Variety's Scores

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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
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  1. The Sea Inside
    A dramatic triumph.
  2. Smoking Causes Coughing
    It’s a film of fragmentary but funny rewards — funnier still, most likely, if accompanied by smoking of a different kind.
  3. The Others
    A luxuriously old-fashioned star vehicle custom-fit to its topliner's strengths, which come across to sensational effect.
  4. Fake It So Real
    The title is an apt one, suggesting that for all its staging and overt theatrics, independent (read: non-WWF) pro wrestling makes huge demands on the body and spirit.
  5. Flushed Away
    Result is a kidpic long on invention but short on likability.
  6. Catherine Called Birdy
    The movie wouldn’t have worked half as well had Dunham not discovered Ramsey, a “Game of Thrones” veteran soon to be seen in HBO’s “The Last of Us.” The young actor has a face one might find in a medieval Madonna portrait and a rowdy contemporary sensibility that makes her instantly relatable.
  7. Mary and The Witch's Flower
    It’s here in the movie’s more fantastical details that Yonebayashi’s imagination runs free — and Studio Ponoc’s potential shines brightest. The world they’ve created may not be logical, but it is intuitive, as Mary adapts to whatever hallucinatory wonder or obstacle the filmmakers can throw at her
  8. The Measure of a Man
    Brize (“Mademoiselle Chambon”) makes compelling drama out of the most ordinary of circumstances, and draws a lead performance from frequent collaborator Vincent Lindon that is a veritable master class in understated humanism.
  9. Like Crazy
    Boasting a deliriously loquacious script together with a rare understanding of how to balance certain Italian caricatures with a grounding sense of realism – a combination that’s truly Virzì’s forte – the film takes two psychologically damaged women...and makes them into a mutually supportive duo who surprisingly touch our emotions.
  10. Western
    Viewers who don’t share the director’s obvious affection for his often funny characters will find the pic too long and too diffuse, but its cumulative rewards are ample.
  11. My Old Ass
    To its credit, this future classic is honest about adolescent desire, self-questioning sexual identity issues and all kinds of other behavior that sends worried moms and dads into meltdown mode.
  12. Thirteen Conversations About One Thing
    This intelligent, engaging indie sets out to find a few answers and in the process introduces a clutch of interesting, very human characters.
  13. Barcelona
    After examining the rarefied world of debutante socialites with wit and obvious expertise in “Metropolitan,” Stillman opens up his artistic universe a bit more here and displays an increased ease with filmmaking craf
  14. Black
    This easily exportable, minority-driven drama has the potential to launch the careers of its young directors and cast.
  15. The Cakemaker
    Tracing with exemplary sensitivity the unlikely bond formed between a gay German baker and the Jerusalem-based widow of the man they both loved, Graizer’s film works a complex range of social and religious tensions into its heartsore narrative, without ever feeling sanctimonious or button-pushing.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Hunchback of Notre Dame
    The new film should further secure Disney’s dominance in animation, and connoisseurs of the genre, old and young, will have plenty to savor.
  17. Gordon Lightfoot: If You Could Read My Mind
    Highly entertaining documentary about the folk-pop troubadour of Canada.
  18. Jackass Forever
    You can only hope, for these dudes’ sakes, that “Jackass” isn’t forever. But for now it’s earning its yucks, and its yuck.
  19. Duck Season
    This slight but appealing film's funky eccentricity feels a little contrived at times.
  20. Inception
    If Inception is a metaphysical puzzle, it's also a metaphorical one: It's hard not to draw connections between Cobb's dream-weaving and Nolan's filmmaking -- an activity devoted to constructing a simulacrum of reality, intended to seduce us, mess with our heads and leave a lasting impression. Mission accomplished.
  21. Serenity
    What makes Serenity refreshing is its avoidance of CGI, which gives the pic a much more human dimension; the evident chemistry between the cast; and a humor that doesn't rely simply on flip one-liners.
  22. Mysterious Object at Noon
    Result is a weird hodgepodge that has the audience doing mental somersaults in an attempt to keep up with this highly original festival head-scratcher.
  23. The Life of Jesus
    An uncompromising portrait of thwarted emotions and small-town tedium, The Life of Jesus is a luminous and disconcerting feature debut from scripter-helmer Bruno Dumont. Pic’s deliberate pace, as it details the actions of adolescents with stifled inner lives, poses a commercial obstacle in markets unfriendly to leisurely fare, but film holds definite rewards for patient viewers and fest auds.
