Variety's Scores

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For 17,832 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: 9,164 out of 17832
  2. Mixed: 7,031 out of 17832
  3. Negative: 1,637 out of 17832
17832 movie reviews
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  1. Sex Is Comedy
    A not terribly creative movie about the creative process.
  2. Bright Young Things
    An easy-to-digest slice of literate entertainment for upscale and older audiences that lacks a significant emotional undertow to make it a truly involving -- rather than simply voyeuristic -- experience.
  3. The Hunting of the President
    Content is engrossing (if so fast-paced that uninformed viewers might easily get lost), but packaging is sometimes questionable.
  4. In the Cut
    Beautifully crafted and highlighted by an arresting change-of-pace perf by Meg Ryan as an English teacher erotically awakened by a homicide detective. But the story's unpalatable narrative holes and dramatic missteps will hold sway over the pic's better qualities.
  5. The Replacement Killers
    This mechanical effort is studied rather than heartfelt and will disappoint aficionados and thwart potential fans.
  6. All the Real Girls
    Director David Gordon Green has created some fresh, penetrating, beautifully drawn scenes of one-on-one intimacy…But some of what surrounds these interludes is variously misguided, fuzzy and borderline pretentious.
  7. Deep Impact
    The season's first comet-targets-Earth special effects extravaganza is spectacular enough in its cataclysmic scenes of the planet being devastated by an unstoppable fireball, but proves far from thrilling in the down time spent with a largely dull assortment of troubled human beings.
  8. I Spy
    It's precisely the lineup of familiar past work that makes I Spy pretty dull goods, invigorated mainly by the sharp interplay between Murphy and Wilson, both of whom shine best when they have a sidekick to work with.
  9. Dr. Dolittle
    Slim on story and rife with scatological jokes, the film may strike a chord with pre-teens but misses for an older crowd despite some nifty effects and broad humor.
  10. Farmingville
    Sincere but unexceptional.
  11. The Hillside Strangler
    Plays as a blackly comic slice of mock '70s-style exploitation that flirts with the viewer before applying its chokehold.
  12. Big Girls Don't Cry
    A moderately successful attempt to ape the standard Hollywood teen movie.
  13. Daredevil
    This franchise-hungry champion of the underdog brings no sense of fun to his pursuit of bad guys; it's just the fate he's stuck with.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Waiting for Guffman
    The enterprise comes across like a bunch of talented friends making an elaborate home movie for their own amusement.
    • 18 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Gigli
    Arrives carrying more baggage than a Greyhound bus, which may distract moviegoers from what is a silly but still an enjoyably written and performed romantic comedy.
  16. The Ladykillers
    The souffle falls a little flat in The Ladykillers, a Coen brothers black comedy in which the humor seems arch and narrative momentum doesn't kick in until the final third.
  17. She Hate Me
    A scabrous, provocative and often funny social satire about the American dream, Spike Lee's flawed but fascinating She Hate Me addresses everything from corporate malfeasance to the African AIDS epidemic, barely catching its breath in-between.
  18. Seducing Doctor Lewis
    Though harmless and amusing, this Quebecois comedy set in an impoverished fishing village is a bit too festooned with provincial humor and a bit too short on memorable perfs or feel-good climaxes to break out commercially beyond French-speaking Canadian territories.
  19. Starsky & Hutch
    Blessed with sporadic moments of cheeky fun, isn't painful but seldom advances beyond costumes and hairstyling in terms of creativity.
  20. Happy Hour
    Fortunately bypassing a re-run of "Days of Wine and Roses" but finding little inspiration to freshen an old concept, this tragedy about a lover and a friend helplessly watching the writer's fade-out comes up short of its potential impact.
  21. Callas Forever
    Main body of the movie is weighed down by flat, expository dialogue and a lot of pedestrian filming. However, Zeffirelli's shooting of the "Carmen" sequences, which make up a sizable chunk of the film and are far and away the pic's most exhilarating sections, are graceful and fluid.
  22. Silent Water
    Worthy intentions are drowned by schematic scripting and only OK direction in Silent Waters, an achingly PC drama on how Islamic fundamentalism wrecks families and oppresses women.
  23. Returner
    Kaneshiro is all long flowing locks and smoldering disdain, the visual F/X are only so-so, and pacing is almost brisk enough to hide the plot holes.
  24. Undertow
    A deep-fried piece of Southern Gothic that wears its unpleasantness like a merit badge.
  25. The Dreamers
    The whole spirit of rebellion, passion and protest that should be a driving force for the characters plays more like a cultivated affectation.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    My Own Private Idaho
    The Shakespearean side of the story falls short due to Reeves' very narrow range as an actor.
  27. Thirteen Ghosts
    The actors manage to keep from being upstaged by the sets, though just barely. Abraham goes over the top, then further still.
  28. The Iron Ladies
    Its screaming-queen stereotypes will look pretty retro in most Western markets, even if an earnest pro-tolerance message disarms potential offense.
  29. The Last Shot
    Contains most of the elements of a "Get Shorty"-type romp without the character depth and wit.
  30. National Security
    Comes off as a retro reprise of those slam-bang, buddy-buddy action-comedies that proliferated throughout the '80s in the wake of "48 HRS."
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