Instead, Drinking Buddies offers mostly froth.
  26. The Colony
    Utterly routine futuristic horror-thriller The Colony substitutes the term “ferals” for plain old zombies (the modern, fast-moving kind), and that’s about it for originality.
  27. Blended
    Blended suffers from a fundamental lack of trust in its audience, following every unexpectedly smart exchange with a numbskull pratfall or one-liner, and every instance of genuine sincerity with an avalanche of schmaltz.
  28. 1st Night
    Many of the actors give performances in line with their low profile here.
  29. Drift
    Manages to get a fair bit right about early 1970s surf culture when it isn’t trafficking in the hoariest of David-vs.-Goliath cliches.
  30. Think Like a Man Too
    Although funnier and mercifully shorter than its 2012 battle-of-the-sexes predecessor, this third collaboration between manic comedian Kevin Hart and director Tim Story (hot on the heels of their January hit “Ride Along”) is an exceedingly formulaic and ultimately exhausting thing to experience.
  31. When the Game Stands Tall
    An inspirational sports drama that goes long on rectitudinous sermonizing but comes up short on gridiron thrills or genuine love for the game.
  32. Tammy
    Falcone’s attempts to spin this flat, formulaic comedy into an affecting character drama are frustrated by filmmaking choices that work against a sense of persuasive reality.
  33. And Now a Word from Our Sponsor
    Plop plop. Fizz fizz. Oh, what a missed opportunity it is! In the well-cast but seldom funny satire And Now a Word From Our Sponsor.
  34. Deliver Us From Evil
    A professionally assembled genre mashup that’s too silly to be scary, and a bit too dull to be a midnight-movie guilty pleasure.
  35. Project Almanac
    Evaluated on the concept’s own terms, the script clearly could have used another do-over or two before Israelite and his cast took the plunge.
  36. A Million Ways to Die in the West
    Seth MacFarlane has delivered a flaccid all-star farce that’s handsomely dressed up with nowhere to go for most of its padded two-hour running time.
  37. Hating Breitbart
    Not so much a probing examination as a fulsome celebration.
  38. Assassin's Creed
    In Assassin’s Creed, Michael Fassbender is like the ultimate special effect. Just by showing up, he confers respectability on two hours of semi-coherent overly art-directed video-game sludge.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Scarecrow
    Scarecrow is a periodically interesting but ultimately unsatisfying character study of two modern drifters.
  40. The Congress
    Apart from its general knock against ageism in Hollywood, The Congress doesn’t have much insight to offer on the subject.
  41. Diana
    While mostly swerving past the pitfall of tastelessness, this sincerely intended account of the last two years of Princess Diana’s life risks an even more perilous roadblock: dullness.
  42. Vampire
    Abundantly goofy, but atmospheric only in spots, this flat-affect screwballer has its moments, and may attract a minor cult.
  43. Age of Uprising: The Legend of Michael Kohlhaas
    Kleist’s direct language and straightforward storytelling are nowhere in evidence in Pallieres’ narratively challenged adaptation, featuring a French-speaking Mads Mikkelsen in one of his least impressive characterizations.
  44. The Rambler
    Bursting with cheap f/x, the pic is often tedious when not repugnant, but it’s hard to dislike.
  45. Fame High
    Director Scott Hamilton Kennedy (“The Garden”) favors formulaic uplift over investigation, failing to offer a p.o.v. on whether young creative people should be driven as mercilessly as these. Lackluster videography further dulls the pic, which culminates in frustratingly fleeting glimpses of the students’ year-end performances.
  46. Three Worlds
    A glossy, well-meaning but dramatically listless study of class relations in contemporary Paris.
  47. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
    Spielberg is such a talented director it’s a shame to see him lose all sense of subtlety and nuance.
  48. Terminator Genisys
    For all its initial playfulness, the script never rises to the level of surreal, cortex-tickling pleasure it seems to be aiming for, and for all its self-awareness it’s weirdly devoid of humor.
  49. The Nut Job
    The critters look cute, but behave less so, while the competing-heists concept never quite takes off.
  50. Beneath
    That sly toying with audience sympathies is, alas, all that’s notable about this otherwise poverty-row quickie produced for the Chiller cable network.
  51. Afternoon Delight
    Although there are moments when it feels the plot might move in unexpected directions, in the end, the expected cliches reign.