  24. The Three Musketeers - Part 2: Milady
    For readers of Alexandre Dumas’ novel, extravagant French adaptation “The Three Musketeers – Part II: Milady” packs its share of surprises: killing off important characters, sparing others and reimagining allegiances that have stood for nearly two centuries.
  25. Ghost Town Anthology
    Mysteries remain mysteries, and the value isn’t in finding answers but in emotionally exploring where the questions take you.
  26. Computer Chess
    Computer Chess is ultimately too slack and scattershot to work consistently well as a comedy.
  27. Paris 05:59: Théo & Hugo
    There’s something stirringly essential about Paris 05:59, partly thanks to the late-night-inspired sensation that Theo and Hugo have the world to themselves, and can make it into whatever they want.
  28. Casting JonBenét
    Director Kitty Green’s high-concept documentary Casting JonBenét breaks fresh ground, probing the public, rather than family members or suspects (often the same thing).
  29. The Last King of Scotland
    In the end, The Last King of Scotland is much better when it plays it cool and amusing than when it tries to ramp up outrage and indignation.
  30. After Innocence
    A powerfully affecting documentary.
  31. Cast Away
    Meticulous, sumptuous production design, and striking visuals compensate for the lack of dramatic momentum in a film that arguably stretches narrative form to its limits.
  32. Caucus
    [A] fascinating but only intermittently insightful film.
  33. Unrelated
    A thinly scripted mood piece centered on an estranged fortysomething among vacationing friends in Italy, Unrelated doesn’t carry the viewer along with its protag’s emotional problems.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Trouble with Harry
    This is a blithe little comedy, produced and directed with affection by Alfred Hitchcock, about a bothersome corpse that just can't stay buried.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Gun Crazy
    Script points up the physical attraction between Dall and Cummins but, despite the emphasis, it is curiously cold and lacking in genuine emotions. Fault is in the writing and direction, both staying on the surface and never getting underneath the characters.
  36. Farewell
    It's juicy, fascinating stuff, well orchestrated by Carion and finely thesped -- especially by Kusturica.
  37. The Orphanage
    A fastidiously grim ghost story that rattles the bones of the haunted-house genre and finds plenty of fresh (but not too bloody) meat.
  38. Restore Point
    Marrying glossy mainstream genre aesthetics to probing, elaborately conceived speculative storytelling, this is a notably ambitious and auspiciously well-realized first feature for Hloz: the kind that appears to be flaunting his capabilities for even bigger international and Hollywood assignments.
  39. Bones and All
    Bones and All is a concept in search of a story. The film doesn’t draw us in. It stumbles and lurches and seems to make itself up as it goes along. You may feel eaten alive with boredom.
  40. The Bleeding Edge
    The Bleeding Edge needs to be seen, so that it can change hearts and minds.
  41. Motel Destino
    As an erotic thriller, it’s more preoccupied with the first half of that term than the second, and that’s just fine.
  42. Dune: Part One
    Dune is out to wow us, and sometimes succeeds, but it also wants to get under your skin like a hypnotically toxic mosquito. It does…until it doesn’t.
  43. Le jour avant le lendemain
    A profound, elemental and hauntingly beautiful period drama that makes an intimate story of endurance into a metaphor for an entire culture.
  44. Cheatin'
    The writer-director-producer’s pulsing, pencil-etched, pastel-hued animation style is a pleasure to behold as ever.
  45. The Invitation
    This well-acted, beautifully modulated exercise represents director Karyn Kusama’s strongest work in years, revealing an assurance of tone, craft and purpose that haven’t been in evidence since her Sundance prize-winning debut, “Girlfight.”
  46. A Woman's Life
    A Woman’s Life has the kind of majesty found not in the grand gesture but the modest detail, the kind that accumulates resonance with each seemingly minor event until the picture of a character becomes as complete as a painting by Ingres. Or a story by Maupassant.
  47. Roxanne Roxanne
    It’s a vivid and unusually honest drama about the pain and bravado that were the fuel of hip-hop.
  48. End of the Century
    At the picture’s best, it recalls Michael Winterbottom's "24 Hour Party People" in its tribute to the music of the times and the way in which that music provided a voice to a generation of social misfits.
  49. Red Lights
    Splendidly sinuous twister Red Lights sees Gallic helmer Cedric Kahn ("Roberto Succo") take his game to the next level with this inky comic thriller.
  50. Ocean's Eleven
    An all-star remake of the all-star original, Ocean's Eleven is a lark for everybody concerned, including the audience. Breezy, nonchalant and without a thing on its mind except having a little fun.
  51. Raja
    Intriguing, provocative and very well acted.
