Variety's Scores

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For 17,847 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: 9,172 out of 17847
  2. Mixed: 7,036 out of 17847
  3. Negative: 1,639 out of 17847
17847 movie reviews
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  1. Starbuck
    A potent comedy of genetic chaos, Starbuck is pointedly contemporary and occasionally cloying, but guaranteed to draw attention for its premise and central character.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Cuba
    Cuba is a hollow, pointless non-drama.
  3. The Lost Husband
    Rushing through an emotional journey with an uneven pace and clumsy dialogue, The Lost Husband aims for familiar sentiments around loyalty, family and sacrifice, but bypasses sincerity, the most crucial ingredient.
  4. The Legacy of a Whitetail Deer Hunter
    McBride is good for a few chuckles during the first two-thirds of the movie and continues to contribute a fair share of funny business after the plot takes a not altogether persuasive serious turn. But Brolin remains the main attraction, and the saving grace, during this lost weekend in the woods.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    None But the Brave
    Frank Sinatra, who also stars with Clint Walker and produces, makes his directorial bow and is responsible for some good effects in maintaining a suspenseful pace.
  6. Death of a President
    Disappointingly, Death of a President shrinks from its promise as a piece of genuinely radical or adventurous speculative fiction.
  7. Lucky You
    The result is dull and lifeless.
  8. Far and Away
    Handsomely mounted and amiably performed but leisurely and without much dramatic urgency.
  9. Enemies Closer
    An unremarkable but entirely serviceable action quickie.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Old Man and the Sea
    It captures the dignity and the stubborness of the old man, and it is tender in his final defeat. And yet it isn’t a completely satisfying picture. There are long and arid stretches, when it seems as if producer and director were merely trying to fill time.
  11. Edtv
    A certain staleness hangs over the proceedings despite the best efforts of the cast and the fun-minded creative team.
  12. Clifford's Really Big Movie
    Harmless tale of the giant pooch helping out some itinerant performing animals while longing for home will go down smoothly with the preschool faithful, but anyone over 5 will feel antsy even given the brief running time.
  13. Georgetown
    It’s downright tricky to maintain the tone Waltz is going for here, but the story is consistently outrageous enough to keep us guessing, and Redgrave goes a long way to offset the lunacy of it all. ... But instead of getting more interesting as it goes on, Waltz’s performance grows tiresome.
  14. The Good German
    For actor and director, the project seems like trying on a new coat, and it doesn't fit either of them.
  15. Casper
    Another demonstration of the hazards involved turning a six-minute animated short into a big budget movie, Casper will doubtless spur nostalgic recognition among grown-ups but skews so heavily toward children that it offers little to divert anyone over the age of 8.
  16. All I Wish
    It’s left to Stone to prop up the whole scented-tissue affair, and that she cheerfully does, with a calm, centered force of personality that lends credibility even to the most raggedly developed aspects of her character.
  17. Henry's Crime
    While the absurdity builds, the intensity never does -- a problem shared by director Malcolm Venville's previous feature, "44 Inch Chest."
  18. Marie Curie: The Courage of Knowledge
    Marie Noelle’s evidently impassioned portrait of the trailblazing Polish-French physicist and chemist emerges as an odd blend of, well, formulae, following a starchy biopic pattern one minute and giving in to impressionistic abstraction the next.
  19. American Woman
    “American Woman” tries to give us a fresh angle on a familiar subject, but the film is listless and desultory. It sketches in the scuzzy power dynamics of these characters but fails, in most cases, to dramatize what made them tick.
  20. Demolition
    Gyllenhaal grounds Davis’ wildly unraveling psyche, finding both the humor and heart in a man who admits to having spent the past 10 to 12 years incapable of feeling.
  21. Vacation Friends
    Vacation Friends does earn a fair share of guffaws with its familiar mix of R-rated raunch and feel-good sentiment, and it’s lightly amusing to see the well-cast players breathe a satisfying degree of fresh life into a predictable scenario that recalls “Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates,” “What About Bob?” and a dozen or so similarly contrived comedies.
  22. Legend of the Fist: The Return of Chen Zhen
    This superhero spin on a largely Eastern legend will appeal primarily to Asian genre aficionados on homevid.
  23. 2012
    The visual effects are pretty sensational, delivering the cutting-edge CGI goods auds want and expect. It will be hard to watch "Earthquake'' ever again after this one.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Great Balls of Fire!
    It's a thin, cartoonish treatment of the hellbent, musically energetic young Jerry Lee Lewis.
  25. Neighbour No. 13
    Scores big in the first few minutes with its atmospheric lensing of the protag's literal separation into two distinct characters, but then settles into a standard psycho-killer payback drama.
  26. Sing 2
    True to their brand, Illumination has engineered another easy-to-swallow confection designed to maximize audience delight, whether on first or fortieth viewing, although this time, there’s almost zero nutritional value.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Class of 1984
    Class of 1984 is pure exploitation with plenty of action and a manipulative plot [from a story by Tom Holland] designed to have audiences cheering on the blood.
  28. Mystery, Alaska
    Relies on ensemble allure, with mixed results.
  29. Paid in Full
    Begins as a serious, straightforward account of the origins of the cocaine trade and "gangsta" culture in 1980s Harlem, but then downward spirals due to a weak plot and gratuitous violence.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Reckoning
    Has its flaws, among them a certain self-righteousness and a complicated storyline, but it is never less than gripping thanks to its gifted international cast.
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