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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    • 69 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Outlaw Josey Wales
    The screenplay [based on the book Gone to Texas by Forrest Carter] is another one of those violence revues, with carnage production numbers slotted every so often and intercut with Greek chorus narratives by John Vernon and Chief Dan George.
  2. Youth
    Feng employs traditional craftsmanship to draw a sweeping historical canvas with profound human upheavals that mirror virtues and flaws of the Chinese people, without ever losing sight of the personal experiences that he dramatizes with such acute sensuality.
  3. Doctor Zhivago
    The sweep and scope of the Russian revolution, as reflected in the personalities of those who either adapted or were crushed, has been captured by David Lean in Doctor Zhivago, frequently with soaring dramatic intensity. Director has accomplished one of the most meticulously designed and executed films--superior in several visual respects to his "Lawrence of Arabia."
  4. See How They Fall
    See How They Fall, a deft interlocking tale of two small-time hoods and an unlikely avenger, is morally ambiguous and dosed with irony in the noir tradition. Dark, compelling helming debut by veteran scripter Jacques Audiard should do nicely at Gallic wickets and rack up healthy tube sales.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Experiment in Terror
    The film treatment embraces a number of unnecessary character bits that merely extend the plot and, despite their striking individual reaction, deter from the suspense buildup.
  6. Happy Holidays
    Copti and cinematographer Tim Kuhn shoot each interaction with an up-close, handheld intimacy that not only magnifies the subtle, powerful performances of the cast (many of them first-time actors), but welcomes the viewer into each scene, as though it were a complicated family reunion.
  7. What They Had
    Chomko mitigates a fairly heavy narrative agenda with a great deal of humor, sometimes threatening to make things a little too seriocomic, but never quite crossing the line into pat dramedy.
  8. Leto
    If not as overtly political as “The Student,” Leto nonetheless represents about as flamboyant a statement of free artistic expression as Serebrennikov could make at this moment: There’s certainly nothing contained or inhibited about its celebration of artists who themselves were given little support or leeway by the Soviet government.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Great Ziegfeld
    William Powell’s Zieggy is excellent. Preserving the sympathies, he endows the impersonation with all the qualities of a great entrepreneur and sentimentalist without sacrificing the shades and moods called for.
  10. Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie
    Captain Underpants isn’t out to be more than a trifle; that’s part of its appeal. It’s not so much potty-mouthed as it is a potty-minded kiddie burlesque, one that finds the supreme innocence in naughtiness.
  11. Hallow Road
    With its dramatic themes spread across two wildly different halves, it makes for a unique, propulsive thrill ride whose baffling existence is key to its enjoyment.
  12. The Boy from Medellín
    If the film falls short as a possible tale of heroic enlightenment, it’s still pretty absorbing, in the in-between moments, as a study of a dude still working out the intersections between wild public success and neurotic torments. To the extent that its middle and best section is really a story of politics driving someone already prone to depression deeper into it, that’s when The Boy From Medellín feels most timely.
  13. Predestination
    Predestination succeeds in teasing the brain and touching the heart even when its twists and turns keep multiplying well past the point of narrative sustainability.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Gremlins 2: The New Batch
    An hilarious sequel featuring equal parts creature slapstick for the small fry and satirical barbs for adults. Addition of Christopher Lee to the cast as a mad genetics engineering scientist is a perfect touch.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Fan-Fan the Tulip
    A rousing, good humored costumer on ribald 18th-century France. (Review of Original Release)
  16. Kings of Pastry
    Given what seems like unprecedented access to the very masculine world of the French patissier, Pennebaker and Hegedus get their subjects to reveal a few trade secrets as well as personal aspirations. As their calm camera glides over the chefs' almost-too-beautiful-to-eat creations, viewers share their awe.
  17. Everyday Sunshine: The Story of Fishbone
    Effortlessly entertaining.
  18. Asako I & II
    Hamaguchi extols his source for a compelling representation of love as a mystic experience. However, what gets transferred to the screen becomes more like banal indecision.
  19. T-Rex
    Though T-Rex leaves some questions unaddressed, and ends with little resolution to protag’s various challenges, it’s compelling throughout.
  20. Feast of the Epiphany
    In “Feast of the Epiphany,” a narrative-documentary hybrid, the line between fiction and reality is demarcated quite clearly, even as those two modes remain in constant dialogue — and the conceit is entrancing precisely because of its elusiveness.
  21. Orwell: 2 + 2 = 5
    2+2 = 5 is a movie that very much leans toward chronicling the brutality and violence of despotic regimes, and is less interested in exploring how they toy with your brain.
