Variety's Scores

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For 17,777 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: 9,133 out of 17777
  2. Mixed: 7,008 out of 17777
  3. Negative: 1,636 out of 17777
17777 movie reviews
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  1. Revolution #9
    Looks with fresh eyes at a new millennium in which, seemingly, the entire world is bought and sold in neatly wrapped packages engineered for mass consumption.
  2. Ararat
    Egoyan's pedantic, lecturing approach makes the film a bit of a slog, although the basic material has an intrinsic interest that makes one at least want to know more about the historical events.
  3. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
    Darker and more dramatic, this account of Harry's troubled second year at Hogwarts may be a bit overlong and unmodulated in pacing, but it possesses a confidence and intermittent flair that begin to give it a life of its own apart of the literary franchise, something the initial picture never achieved.
  4. Bánk bán
    While it creaks along at times, director Csaba Kael's new film version of a Hungarian opera masterpiece, Ferenc Erkel's Bank Ban, is ultimately an invaluable entry in the opera-on-film library.
  5. Hush!
    Meandering melodrama about gay relationships, friendship, loneliness and the elastic notion of family is considerably overlong and hampered by too many superfluous scenes.
  6. The Rising Place
    An ultra-touchy-feely race-relations, civil-rights drama as imagined by theme-park organizers, with every character painted in broad strokes in a story that eagerly tugs at every available heartstring -- and rings false at every turn.
  7. Dieu est grand, je suis toute petite
    Choppy and fragmented to the point of irritation, pic overuses blackouts between scenes, self-conscious camera movements, narrative ellipses and other jangly techniques.
  8. The Bread, My Sweet
    Lightweight but likable.
  9. Far From Heaven
    An accomplished marriage of elaborate style and content.
  10. 'R Xmas
    Despite some hazy plot points, the tough, compelling drama comes together quite satisfyingly, standing alongside 1996's "The Funeral" as perhaps the most controlled and cohesive of Ferrara's uneven work of recent years.
  11. 8 Mile
    The rough power, as well as the humor and sensitivity, of pop phenom Eminem is delivered intact in 8 Mile.
  12. Leela
    Succeeds only as a cultural exchange of cinematic cliches.
  13. Femme Fatale
    An extravagant suspense cocktail of wacky and lascivious ingredients that goes down fine.
  14. Strange Fruit
    Where pic excels is in the depiction of a rich leftist movement, with several cultures interacting expressively in the 1930s and '40s.
  15. Justifiable Homicide
    Film makes a strong case for some form of miscarriage of justice and subsequent high level cover-up in the Rosario shootings.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Treasure Planet
    The film's total appeal may be undercut by a script that rarely feels inspired.
  17. The Weight of Water
    Despite recurrent narrative and dramatic problems, each of Bigelow's pics provides a visual treat, and this film is no exception.
  18. Love in the Time of Money
    This kind of episodic chain of interlocking encounters has become a formulaic favorite in American indie cinema, and Mattei's take on the genre is narrow and schematic.
  19. Daughter from Danang
    An intelligent, well-observed and ineffably poignant study of an Amerasian woman's attempt to trace her roots by journeying back to Vietnam.
  20. The Santa Clause 2
    Festooned with cute, mugging kids; lots of jazzy redos of beloved Christmas tunes on the soundtrack; and enough tug-at-your-heartstrings moments to make an entire theater feel warm on a blustery winter afternoon.
  21. 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.
  22. Santa vs. the Snowman
    The lively visuals, busy story, zippy pace and TV show running time will make this go down very easily with the target moppet audience.
  23. Food of Love
    Pons has aimed for a performance-driven drama whose virtues are of the small-scale, low-key variety, with the director working within narrow dramatic limits as always but here doing so brilliantly.
  24. The Bank
    Will connect with anyone who ever had a bad experience with a bank or finance company, and provides a satisfyingly loathsome character in Anthony LaPaglia's engaging protrayal of a corporate shark.
    • 89 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Quai des Orfèvres [re-release]
    In every respect it is outstanding.
  26. Time Changer
    There is something sweetly naive about pic's astonished contention that this is because morals were taught in a nonreligious context. But it's not a compelling argument for the Apocalypse.
  27. All the Queen's Men
    Not bad enough to qualify as a memorable dud, multinational production nonetheless misses mark on every level.
  28. Frida
    Salma Hayek makes the character an icon of female independence, courage and nonconformity, forecasting special appeal for women viewers.
  29. By Hook or by Crook
    No movie like this about friendship between two young lesbians and their various adventures, punctuated with laissez-faire jump-cutting, should be this boring.
  30. The Truth About Charlie
    Dazzlingly nimble and light on its feet, this breezy but densely textured love letter to modern, multicultural Paris in the guise of a romantic suspenser returns its director to the vibrant vein of his pre-Oscar work in "Something Wild" and "Married to the Mob."
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