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. Vampires
    The pleasures are modest but consistent in John Carpenter's Vampires, a part-Western, part-horror flick that doesn't aim too high but nails the range it occupies.
  2. The Stepford Wives
    Another "remake" that merits the title in name only, The Stepford Wives isn't the "troubled" disaster that media reports have suggested it might be, yet nor do its oddly matched parts ever congeal into a fully formed creation.
  3. Anna
    A likable if overly familiar psychological thriller.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Magic Christian
    A spotty, uneven satire (from the novel by Terry Southern) with a number of good yocks, but insufficient sustained wit or related action.
  5. Austenland
    Austenland doesn’t really satirize Austen’s world (or fans) so much as use them as a pretext for a mixture of middling burlesque and routine romantic comedy.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Harry and the Hendersons
    Harry and the Hendersons is proof that the folks at Amblin Entertainment, a.k.a. Steven Spielberg’s production company, can’t keep using the same E.T. formula for every kiddie pic.
  7. Under the Electric Sky
    The pic provides lots of sexy, neon-hued eye-candy but not many images of deeper resonance.
  8. xXx: Return of Xander Cage
    Rarely do five minutes elapse between some sort of laugh-out-loud absurdity, and the distinction between the film’s intentional and unintentional comedy grows hazier as it goes.
  9. Armageddon
    Much of the confusion, as well as the lack of dramatic rhythm or character development, results directly from Bay's cutting style, which resembles a machine gun stuck in the firing position for 2 and a half hours.
  10. The Great Wall
    Director Zhang Yimou capably gives period fantasy-action The Great Wall the look and feel of a Hollywood blockbuster, but his signature visual dazzle, his gift for depicting delicate relationships and throbbing passions are trampled by dead-serious epic aspirations.
  11. Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones
    The haunted house setpieces provide reliable doses of jolts, even if one can see the scaffolding of each scare being built from miles away, and director Landon has fun with some clever camera placement here and there.
  12. For Love or Money
    Michael J. Fox has charm to burn in his latest screen outing "For Love or Money." A contemporary spin on bygone romantic comedies, the tale of an ambitious young man and the seemingly elusive woman in his life has a definite emotional pull. It falls short on story, however, and no amount of good humor can deter the thin tale from evaporating before the final clinch.
  13. GhettoPhysics: Will the Real Pimps and Hos Please Stand Up?
    For all its street edge, GhettoPhysics pretty much delivers the usual New Age seminar sleight-of-hand, providing a temporary, generalized sense of empowerment without any practical tools to improve one's lot.
  14. Girlfriend
    The bittersweet Girlfriend features Down syndrome actor Evan Sneider in its starring role, and he gives one of the better performances in writer-director Justin Lerner's obviously well-intended and affectionately made first feature.
  15. The Song
    A well-crooned country tune can invest even the hoariest cliches with honest feeling, and in much the same fashion, The Song takes a familiar tale of love, marriage, betrayal and redemption, and delivers a largely satisfying rendition.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Promise
    Kathleen Quinlan is pretty convincing as the painter/photographer and a new, very handsome, young leading man is added to the Hollywood scene with Stephen Collins as the architect.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Bug
    Its last half is largely static, and the film never revives much interest.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Terror Train
    Roger Spottiswoode, vet editor who co-authored a respected book on the subject with Karel Reisz, makes a competent directing debut here.
  19. The Bucket List
    A feel-good film about death, a sitcom about mortality, "Ikiru" for meatheads. It's also a picture about two cancer patients confronting reality, and deciding how they want to spend their presumed last days, that has not an ounce of reality about it.
  20. Mystery Team
    A genuinely funny but amateurishly constructed laffer from Derrick Comedy, a troupe of YouTube-savvy NYU grads with promising writing careers ahead of them.
  21. The Family
    Curiously airless, weightless and tonally uncertain, the picture mixes mass murder, dismemberment and rape threats with sappy sentimentality, fish-out-of-water gags and groan-worthy meta-humor, yet very little of it manages to leave any impression.
  22. Albatross
    Brown Findlay, reportedly cast before she filmed "Downton Abbey," is a real find. Germany's Koch suggests astute fishing beyond the obvious casting pools, and Ormond clearly relishes her change-of-pace role as tough, casually profane Joa.
  23. Crooked Arrows
    The story of a ragtag Native American team rediscovering the tribal roots of the game to defeat preppie champions is rife with tired tropes, and lacking in three-dimensional characters or colorful plot-twists. Happily for this Onandaga-financed production and vet director Steve Rash, gifted Native American lacrosse players lend hard-hitting impact to the game scenes.
  24. Fred Claus
    Alternates between unpleasantness and Hallmark-sweet sappiness.
  25. Opus
    With a confused tone stuck between satire and horror (that also informs Malkovich’s eccentric, out-of-place performance), and various half-baked ideas about cultural icons and toxic fandom, “Opus” mostly feels like a missed genre opportunity.
  26. From Paris with Love
    To his credit, Travolta hams it up with the kind of laissez-faire irony that might have made the film a tongue-in-cheek pleasure, had his attitude extended to the filmmakers.
  27. Trapped
    A pretty skillfully handled domestic thriller about a criminal activity that, while always upsetting, is especially noxious now due to the too many recent tragic and highly publicized instances of it.
  28. Underworld
    Takes itself so seriously that it never has fun with its shopworn genre elements.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Footloose
    By writing both the screenplay and contributing lyrics to nine of the film’s songs, Dean Pitchford has come up with an integrated story line that works.
  30. Almost Love
    With Almost Love, Doyle proves he has an eye, a sense of pacing and a thoughtful touch with actors. But the Almost Love saga is about as distinctive as the canvases Adam paints for Ravella.
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