  22. Eyes Wide Shut
    A riveting, thematically probing, richly atmospheric and just occasionally troublesome work, a deeply inquisitive consideration of the extent of trust and mutual knowledge possible between a man and a woman.
  23. The Underneath
    On its most successful level, the film represents a slashing dramatic essay on the dismaying human tendency not to accept full responsibility for one's actions.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Company of Wolves
    Admirably attempting an adult approach to traditional fairy tale material, The Company of Wolves nevertheless represents an uneasy marriage between old-fashioned storytelling and contemporary screen explicitness.
  25. The Princess
    A perfectly timed, compulsively watchable once-over-lightly documentary. ... After all [the recent] dramatic treatments, it’s galvanizing to see the real story laid out exactly as it happened — or, more precisely, as it happened and as it was presented to the public, those being, quite often, two very different things.
  26. Absolute Wilson
    A surprisingly conventional portrait of a decidedly unconventional man.
  27. The Last Winter
    An imperfect but compelling thriller.
  28. Chicken with Plums
    The same winning balance of seriousness and humor that made "Persepolis" such a hit works equally well in Chicken With Plums.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Lover for a Day
    The film benefits from the collective contributions of four screenwriters...whose collective insights result in a beautiful complexity.
  30. Tenet
    Tenet is no holy grail, but for all its stern, solemn posing, it’s dizzy, expensive, bang-up entertainment of both the old and new school.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Le bossu
    Consistently enjoyable, if rarely exceptional, mass entertainment.
  32. Go Tigers!
    Arguably the best sports-oriented documentary since "Hoop Dreams."
  33. Sunshine State
    Falco, light years from "The Sopranos," is exquisitely vulnerable and her scenes play well with Hutton, in his finest role in years as a good man who knows he's sold out.
  34. O Brother, Where Art Thou?
    A charming, if lightweight, Coen brothers escapade flecked by plenty of visual and performance grace notes.
  35. People Say I'm Crazy
    Fascinating and frustrating in nearly equal measure.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Opening Night
    Gena Rowlands turns in another virtuoso performance as the troubled actress. Cassavetes’ highly personal work will please his coterie of enthusiasts, but for general audiences it will be viewed as shrill, puzzling, depressing and overlong.
  37. Dear Jassi
    The two characters at the center of Amit Rai’s screenplay are superficially defined beyond their all-consuming devotion, and that lack of nuance and texture makes for some flat stretches across a leisurely 134-minute runtime — though a shattering finale, staged with brilliant formalist rigor, leaves the most lasting impression.
  38. The Travel Companion
    Even as it dabbles in toe-curling cringe comedy, The Travel Companion is ultimately too genial a work for such tonal extremes.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein
    The comedy team battles it out with the studio's roster of bogeymen in a rambunctious fracas that is funny and, at the same time, spine-tingling. Stalking through the piece to add menace are such characters as the Frankenstein Monster, the Wolf Man and Dracula.
  40. Climax
    Climax works, at least when it’s willing to be a human drama. But then it sinks in that you’re watching “Fame” directed by the Marquis de Sade with a Steadicam.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Towering Inferno
    The Towering Inferno is one of the greatest disaster pictures made, a personal and professional triumph for producer Irwin Allen.
  42. Solitary Man
    A movie of no small generosity: It offers audiences the pleasures of a screenplay whose every acerbic line is firmly rooted in character, and it hands Michael Douglas one of his best roles in years.
  43. Bastards
    Even at its most opaque, Bastards always exerts a dreamlike pull rooted in Denis’ rhythmic layerings of image, sound and music.
  44. Shallow Grave
    Shallow Grave, a tar-black comedy that zings along on a wave of visual and scripting inventiveness.
  45. The Bank Job
    An engrossing if underwhelming period thriller.
  46. Finding 'Ohana
    While imperfect and at times predictable, the adventure these filmmakers and performers take us on feels like a warm tropical breeze.
  47. Little Voice
    A small picture with a big heart.
  48. Nathalie...
    An intellectual-cum-sexual teaser whose twist is apparent far too early on.
  49. Talk to Me
    Alternates too deliberately between jaunty comedy and serious message-making.
  50. The Reports on Sarah and Saleem
    If at times it feels like the Alayan brothers have bitten off more than they can chew, the core of the plot, and the weighty issues raised, fortunately remain front and center.
  51. The Birth of a Nation
    A biographical drama steeped equally in grace and horror, it builds to a brutal finale that will stir deep emotion and inevitable unease. But the film is perhaps even more accomplished as a theological provocation, one that grapples fearlessly with the intense spiritual convictions that drove Turner to do what he had previously considered unthinkable.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Arthur
    Arthur is a sparkling entertainment that attempts, with a large measure of success, to resurrect the amusingly artificial conventions of 1930's screwball romantic comedies.
