Variety's Scores

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For 17,771 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 2.5 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: 9,130 out of 17771
  2. Mixed: 7,005 out of 17771
  3. Negative: 1,636 out of 17771
17771 movie reviews
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  1. Sirât
    This thrilling directorial confidence, given his film’s elegant opacities and ambiguities, is a quality to marvel at, even as it’s binding your hands and tying you to your seat and forcing you to watch, possibly against your will.
  2. The Ballad of Suzanne Césaire
    “Ballad” is assembled with such peculiar, calm exactness that it actually resembles a series of experiments in simplicity.
  3. Steve
    A profoundly moving and superbly acted diamond in the rough, Steve is better than anything the streamer has pushed for best picture to date.
  4. Magellan
    The spirit of slow cinema is alive and languid in this stunningly mounted, politically rigorous work, which confronts any viewers hoping for a sweeping biographical romp with a frank post-colonial perspective, thoroughly and violently dismantling any romanticized legacy trailing the eponymous Portuguese navigator.
  5. Blue Heron
    Sophy Romvari‘s graceful, singularly heartsore debut feature has a sharp understanding of how memories form and age: Often it’s the incidental, ambient details you recall as vividly as the more significant events at hand.
  6. Remake
    Remake is extraordinarily clear-eyed for a work so broken-hearted: at once a home movie, an intimate diary and an expansive study of the filmmaker’s purpose, constantly disrupting its own conclusions with expressions of anger, amusement and still-unresolved confusion.
  7. EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert
    There’s a purity and natural-born dazzle to EPiC. What you see is what you get: Elvis in the raw, driven by the awareness that it doesn’t get any better than that.
  8. Silent Friend
    Strange, enrapturing, simultaneously vast and minute, Enyedi’s latest spends a lot of time considering how we perceive our surrounding flora — but just as much on how it perceives us, which is where it starts to get a bit special, and even a bit sexy.
  9. The White House Effect
    Engrossing as well as damning.
  10. Newport & the Great Folk Dream
    Newport & the Great Folk Dream is a rapturous documentary — elegant and transporting, full of scratchy lyrical black-and-white images and performances that have a timeless power.
  11. The World of Love
    Expertly balancing its lighter and darker themes while unfolding with almost documentary-like realism, The World of Love rings achingly true at every humorous and heartbreaking turn.
  12. Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma
    A steamy stew of sex, death, VHS and junk food, as though workshopped by Eros, Thanatos, Colonel Sanders and the Jolly Rancher in the seediest recesses of a Blockbuster Video, Schoenbrun’s delirious third film is their most accomplished, most persuasive and most playful movie yet.
  13. Josephine
    While some might find it triggering, “Josephine” dares to confront the life-shattering intersection of sex and violence in our culture, facing the toughest of “adult situations” with clear eyes.
  14. The Invite
    The Invite is marvelously entertaining, but part of the reason for that is that I think a lot of people are going to see themselves mirrored in this movie, which for all its sharp-tongued bravura is humane enough to play a truth game that rings true.
  15. Leviticus
    This outstanding debut from writer-director Adrian Chiarella organically marries blood-curdling fright with incisive social commentary.
  16. Yellow Letters
    At its core is the kind of cinema that has long sustained the medium at large: the family drama. But it’s presented here with invigorating flourishes that encircle the story within specific moments in time, while also granting it a stirring dramatic transcendence. The scope of its ambition is met, at every turn, by deft control over what is witnessed, and how.
  17. Closure
    With a standout central protagonist and an urgent quest that is every parent’s nightmare, the film plays like a thriller but manages to deliver honest and piercing emotions at almost every sequence along the way.
  18. Brian
    That such a hefty topic can be used to create such breathless, eye-watering comedy without tipping into self-indulgence — and without robbing the film of its most meaningful drama — is practically a miracle.
  19. Avatar
    Avatar is all-enveloping and transporting, with Cameron & Co.'s years of R&D paying off with a film that, as his work has done before, raises the technical bar and throws down a challenge for the many other filmmakers toiling in the sci-fi/fantasy realm.
  20. Up in the Air
    The timing in the Clooney-Farmiga scenes is like splendid tennis, with each player surprising the other with shots but keeping the rally going to breathtaking duration.