  52. Dear Mr. Watterson
    It is, in short, everything you’d expect from a crowd-sourced documentary, designed to celebrate its subject, while mostly just validating the aesthetic taste of its backers.
  53. Tiny Times 1.0
    Without a dominant storyline, the film feels more like a collage of photogenic moments than a full-fledged narrative.
  54. Romeo & Juliet
    Shorn of eroticism, intensity or purpose... it strikes familiar beats in a manner more strained than inspired.
  55. Chennai Express
    Shetty’s need to maintain his characters’ romantic heroism constantly grates against his depictions of their ridiculousness.
  56. Paradise
    Cody shows promise as a director, paving over the bumpy patches with clever song choices, but needs to mix things up if she hopes to continue.
  57. A Teacher
    As first features go, A Teacher demonstrates a willingness to provoke, but doesn’t seem to understand the minimum expectations most audiences place on films in terms of both incident and characterization.
  58. Spark: A Burning Man Story
    "Spark” remains a lovingly made and shot tease, designed to ensure that what really happens at Burning Man stays at Burning Man.
  59. 99%: The Occupy Wall Street Collaborative Film
    A documentary as messy as the movement it tries to portray, 99%: The Occupy Wall Street Collaborative Film possesses energy, passion and about a dozen documentaries inside it yearning to breathe free.
  60. The Loft
    The five leads earn kudos for their ability to come across as something approaching credible.
  61. Winnie Mandela
    Decently acted despite screenplay shortcomings.
  62. Instructions Not Included
    Instructions Not Included is a sporadically amusing but unduly protracted dramedy that slowly — very slowly — devolves into a shameless tearjerker during its third act.
  63. McCanick
    If the drably derivative, infuriatingly improbable police drama McCanick is remembered for anything, it will be for its uniformly overqualified cast.
  64. Mission Park
    The movies by their very nature require a certain suspension of disbelief, but Mission Park requires more suspension than a two-ton crane could provide.
  65. Concussion
    Acquitting herself capably in a lead role that strips her bare in more ways than one, Robin Weigert (HBO’s “Deadwood”) proves worthy of a future in features, whereas first-time writer-director Stacie Passon mainly exposes her background in commercials.
  66. Grace Unplugged
    The makers of Grace Unplugged deserve at least some credit for resisting temptations toward melodramatic excess.
  67. Devil's Knot
    Devil’s Knot only occasionally feels weightier than a high-end Lifetime original or “Law & Order” episode.
  68. Are You Here
    One dead giveaway that the comedy isn’t working is the film’s score, which overcompensates throughout by attempting to bolster every second with bouncy energy.
  69. Arise
    Despite an impressive global scope and admirable ethnic diversity among the interview subjects, the central thesis that women are leading the charge on green issues receives nothing but anecdotal support.
  70. The Last Days on Mars
    While it earns high marks for Jon Henson’s production design, this murkily derivative sci-fi-horror entry sets its sights disappointingly low in terms of story and ideas.
  71. Addicted
    The sudsy quality of the production ensures all the performers look terrific, but aren’t given particularly impressive material to work with.
  72. Sal
    While Sal means to honor its subject, it’s too clunky and amateurish to really illuminate him.
  73. Wedding Palace
    Too many stretches of Wedding Palace are so garishly lit and broadly overplayed that they seem more cartoonish than the actual animated sequences that pepper the live-action production. That’s a pity, since this indie romantic comedy is not without its minor charms during its infrequent quiet moments.
  74. In the Heart of the Sea
    In the Heart of the Sea feels stiff and unconvincing, weirdly devoid of texture, and populated by ciphers who speak primarily in the leaden language of exposition.
  75. In Secret
    Serviceable but uninspired, this latest version of Emile Zola’s much-adapted 1867 novel “Therese Raquin” sends its characters to their doom on schedule without stirring much sense of tragedy or emotional involvement.
  76. Horrible Bosses 2
    This inane and incredibly tasteless sequel qualifies as an excuse to bring back those hard-working funnymen Jason Bateman, Charlie Day and Jason Sudeikis for another round of amateur-criminal hijinks and semi-improvised vulgarity, jabbing away repeatedly at some elusive comic sweet spot where blatant nastiness and egregious stupidity collide — and very occasionally hitting the mark.