    • Variety
  53. The Night Comes for Us
    This cartoonish cavalcade of carnage potently reunites “The Raid” stars Joe Taslim and Iko Uwais as former friends on a corpse-strewn collision course.
  54. Narcissister Organ Player
    The drama of “Narcissister Organ Player” is that Narcissister isn’t layering her demons onto the culture; she’s layering the culture onto herself. That’s why that mask of hers looks more and more like one we’re all capable of hiding behind.
  55. Even the Rain (Tambien la Lluvia)
    Iciar Bollain's fifth feature is her most ambitious and best, driving its big ideas home through a tightly knit Paul Laverty script that only falters over the final reel.
  56. The Death of Dick Long
    The distinguishing quality of its jokey, can-you-believe-this? tone is that the two millennial hayseeds at its center are so richly incompetent that they seem to be inventing a new low place on the totem pole of backwoods idiocy.
  57. Cannibal
    The film’s slow deliberation and aesthetic rigor act as a form of seduction, luring the viewer into unwilling identification with Carlos.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Young Man with a Horn
    For the jazz devotee this is nearly two hours of top trumpet notes. For the regular filmgoer, it is good drama.
  59. Idiotka
    Popov delivers a boisterous tale of a woman coming into her own, told with real humor and heart.
  60. Huda's Salon
    On the whole, Abu-Assad is less successful in braiding the respective tales of Reem and Huda through Eyas Salman’s editing. But eventually the seams show and clumsy jumps between the two locations feel strangely episodic, losing Huda’s Salon some of the urgency it has claimed in its earlier moments.
  61. Blink
    The sight loss the children are experiencing is irreversible, and it’s naturally difficult to find the positive angle on that, but their parents are determined to give it their best shot, and the film follows their lead.
  62. William Eggleston in the Real World
    Despite Almereyda's strong following in arthouse circles, William Eggleston in the Real World --which requires patient if not repeat viewing -- will probably not venture far into it.
  63. Suzi Q
    In some sense, Quatro was Jett before Jett was really Jett — laying down the leather law when no female rocker had yet managed the combination of sex appeal and pure machisma.
  64. Femme
    A pair of sensational performances by Nathan Stewart-Jarrett (“Candyman”) and George MacKay (“1917”), locked in a nervy duet as two men with virtually nothing in common but their sexuality, represents the chief selling point for this stylish, commendably uncompromising fusion of genre fireworks and measured, thoughtful character study.
  65. Steal a Pencil for Me
    Fortunately, helmer Michele Ohayon ("Cowboy del Amor") treats her tricky subject matter with sufficient sensitivity to keep doc from ever seeming offensively flip or overly sentimental.
  66. Spider-Man: Far from Home
    The key to the new movie’s appeal, apart from the fact that Tom Holland acts with far greater confidence and verve in the title role, is that the entire film is a bit of a fake-out, and I mean that in a very positive way.
  67. Tell Me Who I Am
    In the documentary, the director appears to be interviewing the twins separately, but he’s really just filming them as they recite their own story. They’ve chosen their words carefully; they cry on cue; and they share just enough, while holding back an enormous amount of information.
  68. Space Station 3D
    Like a really, really high-tech version of a high school class trip to the planetarium.
  69. Zero Day
    Consistently riveting. Anything but sensationalistic, pic powerfully illuminates the banality of evil, as realistically ordinary kids (played brilliantly by non-professional high schoolers) prepare to wreak havoc.
  70. Collateral Damages
    Casts a somewhat different light on the trauma of 9/11 and particularly on its long, devastating aftermath.
  71. The Elephant in the Living Room
    Audiences can't possibly predict the upsetting twist to Landry's story, nor the welcome surprise that precedes it, but these two scenes -- both of which Webber was fortunate enough to capture on camera -- are documentary gold.
  72. The Challenge
    Loathe to mar his exquisite package with the least hint of vulgar commentary, Ancarani arrives at something that is at once luxuriously alluring and a little too like an advertisement for luxury products — dazzling, aloof, uncritical and fatuous.
  73. Good Posture
    [A] roughly drafted feature debut that manages to be just affable enough.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Bloody Mama
    The best performance in the film, and one of the most outstanding screen portrayals in many moons, is that of Pat Hingle, playing a wealthy businessman kidnapped for high ransom.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Arabesque
    Arabesque packs the names of Gregory Peck and Sophia Loren and a foreign intrigue theme, but doesn't always progress on a true entertainment course. Fault lies in a shadowy plotline and confusing characters, particularly in the miscasting of Peck in a cute role.