  21. The White Ribbon
    Immaculately crafted in beautiful black-and-white and entirely absorbing through its longish running time, Michael Haneke’s The White Ribbon nonetheless proves a difficult film to entirely embrace.
  22. A Single Man
    Like the speck of sand that seeds a pearl, it’s the tiny fleck of kitsch at the heart of “A Single Man” that makes it luminous and treasurable, despite its imperfections.
  23. Fish Tank
    What makes the picture feel special is its unflinching honesty and lack of sentimentality or moralizing, along with assured direction and excellent performances.
  24. Sita Sings the Blues
    Paley sustains a consistently funny, sometimes even self-deprecatory comic tone.
  25. District 9
    Though compelling throughout, District 9 never becomes outright terrifying, largely because Blomkamp is less interested in exploiting his aliens for cheap scares than in holding up a mirror to our own bloodthirsty, xenophobic species.
  26. The Men Who Stare at Goats
    A superbly written loony-tunes satire, played by a tony cast at the top of its game.
  27. Ponyo
    Though targeted at tots, Ponyo may appeal most to jaded adults thirsty for wondrous beauty and unpackaged innocence
  28. Sideways
    A beautifully observed, small-scale study of personal foibles, romantic uncertainty and two sides of the sadly predictable male animal.
  29. The Hangover
    At once raucously free-wheeling and meticulously contrived, picture satisfies as a boys-gone-wild laff riot that also clicks as a seriocomic beat-the-clock detective story.
  30. In the Loop
    Intelligent political satire this expertly acted is nothing to sneeze at.
  31. Bright Star
    Breaking through any period-piece mustiness with piercing insight into the emotions and behavior of her characters, the writer-director examines the final years in the short life of 19th-century romantic poet John Keats through the eyes of his beloved, Fanny Brawne, played by Abbie Cornish in an outstanding performance.
  32. A Town Called Panic
    A sparkly little gem.
  33. The Departed
    This reworking of a popular Hong Kong picture pulses with energy, tangy dialogue and crackling performances from a fine cast.
  34. Goodbye Solo
    Utterly engrossing dual-character study, unfolding with a serene disregard for indie quirkiness, Goodbye Solo radiates authenticity.
  35. The Best of Youth
    At nearly six hours, pic's extreme length lets Giordana and screenwriters Sandro Petraglia and Stefano Rulli build up a novelistic rhythm, pulling the audience so deeply and forcefully into their story that it becomes like a enveloping dream; when it's over, parting with the characters is truly sweet and sorrowful.
  36. Werckmeister Harmonies
    A stunning feature -- another hypnotic meditation on popular demagogy and mental manipulation.
  37. Rachel Getting Married
    Brimming with energy, elan and the unpredictability of his "Something Wild," Jonathan Demme's triumphant Rachel Getting Married may just lay the wedding film to rest, being such a hard act to follow.
  38. Turtles Can Fly
    Ghobadi in this pic displays a complete command of his art as he shifts between -- and even blends -- wrenching tragedy and amusing comedy.
  39. Persepolis
    This autobiographical tour de force is completely accessible and art of a very high order.
  40. Letters from Iwo Jima
    Taken together, "Flags" and "Letters" represent a genuinely imposing achievement, one that looks at war unflinchingly -- that does not deny its necessity but above all laments the human loss it entails.
  41. Fat Girl
    Despite the disappointing conclusion, it's hard not to be affected by the film, because of the director's frank approach to her subject and the sheer skill with which she tells her story.
  42. The Queen
    Tradition and informality collide -- and mutually benefit -- in the deliciously written and expertly played The Queen.
  43. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
    Dazzlingly well made and perhaps deliberately less fanciful than the previous entries, this one is played in a mode closer to palpable life-or-death drama than any of the others and is quite effective as such.
  44. Babel
    Effectively building dread and emotional tension as tragic incidents triggered by human stupidity and carelessness steadily multiply, this film, like "21 Grams" in particular, employs a deterministically grim mindset in the cause of its philosophical aspirations, but is gripping nearly all the way.
  45. Zodiac
    Conveying an astonishing array of information across a long narrative arc while still maintaining dramatic rhythm and tension, this adaptation of Robert Graysmith's bestseller reps by far director David Fincher's most mature and accomplished work.