  52. They Shot the Piano Player
    Jazz and animation make for strong bedfellows in They Shot the Piano Player, a film from Spanish directors Fernando Trueba and Javier Mariscal that represents an intriguing hybrid in all sorts of ways.
  53. In the Shadow of Women
    A tightly focused romantic drama that exudes the narrative terseness of a good short story and the lucid craftsmanship of a filmmaker in full command of the medium.
  54. Wonder Boys
    Massively inventive, Wonder Boys is spiked with fresh, perverse humor that flows naturally from the straight-faced playing.
  55. The Oldest Person in the World
    Delightfully insightful ... Whatever comes next (and the movie makes a beautiful kind of peace with not knowing), Green has given his subjects an incredible gift: the kind of immortality only cinema can provide.
  56. Forty Shades of Blue
    A muted but nicely observed study of a Russian woman's gradual estrangement from her domineering Memphis music-legend husband.
  57. Buñuel in the Labyrinth of the Turtles
    Though undeniably charming, Buñuel can be a difficult character to like here, but that’s the point: The movie dares to imagine the exact moment when Buñuel the callow prankster became Buñuel, engaged anthropologist of the human condition, whose later Mexico City masterpiece “Los Olvidados” was clearly informed by what he witnessed in Las Hurdes.
  58. Mysterious Skin
    By turns spiky and lyrical, this unsettling drama will be anathema to many audiences, but is bound to be a provocative, talked-about release.
  59. Rush
    Not just one of the great racing movies of all time, but a virtuoso feat of filmmaking in its own right, elevated by two of the year’s most compelling performances.
  60. The Time That Remains
    As in "Divine," there's an uneven quality to Suleiman's often surreal ideas, but in general there are way more hits than misses this time round, some of them laugh-out-loud.
  61. Mean Creek
    Estes' debut feature's strength lies in its crackling intensity, ultra-sharp character insights and an affinity for teenage protagonists who look and sound like real teens.
  62. Bully
    Lee Hirsch's "The Bully Project" serves as a call to action against abuse of students by their peers as it follows, over the course of a year, five sobering case histories of unrelenting schoolyard persecution.
  63. The Half of It
    It’s also made fresh by the myriad literary and cinematic references Wu weaves into Aster’s correspondence with “Paul.” With its slightly nerdy, play-on-wordy title, The Half of It alludes to the ancient Greek belief that two-faced humans were separated by the gods, devoting their lives to finding their lost soulmates (if you like the idea, read Plato’s “Symposium,” or check out “Hedwig and the Angry Inch”).
    • 74 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Magnificent Seven
    Until the women and children arrive on the scene about two-thirds of the way through, The Magnificent Seven is a rip-roaring rootin' tootin' western with lots of bite and tang and old-fashioned abandon.
  65. Mongol: The Rise of Genghis Khan
    This Central Asia-set historical epic from Russian helmer Sergei Bodrov ("Nomad") boasts breathtaking landscapes, dazzling cinematography, bloody battles and unique traditions.
  66. Kundun
    Ultimately Kundun emerges as a movie that's hypnotic without being truly compelling, sensuously stunning but not illuminating.
  67. Winnie the Pooh
    The desire to stay true to what was lovable and enduring about the originals is palpable throughout, down to the amusing storybook conceit of having the characters interact not only with the narrator (voiced by John Cleese), but also with the letters and punctuation marks on the page.
  68. Armageddon Time
    The movie ends with a rebel gesture that feels too much like…a gesture. It’s the perfect sign-off for a drama that cares, but maybe not enough to see that this kind of caring actually became part of the problem
  69. Munich
    Beautifully made pic will spur newsy media coverage and possible consternation on both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian divide, but members of the general public will be glancing at their watches rather than having epiphanies about world peace.
  70. Lovesong
    Lovesong makes a virtue of restraint as it traces a complex emotional history in two parts, and innumerable (and sometimes quite literal) shades of gray.
  71. Thelma
    At times a tad too subtle, Thelma is nonetheless an unnervingly effective slow-burn, and those with the patience for Trier’s patient accumulation of detail will find it pays off in unexpected ways.
  72. Plan B
    Plan B is a girls-behaving-badly all-night-long road-trip comedy that’s built on a formula chassis, but it’s fast and funny, with a scandalous spirit, and it’s got a couple of lead performances that, if there’s any justice, should have the town talking.
  73. Take My Eyes
    Handles the subject of domestic violence with intelligence and compassion.
  74. Colette
    Less stuffy literary biopic than ever-relevant female-empowerment saga, Colette ranks as one of the great roles for which Keira Knightley will be remembered.