  76. Citizen Penn
    Some of this is stirring stuff, and all of it is worth learning about, but as a documentary Citizen Penn is more diligent than riveting.
  77. Blood Brothers: Malcolm X & Muhammad Ali
    The movie does a compelling job laying out how vulnerable this relationship was, given their faith, given Ali’s ascendency in the nation and the Nation.
  78. Ginger & Rosa
    Potter seems at a loss to communicate the ideas behind her agonizingly elliptical picture, leaving auds to marvel at the gorgeous cinematography and scarlet-red hair of its heroine, earnestly played by Elle Fanning in a project undeserving of her talents.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Raising Arizona
    As leisurely and disconnected as "Blood Simple" was taut and economical. While film is filled with many splendid touches and plenty of yocks, it often doesn't hold together as a coherent story.
  80. Live Flesh
    Most of all, the satisfyingly cinematic screen adaptation puts motion and energy into a story that was mostly internalized from Victor's perspective in Rendell's book.
  81. Patriots Day
    It’s genuinely exciting megaplex entertainment, informed by extensive research, featuring bona fide movie stars, and staged with equal degrees of professionalism and respect.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Slacker
    Linklater springs these seemingly random encounters together with a fluid, on-the-move style. Basic problem, given the absence of storyline, is that interest quickly rises and falls by virtue of who happens to be on screen.
    • Variety
  83. Echo In the Canyon
    Echo in the Canyon offers a richly evocative and star-studded overview of the 1960s Laurel Canyon music scene.
  84. Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon
    Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon is a lark, a contradiction — a lurid, violent, caught-in-the-gutter movie that’s also a nimble and knowing tall tale for adults.
  85. The Sentence
    It’s a dramatic portrait of institutionalized injustice, though the film is too narrowly focused to plead its case with maximum effectiveness.
  86. 25th Hour
    Lapses into melodramatic self-importance and gratuitous stylistic flourishes that take the audience out of the action -- are outweighed by the steadily amplified emotional power of this ultimately moving drama.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Hidden
    The Hidden is a well-constructed thriller, directed with swift assurance by Jack Sholder, brought down by an utterly conventional sci-fi ending.
  88. The Fault in Our Stars
    Director Josh Boone is hardly the most distinctive cinematic stylist, but he’s smart enough to let his scenes linger for a few beats longer than most mainstream directors would, and seems to trust his actors to carry their own dramatic weight.
  89. Welcome to Me
    A strange and often startlingly inspired media/mental-illness comedy.
  90. The Last Family
    The film is a remarkable, frequently unsettling exercise in staged voyeurism, recreating the interdependent lives of the three members of the troubled Beksiński family.
  91. 21 Jump Street
    By casting Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum as fish-out-of-water buffoons, the irreverent result feels fresher than most '80s-show reboots, effectively flipping the address Johnny Depp made famous.
  92. Greener Grass
    Presented as if filtered through a sunny Instagram setting, Greener Grass won’t exactly make you envious of the over-idealized lifestyle it skewers, and yet it’s such a delightful place to inhabit, you won’t want to leave when the credits roll.
  93. Redbelt
    An absorbing and colorful, if not particularly convincing, excursion into a demi-monde of fighters, scammers, promoters and self-styled modern samurai, Redbelt gives the impression of Mamet coyly toying with the idea of making a populist little-man-against-the-system sports melodrama without actually attempting to create a film for the masses.
  94. Vodka Lemon
    A little gem that takes a potentially grim subject and mines it for maximum humor and insight.
  95. Kinyarwanda
    Doubly disappointing considering that it marks the first feature by Rwandan filmmakers to address the country's 1994 Hutu-on-Tutsi genocide, Kinyarwanda awkwardly and fitfully patches together a half-dozen story strands meant to provide a panoramic view of war and reconciliation.
  96. A Gay Girl in Damascus: The Amina Profile
    The insights the movie has aren’t exceptional; this stranger-than-fiction series of events is enough.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Hard Times
    The production has a very handsome mid-1930s New Orleans period flavour but the cast can’t lick the script.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Cocoanuts
    That's all it has --comedy-- but that's enough. [29 May 1929, p.14]
    • Variety
  99. Held for Ransom
    Partly, the balance between gritty, true-life fidelity and pacy, exciting storytelling is achieved because in Rye, to whom Eric Kress’ warm, compassionate camera clings so doggedly, we have such a sympathetic, human protagonist.
  100. Selah and The Spades
    Writer-director Tayarisha Poe’s cold and stylish debut, commands attention. More specifically, Simone’s Selah seizes it.
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