  77. Besharam
    Kashyap relies completely on star Ranbir Kapoor to put over this relentless reiteration of cliches and, admittedly, the actor invests his aggressively tasteless, crotch-grabbing antics with enough energy and humor to make it palatable, but only just.
  78. Cooper and Hemingway: The True Gen
    Once Mulholland has established that both men hark back to a bygone, Teddy Roosevelt-fostered image of laconic masculinity, his peculiar vantage point generates little insight into the psychology and accomplishments of either man, as “The True Gen” abandons biographical logic in favor of a catalogue of arbitrary differences and similarities.
  79. Hellbenders
    Hellbenders becomes what it intends to burlesque, and that’s not so damn funny, even with 3D gimmickry.
  80. Last Love
    Last Love sticks to a flaccid middle ground lacking any real drama or pathos.
  81. Our Day Will Come
    Once it’s evident that there’s hardly a point to all the random mischief — or that the point is precisely that there isn’t one — the idea of watching a pair of grown men inflect violence upon innocent bystanders feels awfully tedious
  82. Son of God
    A clumsily edited feature-length version of five episodes from History’s hugely popular 10-hour miniseries “The Bible,” this stiff, earnest production plays like a half-hearted throwback to the British-accented biblical dramas of yesteryear, its smallscreen genesis all too apparent in its Swiss-cheese construction and subpar production values.
  83. Victor Frankenstein
    This reimagining features some fun production design and a performance of undiluted bug-eyed flamboyance from James McAvoy as the titular pale student of unhallowed arts, but its reservoirs of energy and ingenuity run dry long before the finale, leaving the film to lumber to its half-hearted conclusion.
  84. One Chance
    What keeps One Chance plugging along almost in spite of itself are the warmly engaging performances of Corden and Alexandra Roach.
  85. The End of Time
    Intermittently interesting but more often pretentious, this sluggish exploration of time as real and conceived concepts rarely does more than regurgitate philosophical platitudes without locating the depth to make them interesting.
  86. Immigrant
    The storyline develops so erratically that it lacks any internal momentum, with some scenes unfolding in exhaustive detail and others seemingly missing, as if whole chunks had been shot and later edited out.
  87. The Ghosts in Our Machine
    This off-putting pic requires open minds and iron nerves.
  88. Faust
    [A] film with a maddeningly opaque narrative and a brutalizing cascade of nonstop verbiage.
  89. The Truth About Emanuel
    Played flatly head-on with some poetic pretensions, the concept never becomes particularly credible or appealing.
  90. Everyday
    As the years go by and the kids grow — perhaps the only real benefit of Winterbottom’s approach — time begins to run together, making it all too easy for the mind to wander.
  91. Beatocello’s Umbrella
    More scenes of Richner’s admirable efforts in the hospital and fewer expressions of admiration by the doctors and nurses he trains would also have helped to anchor the film’s sincere but repetitive hosannas.
  92. Insidious: Chapter 3
    Whereas Wan (who retains a producer credit here, and makes a cameo appearance) is the sort of director who can effortlessly turn a billowing curtain or creaking floorboard into an unbearable portent of dread, Whannell rarely makes the neck hairs quiver, let alone stand at attention.
  93. The Purge: Anarchy
    For all the philosophical and metaphorical shortcomings of his script, however, DeMonaco is an efficient orchestrator of action.
  94. Sugar
    Its compassion and careful sidestepping of exploitation tropes can’t make up for a fundamental lack of depth and urgency in the storytelling.
  95. Alice Through the Looking Glass
    The problem with “Alice” is its lack of narrative imagination.
  96. Regression
    Though performed with some perspiring conviction by Emma Watson and Ethan Hawke — as a confessed victim of cult abuse and the agnostic cop investigating her case — the pic is neither disquieting enough to take seriously, nor lurid enough for fright-night indulgence.
  97. Gimme Shelter
    The film is hamstrung by its fidelity to real-life inspirational models.
  98. The Wedding Ringer
    A well-cast but clumsily assembled buddy-for-hire comedy that increasingly smacks of desperation as it approaches its big-day climax.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Big Trouble in Little China
    Director John Carpenter seems to be trying to make an action-adventure along the lines of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. The effect goes horribly awry.
Page:

Top Trailers

See all »
See all trailers »