Variety's Scores

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For 17,835 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: 9,166 out of 17835
  2. Mixed: 7,032 out of 17835
  3. Negative: 1,637 out of 17835
17835 movie reviews
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  1. Incident at Loch Ness
    Constructed Chinese-box style as a series of films within films, with a faked one about the Loch Ness monster at the center, "Incident" will have maximum impact for the first auds to catch it before its sly central joke gets out.
  2. The Mafia Only Kills in Summer
    There are moments when audiences will wonder if laughing about gangland whackings isn’t in bad taste, yet it becomes increasingly clear that the helmer-scripter is using humor to cut Mafia bosses down to size, thereby turning an accusatory glare at an Italy that granted these people power.
  3. Love to Love You, Donna Summer
    The interviews are illuminating; Summer’s family members speak of her with complicated reverence, and with an appreciation for the currents of despair that she nurtured in private.
  4. Labyrinth of Lies
    An intelligent and arresting fact-based drama.
  5. A Man of No Importance
    Despite fine work from his actors and smooth technical polish, the more provocative elements of the tale arise awkwardly and grate against the early section's almost whimsical nature.
  6. Centurion
    "Doomsday," horror-trained British helmer Neil Marshall flexes strong action muscles and carves copious flesh here, creating the sort of broadsword-based bedlam that will thrill fans of ancient martial movies.
  7. H is for Happiness
    Provides feel-good entertainment for the entire family without pandering — and definitely without sacrificing style or substance.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    McLintock!
    Wayne is in his element, or home, home on the Waynge. O’Hara gives her customary high-spirited performance, although it’s never quite clear what she’s so darned sore about.
  9. Madame X
    Madame X, on the joy scale, feels drained. The show is a concert that plays, at times, like a lecture — or maybe the world’s most extended Oscar/Grammy star-makes-a-statement speech. But I don’t say that because I begrudge Madonna’s message. It’s just that she didn’t use to be so deadly serious and, at times, almost punitive about it.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Gambit
    Shirley MacLaine and Michael Caine star in a firstrate suspense comedy, cleverly scripted, expertly directed and handsomely mounted.
  11. The Help
    A stirring black-empowerment tale aimed squarely at white audiences, The Help personalizes the civil rights movement through the testimony of domestic servants working in Jackson, Miss., circa 1963.
  12. William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe
    In attempting to address its subject's ideological discrepancies, "Kunstler" lacks the objectivity needed to put the lawyer's shift from '60s fist-pumper to '80s and '90s headline-grabber in proper context.
  13. Girls Rock!
    Aggressively upbeat docu, helmed by two males ill-equipped to bring any distance to the camp's pervasive feel-good feminism, tends to relentlessly reiterate points better served by example.
  14. Lu Over the Wall
    In terms of craftsmanship, the film has a scrappy, sometimes cheap look to it (characters look flat, like thin-lined Etch-a-Sketch drawings, superimposed over more colorful hand-painted backgrounds), for which it more than compensates via other strengths — namely, a trio of relatable, well-written human protagonists and Lu, who can change form and bend water at will.
  15. Charm City Kings
    The film’s truly ridiculous plot choices — the phony twists that make you leave the theater feeling like you’ve inhaled a tank of carbon monoxide — are its own invention, bolted onto a likable, if formulaic, charmer.
  16. Loggerheads
    A respectably crafted, earnest ensemble drama.
  17. Annabelle: Creation
    Here, Sandberg once again plays with both lighting, composition and suspense, framing shots in such a way that we’re constantly searching the shadows for hints of movement, while drawing out scenes for maximum tension.
  18. Ira & Abby
    Starts off deliriously, is derailed into reality, and finally settles into something in between.
  19. Stuck on You
    A one-joke affair about conjoined twins that feels like it bypassed the scripting stage and was filmed directly from the pitch, the comedy remains resoundingly unfunny.
  20. Daddio
    Every aspect of Daddio is designed to spark conversation. But it’s sweeter and more satisfying than you might expect, especially as Hall pays off ideas introduced early in her script.
  21. Rolling Family
    The film has humanity to burn, but its loose structure makes it hard to connect with the multiple characters.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Dragnet
    Dragnet tries very hard to parody its 1950s TV series progenitor but winds up more innocuous than inventive.
  23. Ideal Home
    Ideal Home is a trifle, but more than that it’s caught between eras, poised between wanting to crack you up at what cranky prima donnas its characters are and to make you tear up at the revelation of their normal hearts. The result? A comedy of flamboyant banality.
  24. The Quietude
    Boasting a trio of actresses at the top of their game and cinematography that constantly impresses with its confident yet unshowy fluidity, the movie deftly enters into the bosom of a family harboring multiple secrets, encompassing the personal and political.
  25. Fierce Creatures
    A hilarious farce.
  26. Lipstick & Dynamite, Piss & Vinegar: The First Ladies of Wrestling
    Smart assembly of terrific archive footage is matched by spirited interviews with the tough old broads today.
  27. Bug
    A ranting, claustrophobic drama that trades in shopworn paranoid notions, William Friedkin's overwrought screen version of Tracy Letts' play assaults the viewer with aggressive thesping and over-the-top notions of shocking incident, all to intensely alienating effect.
  28. Oswald's Ghost
    Oswald's Ghost impresses as a concise, intelligent and rigorously well-researched piece of work.
  29. Dream Lover
    An overly abstract mystery about the difficulty of really knowing another person, "Dream Lover" is too rarefied for a popular thriller and too hokey for an art film. Directorial debut of notable screenwriter Nicholas Kazan displays more of an awareness of film's visual possibilities than a flair for them, and while there are any number of interesting ideas bouncing around here, pic falls between stools both artistically and commercially.
  30. The Cursed
    Horror is most effective when the graphic scares are matched with an emotional dimension, something at which Ellis aims but doesn’t quite arrive — a shortcoming that also undersells the marvels of his first-rate ensemble cast.
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