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. Kill Switch
    Had Smit developed his themes as scrupulously as his visual effects, Kill Switch might have been the next “Primer” or “District 9,” but instead it feels like a demo reel for a game that nobody can play.
  2. Despicable Me 3
    Yes, Despicable Me 3 is unwieldy, but it mostly works, as co-directors Pierre Coffin (who also voices the Minions) and Kyle Balda never lose sight of the film’s emotional center, packing the rest with as much humor as they can manage.
  3. Hampstead
    Gleeson and Keaton, for their part, play this bourgeois rags-to-tweed fairytale with such good humor that one is fleetingly able to overlook the frank bogusness of the mechanics that bring them together.
  4. The Book of Henry
    The film’s muted yet still rather flamboyant terribleness derives from the fact that it seems to be juggling three or four borderline schlock genres at once.
  5. Rough Night
    Rough Night, a bachelorette-party-from-hell thriller comedy that’s got some push and some laughs, despite its essentially formulaic nature, is a perfect example of why Hollywood needs (many) more women filmmakers.
  6. Viceroy's House
    Such a sprawling, two-pronged saga may well have been better served in television miniseries format.
  7. Harmonium
    Shot in a meticulous yet unmannered style, the film provides the veteran cast with an ideal framework to mount masterful performances.
  8. The Journey
    The Journey, thanks to its buddy-movie structure, is destined to feel a little corny, but the movie gets at something real. It’s a celebration, by two splendid actors, of the art of political theater.
  9. Cars 3
    Cars 3 is a friendly, rollicking movie made with warmth and dash, and to the extent that it taps our primal affection for this series, it more than gets the job done.
  10. Strange Weather
    There’s no free-at-last rain dance for Darcy, but just about every other lyrical cliche appears on cue.
  11. Letters from Baghdad
    The bottom line is that Oelbaum and Krayenbühl have fleshed out a complex, fascinating figure.
  12. Camera Obscura
    “Camera” scores more points for an intriguing premise than for its execution, which grows more muddled conceptually as the horror elements grow more prominent. Still, this is an accomplished effort that holds full attention while you’re watching it, even if it leaves a few too many questions dangling at the end.
  13. Moscow Never Sleeps
    The various story currents move swiftly but don’t run particularly deep, so the film works better as a kind of best-foot-forward overview of modern urban Russia — “Moscow, I Love You” — than it does as a multi-stranded human drama.
  14. Middle Man
    Crowley’s thinly conceived debut feature only has one big joke, and everything around it is either long-winded setup or deflating letdown.
  15. The Mummy
    The Mummy is a literal-minded, bumptious monster mash of a movie. It keeps throwing things at you, and the more you learn about the ersatz intricacy of its “universe,” the less compelling it becomes.
  16. My Cousin Rachel
    It’s pure pleasure to watch Weisz as Rachel, who is also an actress of sorts, adapting to suit the needs and desires of whoever she’s seducing. Her manipulations feel more intuitive than conniving and need not be explicitly sexual per se.
  17. Sami Blood
    This handsome debut feature from Swedish-Sami writer-director Amanda Kernell robustly blends adolescent fears that resonate across borders and generations with a fascinatingly specific, rarely depicted cultural context: Sweden’s colonial oppression of the indigenous Sami folk.
  18. Vincent N Roxxy
    Genre clichés catch up with Schultz just as surely as the past catches up with his characters and the sweet, redemptive possibilities of their relationship gets washed away in the tide of gratuitous bloodshed.
  19. April's Daughter
    Frankly, it’s anybody guess why characters do what they do in April’s Daughter, which may be both realistic and admirably nonjudgmental on Franco’s part, but it makes for a confusing and at times clinical moviegoing experience, as the director applies his detached Michael Haneke-like style to material that begs a certain amount of clarification.
  20. Jeune Femme (Montparnasse Bienvenüe)
    Serraille studied literature before switching to cinema, and her sharp attention to the detail distinguishes Jeune femme from so many first-time indie features.
  21. Fortunata
    The camera barely leaves Trinca’s side. She delivers an over-sized, nervy performance but the material is so flawed that it’s hard to truly say whether it’s exceptional acting.
  22. 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.
  23. Megan Leavey
    Often too clunky for its own good, and (ahem) doggedly apolitical throughout, this earnest feel-good tale nonetheless manages to pull on the heartstrings with sufficient gentleness.
  24. Churchill
    Churchill is a small, watchable, rather prosaic backroom docudrama.
  25. Wonder Woman
    Wonder Woman is the first major studio superhero film directed by a woman, and it shows in a number of subtle, yet important ways.
  26. Faces Places
    Agnès Varda, in the glory of her golden years, has become a humanist magician.
  27. A Ciambra
    Creatively speaking, however, A Ciambra is something of a step sideways for the Italian-American filmmaker, consolidating his considerable formal and observational gifts while fumbling a bit as storytelling.
  28. Barbara
    The movie lightly plumbs that dangerously unsettled space between performing and literally being the protagonist in a biopic.
  29. Gabriel and the Mountain
    On one level, the film can be classified as a journey of discovery, but what deepens interest is the way Barbosa constantly asks the viewer to question what it means to travel.
  30. Before We Vanish
    Playing frequently like an absurdist political satire with only flashes of violence, this low-tension, drawn-out work won’t gratify the chills or adrenaline rushes fanboys crave, but the ending strikes a romantic chord so pure that all but the most jaded cynics will be moved.
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