  46. The Savages
    Jenkins brings a rigor, intelligence and eye for the slightly absurd to the proceedings that is instantly disarming.
  47. United 93
    The result is a tense, documentary-style drama that methodically builds a sense of dread despite the preordained outcome.
  48. 28 Weeks Later
    A full-bore zombie romp that more than delivers the genre goods.
  49. Duplicity
    Smart, droll and dazzling to look at and listen to, writer-director Tony Gilroy's effervescent, intricately plotted puzzler proves in every way superior to his 2007 success "Michael Clayton."
  50. The Bourne Ultimatum
    A pounding, pulsating thriller that provides an almost constant adrenaline surge for nearly two hours.
  51. Downfall
    Not so much a Hitler movie as a portrait of a totalitarian machine's spiritual and emotional collapse, Downfall is a cumulatively powerful Goetterdammerung centered on the last 10 days of the bunkered Fuehrer and those around him.
  52. Intimate Stories
    Endowed with captivating simplicity, gentle humor, rich humanity and infectious generosity of spirit.
  53. Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith
    Emerges as the best in the overall series since "The Empire Strikes Back."
  54. 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.
  55. 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.
  56. 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.
  57. War of the Worlds
    A gritty, intense and supremely accomplished sci-fier.
  58. Duma
    A superior all-ages adventure pic made by a filmmaker who knows more than a thing or two about the genre.
  59. Corpse Bride
    An endearingly schizoid Frankenstein of a movie, by turns relentlessly high-spirited and darkly poignant.
  60. Ballets Russes
    Enormously absorbing.
    • 90 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Passenger (re-release)
    Nicholson plays the character with personal flair, as penetrating as Antonioni's handling of the film. (Review of Original Release)
  62. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
    Last year's "The Prisoner of Azkaban" seemed dark, but this excellent fourth film derived from J.K. Rowling's books is the darkest "Potter" yet, intense enough to warrant a PG-13 rating.
  63. Gilles' Wife
    Told primarily via body language and facial expressions with a minimum of dialogue, beautifully observed, emotionally intense tale is an ambitious and rewarding outing for Frederic Fonteyne.
  64. King Kong
    Almost too much of a good thing, Peter Jackson's remake of the film that made him want to make movies is a super-sized version of a yarn that was big to begin with, a stupendous adventure that maximizes, and sometimes oversells, its dazzling wares.
  65. The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada
    Outstandingly realized on all levels.
  66. The Power of Nightmares: The Rise of the Politics of Fear
    A superb, eye-opening and often absurdly funny deconstruction of the myths and realities of global terrorism that is marked by a balance, broadmindedness and sense of historical perspective so absent from many recent political-themed documentaries.
  67. Fateless
    Exquisitely modulated and superbly mounted, the directing debut of skilled cinematographer Lajos Koltai went through an extended, unpredictable production history to emerge as a genuinely new way of looking at the Holocaust that is markedly different in tone from other such stories including "Schindler's List" and "The Pianist."
  68. Why We Fight
    Picture sets the gold standard for political documentaries.
  69. Who Gets to Call It Art?
    Lively, intelligent collage, both richly complex and immediately accessible.
  70. Merry Christmas
    A period drama marbled with humor, bold gestures and bittersweet consequences.
  71. Metal: A Headbanger's Journey
    Superbly crafted documentary is strong enough to make believers out of non-metalheads, and inside enough to get the devil's-horns salute from the most diehard followers.
  72. The Death of Mr. Lazarescu
    Picture's dour take on the dehumanizing process of medical treatment is leavened by black humor and dialogue that always rings true.
  73. Water
    Deftly balancing epic sociopolitical scope with intimate human emotions, all polished to a high technical gloss, Deepa Mehta's Water is a profoundly moving drama.
  74. A Prairie Home Companion
    Rib-ticklingly funny at times and genial as all get-out.
  75. Superman Returns
    Grandly conceived and sensitively drawn.
  76. Mutual Appreciation
    If John Cassavetes had directed a script by Eric Rohmer, the result might have looked and sounded like Mutual Appreciation.
  77. I Trust You to Kill Me
    Deftly mixing alternating tracks of playful rowdiness, thoughtful introspection, ferociously slamming rock and not-so-quiet desperation, helmer Manu Boyer scores impressively with I Trust You to Kill Me, arguably the best rockumentary since "Some Kind of Monster."
