Variety's Scores

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For 17,831 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: 9,163 out of 17831
  2. Mixed: 7,031 out of 17831
  3. Negative: 1,637 out of 17831
17831 movie reviews
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  1. Chasing Ice
    Following the exhaustive efforts of photographer-scientist James Balog to capture irrefutable evidence of the world's glaciers in retreat, first-time helmer Jeff Orlowski's documentary supplies a heroic human-interest angle on global warming that's ultimately less remarkable than the grandeur of its arctic imagery.
  2. Rust and Bone
    A tender yet heavily de-romanticized love story between a boxer with broken hands and an orca trainer with missing legs, Rust and Bone serves as an impressive if somewhat overblown exercise in contrasts.
  3. Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning
    There's something perversely fascinating about helmer John Hyams' freewheeling yet deliberately paced mashup of noirish mystery, splatter-movie intensity, first-person-shooter vidgame and "Apocalypse Now"-style surrealism.
  4. A Late Quartet
    Centered around four outstanding performances, Yaron Zilberman's fiction-feature debut feels like the work of a filmmaker who knows and appreciates the art form under scrutiny, laying a credible foundation for a story that lays bare the often melodramatic passions of the artistic soul.
  5. Minions
    Stronger on concept than story, Brian Lynch’s Minions script emphasizes scale over quantity.
  6. The Ambassador
    Brugger ensures it's a fairly entertaining excursion, especially when he starts to enjoy getting into character as the nefarious white man in Africa.
  7. Head Games
    Parents could be making their kids wear helmets to the library by the conclusion of helmer Steve James' science-and-sports docu Head Games, which scores solid hits on everyone from the NFL down to peewee hockey as it links contact sports, concussions and those calling for widespread reformation of the nation's athletic philosophies and priorities.
  8. Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit
    Crisp, efficient and appreciably modest in scale...this conspicuous attempt to breathe new life into a long-dormant action franchise gets at least a few things right, chiefly the shrewd casting of Chris Pine.
  9. The To Do List
    This rare femme-centric addition to the loss-of-virginity canon (dominated by the likes of “Porky’s,” “Risky Business” and “American Pie”) hits its fair share of outrageously funny highs amid lots of so-so filler, but stays buoyant and likable throughout thanks to the winning presence of “Parks and Recreation” star Aubrey Plaza in the lead.
  10. Keep the Lights On
    Delicately tracing the troubled nine-year bond between two men living in New York, Ira Sachs mines his own memories to sensitive, melancholy if somewhat muted effect in Keep the Lights On.
  11. Stand Up Guys
    Veering between buddy movie and action-thriller, Stand Up Guys is a mildly raunchy, modestly entertaining geriatric comedy.
  12. The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies
    If none of the Hobbit films resonate with "Rings'" mythic grandeur, it’s hard not to marvel at Jackson’s facility with these characters and this world, which he seems to know as well as John Ford knew his Monument Valley, and to which he here bids an elegiac adieu.
  13. Francine
    A glum but tenderly observed micro-portrait of a woman struggling to re-enter society after being released from prison.
    • 100 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Vertigo
    Unfortunately, even that mastery is not enough to overcome one major fault, for the plain fact is that the film’s first half is too slow and too long.
  15. You're Next
    You’re Next is fairly light on psychological and narrative complexity, but it’s still a good cut above the slasher norm, with a firm grasp on visceral action and the wisdom to place tongue slightly in cheek when things go further over the top.
  16. Hellbound?
    By narrowing its range of voices to Christian leaders, thinkers and writers, Kevin Miller's sober, stimulating documentary on the hot topic of eternal damnation necessarily limits its audience, but achieves a level of rhetorical eloquence that would theoretically appeal to open-minded viewers of any religious stripe.
  17. The Comedy
    For a catalog of aggressively stupid, socially deviant male behavior, Rick Alverson's cheekily titled The Comedy is not without a certain subversive intelligence.
  18. The House I Live In
    A ballsy mix of interviews and editorializing that's daring enough to question a costly crackdown that has long had the public's support.
  19. Fat Kid Rules the World
    Affecting performances and effective storytelling are the hallmarks of Fat Kid Rules the World.
  20. Escape Fire: The Fight to Rescue American Healthcare
    Lacking the outrage and wit of Michael Moore's "Sicko," which dealt with the different matter of health insurance, this documentary is stronger on finding viable solutions.
  21. Jab Tak Hai Jaan
    Even by the freewheeling, mood-swinging standards of Bollywood, the pronounced disparity between the pre- and post-intermission halves of Jab tak hai jaan is more than a tad jarring. Indeed, viewers may feel they've been treated to an oddly matched double bill -- a delightfully vivacious romantic dramedy, followed by an Old Hollywood sort of psychological melodrama.
  22. Gayby
    Although it traffics freely in stereotypes and sitcom-style one-liners, Gayby is never less than likable.
  23. Madrid, 1987
    A perceptive, ultra-wordy stab at catching the zeitgeist at a time of change in Spain, David Trueba's two-hander nonetheless feels like a working-out of social and personal themes that hasn't quite achieved the full leap from page to film.
  24. Prisoners
    A spellbinding, sensationally effective thriller with a complex moral center.
  25. We Are Legion: The Story of the Hacktivists
    A cumulative feeling of urgency and you-are-there world-beating are key to the picture's seductive appeal, though lack of informed dissenting opinions reps an unfortunate editorial choice.
  26. Bad 25
    A blockbuster melange of Motown, metal, hip-hop, world and gospel influences, bound by trailblazing production, "Bad" has stood in its predecessor's shadow too long, and Spike Lee convincingly makes the case for reassessment with this exhaustive and entertaining if less-than-penetrating documentary on its creation.
  27. Funeral Kings
    A raggedy but refreshing yarn about the near-terminal condition known as male adolescence.
  28. The Zen of Bennett
    While the result is sure to appeal to the star's fans, they may find this less-than-definitive portrait distractingly arty at times, while viewers attracted by such up-to-the-moment talents as Lady Gaga will wonder why the picture doesn't bother providing a little more explanatory background about that old guy she's singing with.
  29. Bears
    Surely some of the film’s various incidents have been creatively stitched together from stray bits and pieces of footage, but its central conflict is an entirely organic one, and rarely is any offscreen string pulling distractingly evident.
  30. Closed Circuit
    [A] slick, smarter-than-usual conspiracy yarn.
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