Variety's Scores

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For 17,825 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 2.3 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: 9,159 out of 17825
  2. Mixed: 7,029 out of 17825
  3. Negative: 1,637 out of 17825
17825 movie reviews
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  1. Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice
    With its many references, Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice takes a cue from its lead character Nick, who sees the past as something to build on rather than recycle, and ends up delivering quite a good time.
  2. Post Tenebras Lux
    The title, signifying “light after darkness,” derives from the Latin translation of the Book of Job, an appropriate source given that a considerable amount of the prophet’s proverbial patience is required. Not that the pic doesn’t have its frequent rewards.
  3. Sunshine Superman
    First-rate assembly has a real dramatic grip as well as considerable lightheartedness, the obvious standout element being the large chunks of startling freefall and helicopter camera footage, both new and archival.
  4. How to Eat Your Watermelon in White Company (and Enjoy It)
    Lively interviews from a wide range of people, a wealth of excerpted footage stretching over decades, and a story packed with legend are served up by helmer Joe Angio with a verve mirroring the restless creativity of the film's subject.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Black Widow
    Lacking the snap and sharpness that might have made it a firstrate thriller, Black Widow instead plays as a moderately interesting tale of one woman's obsession for another's glamorous and criminal lifestyle.
  6. The Science of Sleep
    With Mexican star Gael Garcia Bernal energetically playing a vulnerable graphic artist with a hyperactive imagination and little confidence with women, picture has an overriding quality of sweetness that will prove endearing to audiences, especially younger females.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Elling
    A darkly funny, very human comedy.
  8. Elephant
    Achieves some glancing poetic effects during its first hour, but becomes gross and exploitative during the shooting rampage of the final act.
  9. Love Songs
    Likeable film doesn't measure up to helmer Christophe Honore's previous "Inside Paris," stumbling a bit in capturing the genuine grief that sits at its heart, though once again his feel for family is unerring and some of pic's greatest charms come from the warmth they inspire.
  10. Nenette and Boni
    Claire Denis comes up with her emotionally richest pic to date in Nenette and Boni, a multilayered look at unformed teen emotions and the mysterious, almost invisible ties that bind siblings.
  11. Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free
    It’s so removed from having a dark side that you know you’re getting the feel-good version of a Tom Petty portrait.
  12. The Harbinger
    The Harbinger disappoints only in that it’s good enough to make you wish it were better — that it left an indelible impression rather than a slightly vague one.
  13. Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris
    Fabian’s film is charming enough, though his attempts at romance remain earthbound as he makes a clean break from the TV version, offering a different interpretation of the character.
  14. The Syrian Bride
    Ambitious screenplay by helmer Eran Riklis (best known outside Israel for "Cup Final") and former journalist Suha Arraf puts plenty of human flesh on its characters, who span the religious and cultural spectrum of Golan Heights dwellers.
  15. The 12th Man
    A stirring adventure by any standard.
  16. The Dead Don't Hurt
    That nonlinear narrative choice in an otherwise understated art-house Western serves to confuse more than it reveals, complicating things for the meat-and-potatoes crowd that regularly turn out for cowboy stories.
  17. Twist of Faith
    A powerful and damning look at the long-term impact of sexual abuse.
  18. Strange Culture
    Younger filmmakers should be looking to Hershman Leeson for lessons on how to reinvent old forms while at the same time telling an urgently topical story.
  19. A Brave Heart: The Lizzie Velasquez Story
    A Brave Heart: The Lizzie Velasquez Story is strong on Velasquez’s developing backbone and smarts with the support of school and family. As a rallying cry for anti-bullying legislation, however, the film is superficial.
  20. Liar Liar
    Awfully funny at times.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Dead Calm
    Though not always entirely credible, Dead Calm is a nail-biting suspense pic handsomely produced and inventively directed.
  22. The Weight
    While the pieces for a white-knuckle mission seem to be in place, The Weight has an uneven, lurching quality, where slogging through the picturesque-yet-endless expanse of tall trees (arboraceous Bavaria doubling for Oregon) is punctuated by bursts of excitement.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Best Friends
    Best Friends is probably not the light romantic comedy audiences expect from a Burt Reynolds-Goldie Hawn screen pairing but is nevertheless a very engaging film.
  24. Before, Now & Then
    Before, Now & Then moves with its own dreamy cadence, with narrative developments washing over the film like waves. Closing your eyes once it’s over, you might even experience the sensation of having been in the water all afternoon as those gentle waves lapped over you — and longing to return to them.
  25. Running with Beto
    If it’s an optimistic beginning you’re after, Running With Beto makes for a fine start. Speaking as a former Texan, I’m so f—ing proud of how far the state has come.
  26. Rebuilding Paradise
    Rebuilding Paradise is a movie that shows us a great deal without necessarily exploring what it shows.
  27. Happy Together
    Maverick director Wong Kar-wai manages to pour old wine into new jars with Happy Together, a fizzy chamber yarn about two gay Hong Kongers in Argentina that's as slim as a bamboo flute but is his most linear and mature work for some time.
  28. Sidney
    The film isn’t groundbreaking, but its subject most certainly was, and Hudlin has the good sense to get out of the way and give Poitier the spotlight, which shines all the brighter through the eyes of the talents who followed in his footsteps.
  29. The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert
    A cheerfully vulgar and bitchy, but essentially warmhearted, road movie with a difference, which boasts an amazing star turn by Terence Stamp as a transsexual, Stephan Elliott's second feature is a lot of fun.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Soul Food
    Soul Food serves up family melodrama-cum-comedy that's tasty and satisfying, if not particularly profound or original.
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