  75. Little Sister
    Clark’s fifth feature is marked by his characteristic brand of distorted realism, though a classically redemptive arc — with even a hint of spiked sentimentality — sounds a new note in his oeuvre.
  76. The Workshop
    A sly, supple and repeatedly surprising collision of literary, moral and political lines of debate that marks an enthralling return to form for writer-director Laurent Cantet.
  77. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem
    The movie’s mostly just meant to be fun, and that it is, skewing young while giving lifelong fans (including those who grew up on the Turtles) plenty to geek out about.
  78. Millions
    Maintains a bankable charm and innocence even when overdrawn on the special effects side.
  79. Disobedience
    None of these three characters are tidy, but neither is desire, nor faith, nor love, and Lelio resists every opportunity to make them so.
  80. Judy Berlin
    Numerous lovely, quirky moments.
  81. East Is East
    A sprightly acted, warm and often extremely funny ensemble comedy.
  82. The Legend of Drunken Master
    Well positioned to slake the thirst of action fans for world-class, slam-bang rough stuff.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Dangerous Liaisons
    The real problem is Malkovich's Valmont. This sly actor conveys the character's snaky, premeditated Don Juanism. But he lacks the devilish charm and seductiveness one senses Valmont would need to carry off all his conquests.
  84. Pin Cushion
    Cinematically, Pin Cushion goes all in on a heightened, macramé-and-macaroons aesthetic that occasionally smothers the rawer nerves of its storytelling.
  85. Commune
    Often mocked and rarely understood, the movement in communal living that blossomed with Flower Power in the '60s gets its most honest appraisal yet on film with Jonathan Berman's Commune.
  86. Becoming Cousteau
    Becoming Cousteau, Liz Garbus’s ardent and transporting documentary, is one of those movies that puts a life together so beautifully that you feel it heightening your awareness of everyday things.
  87. Eat That Question: Frank Zappa in His Own Words
    Thorsten Schutte’s entirely archival assemblage is most likely to be appreciated by the previously converted, as its stimulating if somewhat patchy overview of a multi-various career skims over or omits too many aspects to comprise a definitive introduction.
  88. In the Line of Fire
    What neophyte scripterscripter Jeff Maguire's plot comes down to, however, is the cat-and-mouse game between Horrigan and Leary, and the craftiness and strategies involved on both sides, while not exactly ingenious, are tantalizing enough to compel interest.
  89. Love, Gilda
    Love, Gilda is plain but beautifully crafted. It draws you close to Radner, presenting her rise through the world of ’70s comedy as a journey of discovery.
  90. Hidden Figures
    Hidden Figures is empowerment cinema at its most populist, and one only wishes that the film had existed at the time it depicts — though ongoing racial tensions and gender double-standards suggest that perhaps we haven’t come such a long way, baby.
  91. Sylvie's Love
    More even than Declan Quinn’s sumptuously old-school cinematography and the throwback styling and stock footage exteriors that deliberately mimic the Technicolor romances of old, it’s the fresh-faced naiveté of the storytelling that feels so anachronistic.
  92. Eno
    The appeal of “Eno” — like the appeal of Brian Eno himself — is that the film conjures a wholehearted and accessible experience within an experimental veneer.
  93. Assassins
    Assassins is a terrific true-crime story, but it’s also a documentary thriller about the new world disorder.
  94. Robin Williams: Come Inside My Mind
    Zenovich, the director of “Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired,” offers just what you want from a documentary like this one: She brings us closer to events that have been covered many times, deepening — or overturning — what we think we know about them.
  95. Plan C
    Urgent and unvarnished, Tracy Droz Tragos’ documentary Plan C is an early entry in what might be considered post-Roe cinema, focusing less on pro-choice ideology than on the practicalities of ensuring choice in a system increasingly stacked against the idea.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Heart Like a Wheel
    Heart Like A Wheel is a surprisingly fine biopic of Shirley Muldowney, the first professional female race car driver. What could have been a routine good ol' gal success story has been heightened into an emotionally involving, superbly made drama.
  97. Sand Storm
    The director juggles different points of view with aplomb, and her strong script addresses with impressive subtlety the gap between what people say and what they do under extreme pressure.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Panic in Needle Park
    The Panic in Needle Park is a total triumph. Gritty, gutsy, compelling, and vivid to the point of revulsion, it is an overpowering tragedy about urban drug addiction.
  99. The Line
    While The Line doesn’t offer an especially unique take on this milieu, it plays well and acts as a solid showcase for its young cast.
  100. A Woman in Berlin
    A stately, intermittently gripping, ultimately overlong drama.
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