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. The Players
    The Players is an odd beast that, like all omnibus films, is only as strong as its weakest link.
  2. Dark Phoenix
    Turner’s damaged conviction holds Dark Phoenix together, giving it a treacherous life force.
  3. Spread
    With "Shampoo" and "American Gigolo" now distant memories, the time evidently seemed ripe for another Hollywood stud movie. Despite Ashton Kutcher’s believability as an older woman’s kept boy, Spread isn’t a patch on those previous films.
  4. A Dog's Purpose
    Viewed in a vacuum, it’s hard to fault the movie’s earnestness; Hallström’s canine cinema pedigree (which includes the superior “Hachi: A Dog’s Tale”) shows through; and Rachel Portman’s score is understandably sentimental without going completely saccharine.
  5. Miss Congeniality
    Stumbling its way down the comedy runway, Miss Congeniality is yet another miscalculated vehicle for the ever-feisty Sandra Bullock.
  6. The Grace Card
    Blessed with fine performances, credible dialogue and slick production values that belie a reportedly paltry budget, The Grace Card ranks among the better religious-themed indies released in recent years.
  7. Nitro Circus: The Movie
    Watching people take their lives into their hands shouldn't be as tedious as Nitro Circus: The Movie 3D, which could be described as "Jackass" with a death wish (or "Wipeout" without the water).
  8. Bonhoeffer: Pastor. Spy. Assassin.
    The filmmaker also makes effective use of some timeworn narrative conventions to build and sustain suspense.
  9. The New Mutants
    Re-shot, re-cut and somehow rescued from total obscurity, Boone’s movie isn’t half bad. Alas, it’s not half good either. It’s basically just decent enough to motivate those sick of shutdown to risk getting sick for real.
  10. Brooklyn's Finest
    It’s more like "Hamlet" -- the ending, at least, with enough blood and corpses to fill a housing project. The only thing missing is a point, which Fuqua circles for two hours without landing.
  11. M. Butterfly
    This butterfly just doesn't fly. Icy, surprisingly conventional and never truly convincing.
  12. Last Days
    Even Yang, whose commitment is admirable, struggles to convey what’s inside John’s head — which, of course, is the whole point of this project.
  13. Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins
    Snake Eyes, as directed by Robert Schwentke (“The Divergent Series: Insurgent”), has style and verve, with a diabolical family plot that creates a reasonable quota of actual drama. The movie is also a synthetic but infectiously skillful big-studio hodgepodge of ninja films, wuxia films, yakuza films, and international revenge films.
  14. The Circle
    You could call The Circle a dystopian thriller, yet it’s not the usual boilerplate sci-fi about grimly abstract oppressors lording it over everyone else. The movie is smarter and creepier than that.
  15. America: Freedom to Fascism
    The strong case built in pic's first half is weakened by the vaguely argued contention in the second that the land of the free is becoming anything but. Attack focuses on the Federal Reserve, the Patriot Act, the abolition of the gold standard, and not-yet-ratified plans to introduce identity chips on currency and in citizens in the future.
  16. To Catch a Killer
    The worst thing you can say about To Catch a Killer is that it’s so adeptly executed in all departments that one is disappointed it ends up feeling a tad generic. It’s engrossing, sometimes exciting, yet never fully free from an overall sense of derivation.
  17. Death Note
    The movie never quite reckons with just how twisted a concept it’s peddling, and that’s easily the scariest thing about it.
  18. The Iron Orchard
    The narrative itself, however, is not without its bumpy stretches. The Iron Orchard is satisfyingly involving and entertaining as a whole — call it “Giant Lite” and you won’t be far off the mark — and the performances are sufficiently compelling to ease a viewer through some abrupt and elliptical transitions.
  19. Glass
    It’s good to see Shyamalan back (to a degree) in form, to the extent that he’s recovered his basic mojo as a yarn spinner. But Glass occupies us without haunting us; it’s more busy than it is stirring or exciting.
  20. The Peacemaker
    An uncommonly dour and even grim action thriller that globetrots as diversely as a James Bond film but offers a very limited view politically, emotionally and dramatically.
  21. Feast
    Forgettable fun for the undiscriminating.
  22. Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life
    Jolie is even hotter, faster and more commanding than last time around as the fearless heiress/adventuress, plus a little more human. The less welcome news is that most of the same shortcomings that cramped the first installment are still dogging the sequel, which delivers on action but dawdles through downtime.
  23. 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.
  24. Recess: School's Out
    Animation is dull and characterless, and vocal talent has evidently received blanket direction to, when in doubt, shout.
  25. The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement
    Too blandly insubstantial to expand its appeal beyond its target demographic.
  26. Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls
    It's a death-defying hodgepodge anchored by the complete confidence of star Carrey.
    • 43 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Great Gatsby
    The Francis Coppola script and Jack Clayton's direction paint a savagely genteel portrait of an upper class generation that deserved in spades what it got circa 1929 and after.
    • Variety
  28. Dealin' with Idiots
    For once, truth in advertising: Dealin’ With Idiots spends 83 minutes doing exactly that.
    • 43 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge
    Beneath its verbose, title, Jack Sholder's follow-up to Wes Craven's 1984 hit is a well-made though familiar reworking of demonic horror material.
  30. 47 Meters Down: Uncaged
    It takes a lot of chops to shoot the majority of a movie underwater, and Johannes Roberts is a skillful crafter of images ... But he’s a throw-what-he-can-at-the-audience director, and there’s little in 47 Meters Down: Uncaged that really sticks. The shocks, however, are consistently well-timed, and for the audience that seeks out a movie like this one that’s probably enough.
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