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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    • 63 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Defending Your Life
    Defending Your Life is an inventive and mild bit of whimsy from Albert Brooks.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Comfort of Strangers
    Neither the beguiling romance of Venice nor the undraped bodies of Natasha Richardson and Rupert Everett can disguise the hollowness of The Comfort of Strangers.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Ju Dou
    The plot [from the novella Fuxi fuxi by Liu Heng] has all the elements of a Hollywood melodrama of the ’40s (both The Postman Always Rings Twice and Leave Her to Heaven come to mind), and the picture is, indeed, as deliriously enjoyable as it sounds, but with the added dimension of age-old tradition forcing the characters into roles they don’t want to play.
    • 41 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Career Opportunities
    Writer-producer John Hughes' followup to Home Alone lacks the spit-polish and magic of the blockbuster but still has plenty of absorbing characters, smart, snappy dialog and delightful stretches of comic foolery.
    • 45 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze
    Though Turtles II suffers from a lack of novelty and an aimless screenplay, the bottom line is that the pic won't disappoint its core subteen audience.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Class Action
    Winning performances by Gene Hackman and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio and potent direction by Michael Apted pump life into the sturdy courtroom drama formula once again.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Guilty by Suspicion
    First writing-directing effort by vet producer Irwin Winkler squarely lays out the professional, ethical and moral dilemmas engendered by the insidious political pressures brought to bear on filmmakers in the early 1950s. Robert De Niro is excellent as a top director brought down by reactionary paranoia. But the drama comes to life only fitfully.
    • 43 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    True Colors
    True Colors represents a cloyingly schematic attempt to portray the political and moral bankruptcy of the 1980s in a neat little package. Pic condemns but doesn't begin to analyze the corrupted values of the Reagan years, leaving one feeling soiled but unenlightened.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    La Femme Nikita
    [Parillaud] remains a totally uninteresting figment of Besson's blinkered movieland imagination, especially when she's in the company of Karyo and Anglade, who provide balance to her overacting.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    New Jack City
    Filmmakers pull off a provocative, pulsating update on gangster pics with this action-laden epic about the rise and fall of an inner city crack dealer. Strongest element is the anger and disgust directed squarely at drug dealers.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Doors
    This $40 million look at Jim Morrison's short, wild ride through a rock idol life is everything one expects from the filmmaker - intense, overblown, riveting, humorless, evocative, self-important and impossible to ignore.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Bride of Re-Animator
    Fans of Stuart Gordon's 1985 Re-Animator will probably dig this campy gorefest sequel directed by the original's producer, Brian Yuzna.
    • 13 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Nothing But Trouble
    It’s a good bet a film is in trouble when the highlight comes from seeing John Candy in drag.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    The Silence of the Lambs
    A mesmerizing thriller that will grip audiences from first scene to last.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    L.A. Story
    Goofy and sweet, L.A. Story constitutes Steve Martin's satiric valentine to his hometown and a pretty funny comedy in the bargain.
    • 48 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Sleeping with the Enemy
    In Sleeping with the Enemy, a chilling look at marital abuse gives way to a streamlined thriller [from the novel by Nancy Price] delivering mucho sympathy for imperiled heroine Julia Roberts and screams aplenty as she's stalked by her maniacal husband.
    • 30 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The NeverEnding Story II: The Next Chapter
    Film is effective in its own right, but as with most sequels, it lacks freshness. American actress Burt is any adolescent boy’s fantasy seductress. Rest of the cast is adequate, but a letdown compared with the original’s.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Hamlet
    Franco Zeffirelli's Hamlet is bland.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    White Fang
    Disney’s workmanlike remake of Jack London’s adventure White Fang boasts enough nature footage and a strong central performance by Ethan Hawke to win over small fry.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Green Card
    Although a thin premise endangers its credibility at times, Green Card is a genial, nicely played romance.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Not Without My Daughter
    Sally Field has the stage to herself to engage the audience’s sympathy, and this she does with an earnest, suitably emotional performance as a rather typically sincere, middle-class American.
    • 44 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Warlock
    Warlock is an attempt to concoct a pic from a pinch of occult chiller, a dash of fantasy thriller and a splash of 'stalk 'n' slash'. But what could have been a heady brew falls short, despite some gusto thesping from Richard E. Grant and Lori Singer.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Godfather: Part III
    Part III matches its predecessors in narrative intensity, epic scope, socio-political analysis, physical beauty and deep feeling for its characters and milieu.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Alice
    Performances are strong all around, with a succession of top actors making the most of their brief turns. But the center of the pic is Farrow, who’s funny and touching.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Kindergarten Cop
    The polished comic vision that gave Twins, Arnold Schwarzenegger's comedy breakthrough, a storybook shine completely eludes director Ivan Reitman here. Result is a mish-mash of violence, psycho-drama and lukewarm kiddie comedy.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Long Walk Home
    An effectively mounted drama about the human impact of changing times on two families, with sturdy performances by Sissy Spacek as an uppercrust white housewife and Whoopi Goldberg as her maid.
    • 27 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    The Bonfire of the Vanities
    Unfortunately, the caricatures are so crude and the ‘revelations’ so unenlightening of the human condition, that the satire is about as socially incisive as a Police Academy entry.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Russia House
    John le Carre's glasnost-era espionage novel has been turned into intelligent adult entertainment, but somber tone, utter lack of action and sex, and complexity of plot tilts this mainly to upscale audience.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Mermaids
    As eccentric mother-daughter films go, this one [from the novel by Patty Dann] falls into the same category as Terms of Endearment, with many of the same comedic pleasures and dramatic pitfalls. The delightful Ryder, billing notwithstanding, is really the star. Cher is also fine as the cavalier, self-centered mom, an equally amusing if less sympathetic character.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Edward Scissorhands
    A delightful and delicate comic fable.
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