  78. American Hardcore
    Excellent documentary American Hardcore chronicles the short-lived but influential musical moment when a defiantly anti-commercial underground put a distinctive U.S. stamp on the hitherto Brit-driven punk movement.
  79. Flags of Our Fathers
    Ambitiously tackling his biggest canvas to date, Clint Eastwood continues to defy and triumph over the customary expectations for a film career in Flags of Our Fathers.
  80. Flicka
    It's not really either an animal or a kids' film but rather a young adult drama that rings emotionally true.
  81. Requiem
    Stunningly played story of faith vs. family.
  82. Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan
    Uproariously funny mockumentary.
  83. Volver
    Peopled with superbly drawn, attractive characters smoothly integrated into a well-turned, low-tricks plotline, Volver may rep Almodovar's most conventional piece to date, but it is also his most reflective, a subdued, sometimes intense and often comic homecoming that celebrates the pueblo and people that shaped his imagination.
  84. Dreamgirls
    Finally. After "The Phantom of the Opera," "Rent" and "The Producers" botched the transfer from stage to screen, Dreamgirls gets it right. Bill Condon's adaptation of the 1981 show about a Motown trio's climb to crossover stardom pulls off the fundamental double-act those three musical pics all missed: It stays true to the source material while standing on its own as a fully reimagined movie.
  85. Notes on a Scandal
    The riveting interplay between Dench and Cate Blanchett draws blood with every scene, thanks to a precision-honed script and Eyre's equally incisive direction.
  86. Zoo
    A breathtakingly original nonfiction work by Seattle-based filmmaker Robinson Devor (whose "Police Beat" was among the highlights of Sundance's 2005 dramatic competition).
  87. Les amitiés maléfiques
    A movie so unrepentantly French that viewers who enjoy truly Gallic pics can start (tastefully) salivating now.
  88. Transformers
    Big, loud and full of testosterone-fueled car fantasies, Michael Bay's actioner hits a new peak for CGI work, showcasing spectacular chases and animated transformation sequences seamlessly blended into live-action surroundings.
  89. Eastern Promises
    A superbly wrought yarn set in the milieu of first-generation Russian mobsters in London that is simultaneously tough-minded and compassionate about the human condition, Eastern Promises instantly takes its place among David Cronenberg's very best films.
  90. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
    One of the best Westerns of the 1970s, which represents the highest possible praise. It's a magnificent throwback to a time when filmmakers found all sorts of ways to refashion Hollywood's oldest and most durable genre.
  91. Lake of Fire
    An extraordinary docu achievement. Handsomely filmed on silvery 35mm and high-definition by Kaye himself, the shrewdly edited picture balances a full spectrum of views from all sides of the abortion debate without obviously taking a position itself.
  92. Before the Devil Knows You're Dead
    The wrenching tale has something for anyone who likes their melodrama spiked with palpable tension and genuine suspense.
  93. Honeydripper
    The result is one of Sayles' best films. The music, a mix of blues, seminal rock and newcomer Gary Clark Jr.'s performance, will be an obvious draw, as will the performances by some leading African-American actors.
  94. 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.
  95. Diary of the Dead
    Gripping, intimate genre triumph.
  96. Paranoid Park
    Through immaculate use of picture, sound and time, the director adds another panel to his series of pictures about disaffected, disconnected youth.
  97. Alexandra
    Though he's sure to deny it, Alexandra is Alexander Sokurov's most directly political work for years. Featuring a performance of monumental depth by opera legend Galina Vishnevskaya, pic presents war for what it is: brutal, crushing, and ugly, and yet Sokurov doesn't lens any battles.
  98. Then She Found Me
    A smart, subtle and seriously funny dramedy bound to find favor with sophisticated auds.
  99. Bigger Stronger Faster*
    More scrupulously reported than your average Michael Moore film but every bit as entertaining, Bigger, Stronger, Faster* is as commercial as documentaries come.
  100. Hellboy II: The Golden Army
    Not to disparage the f/x guys, but what's onscreen in Hellboy II is all about the seismic eruptions in del Toro's head. Comparing his work to most fantasy cinema is like comparing cave drawings to the Cathedral of Cologne.
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