Variety's Scores

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For 17,782 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 2.4 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: 9,136 out of 17782
  2. Mixed: 7,010 out of 17782
  3. Negative: 1,636 out of 17782
17782 movie reviews
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  1. Magnifico
    A wholesome family movie with a moppet star and tearjerker ending, Magnifico milks the sentiment like an industrial dairy machine on overdrive.
  2. Home of the Brave
    di Florio emerges with a serenely powerful, handcrafted film that navigates into a place Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once called "the tangled discords of our nation."
  3. Sideways
    A beautifully observed, small-scale study of personal foibles, romantic uncertainty and two sides of the sadly predictable male animal.
  4. Stella Street
    A hip comic curio.
  5. 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.
  6. Undertow
    A deep-fried piece of Southern Gothic that wears its unpleasantness like a merit badge.
  7. The Manson Family
    Its own mythology aside, this flamboyant, graphic and disturbing quasi-docu reenactment of a notorious chapter in U.S. counterculture life is a fascinating if peculiar accomplishment.
  8. Lightning in a Bottle
    Undeniably powerful on the bigscreen.
  9. Postmen in the Mountains
    Too slim to make much impression outside fests, this nevertheless reps another solid outing by former art director Huo Jianqi.
  10. The Machinist
    An intense, precision-controlled psychological mystery built around a very creepy lead performance by Christian Bale.
  11. The Grudge
    Viewers of this Sam Raimi-produced, sub-"Amityville" scarefest are likely to hold the real grudge.
  12. Surviving Christmas
    An almost mirth-free, poorly conceived comedy destined to offer Ben Affleck bashers satchels full of new ammunition.
  13. Celsius 41.11: The Temperature at Which the Brain... Begins to Die
    Preaches purely to the converted.
  14. Sex Is Comedy
    A not terribly creative movie about the creative process.
  15. The Dust Factory
    A muddled metaphysical allegory that isn't nearly sunny enough to camouflage its darker undercurrents.
  16. P.S.
    Laura Linney’s beautiful performance is most of the story in p.s.
  17. Riding the Bullet
    A ponderous, incoherent horror mishmash that turns King's short story into utter nonsense.
  18. The Final Cut
    Striking visuals help, but pic won't make the final cut with either genre fans, who've seen it all and better before, or the arthouse crowd, who will sneer at pic's cliches.
  19. Moolaadé
    This richly textured parable feels every inch the work of a master.
  20. Eulogy
    Nine very good actors are wasted, if not embarrassed, by the thoroughly unconvincing shenanigans perpetrated by first-time writer-director Michael Clancy, while a tenth -- Zooey Deschanel -- somehow manages to float ethereally above it all with her dignity intact.
  21. Being Julia
    A minor affair, a confection based on dalliances and the way a set of sophisticated theater people handle them, that lacks true distinction.
  22. Hair Show
    An anemic sitcom pilot dragged out to an excruciating 108-minute running time.
  23. Saints and Soldiers
    Well mounted, frequently gripping.
  24. Shall We Dance
    An unabashedly old-fashioned entertainment loaded with traditional dancing and music.
  25. Team America: World Police
    Goes the extra mile to piss off everybody -- which includes gleefully destroying renowned Hollywood liberals, literally and figuratively.
  26. In the Face of Evil: Reagan's War in Word and Deed
    Archival material -- especially rare B&W Soviet footage -- is a knockout, though the assembly of talking heads, nearly all Reagan loyalists, is predictable and uninspired.
  27. The Scandal
    A 10-course treat for the eyes and ears.
  28. Vera Drake
    Mike Leigh is at the peak of his powers with Vera Drake, a compassionate, morally complex drama that stands easily alongside his best work, "Secrets & Lies" and "Topsy-Turvy."
  29. Around the Bend
    Self-consciously mannered yet fitfully interesting, Around the Bend gets the most mileage it can from the eccentric, low-key charisma of Christopher Walken.
  30. Vodka Lemon
    A little gem that takes a potentially grim subject and mines it for maximum humor and insight.
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