Variety's Scores

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For 17,760 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: 9,121 out of 17760
  2. Mixed: 7,003 out of 17760
  3. Negative: 1,636 out of 17760
17760 movie reviews
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    • 61 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Big Country
    Although the story – based on Donald Hamilton’s novel, with Jessamyn West and Robert Wyler credited with the screen adaptation – is dwarfed by the scenic outpourings, The Big Country is nonetheless armed with a serviceable, adult western yarn.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Defiant Ones
    The performances by Tony Curtis and Sidney Poitier are virtually flawless. Poitier captures all of the moody violence of the convict, serving time because he assaulted a white man who had insulted him. It is a cunning, totally intelligent portrayal that rings powerfully true.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    The Blob
    Neither the acting nor direction is particularly creditable.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
    Taylor has a major credit with her portrayal of Maggie. The frustrations and desires, both as a person and a woman, the warmth and understanding she molds, the loveliness that is more than a well-turned nose – all these are part of a well-accented, perceptive interpretation.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Fly
    One strong factor of the picture is its unusual believability. It is told as a mystery suspense story, so that it has a compelling interest aside from its macabre effects. There is an appealing and poignant romance between Owens and Hedison, which adds to the reality of the story, although the flashback technique purposely robs the picture of any doubt about the outcome.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Gigi
    It has all the ingredients. It's a naughty but nice romp of the hyper-romantic naughty 90s of Paris-in-the-spring, in the Bois, in Maxim's, and in the boudoir. How can it miss?
    • 68 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Revenge of Frankenstein
    The production is a rich one. The screenplay is well-plotted, peopled with interesting characters, aided by good performances from Francis Matthews as Cushing’s chief assistant and others.
    • 100 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Vertigo
    Unfortunately, even that mastery is not enough to overcome one major fault, for the plain fact is that the film’s first half is too slow and too long.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Horror of Dracula
    Both director Terence Fisher as well as the cast have taken a serious approach to the macabre theme that adds up to lotsa tension and suspense.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Run Silent Run Deep
    Run Silent, Run Deep is a taut, exciting drama of submarine warfare in the Pacific during the Second World War.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Carve Her Name with Pride
    Part of the pic's attraction is its lack of hysteria. It keeps resolutely to the facts [from a book by R.J. Minney] and refuses to allow the espionage and torture sequences to go past the bounds of credulity.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Witness for the Prosecution
    A courtroom meller played engagingly and building evenly to a surprising and arousing, albeit tricked-up, climax, Witness for the Prosecution has been transferred to the screen (from the Agatha Christie click play) with competence.
    • 99 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Touch of Evil
    Touch of Evil smacks of brilliance but ultimately flounders in it.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    The Tarnished Angels
    The Tarnished Angels is a stumbling entry. Characters are mostly colorless, given static reading in drawn-out situations, and story line is lacking in punch.
    • 90 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Paths of Glory
    While the subject is well handled and enacted in a series of outstanding characterizations, it seems dated and makes for grim screen fare.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Old Yeller
    Disney organization's flair for taking a homely subject and building a heartwarming film is again aptly demonstrated in this moving story set in 1869 of a Texas frontier family and an old yeller dog. Based on Fred Gipson's novel of same tag, this is a careful blending of fun, laughter, love, adventure and tragedy.
    • 88 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    The Bridge on the River Kwai
    A gripping drama, expertly put together and handled with skill in all departments. Its potency stems only partly from the boxoffice draw of William Holden and, to a lesser degree, Alec Guinness. What elevates “Kwai” to the rank of an artistic and financial triumph for producer Sam Spiegel is the engrossing entertainment it purveys, including some scenes which will be listed as among the best of film memorabilia.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Peyton Place
    Under Mark Robson’s direction, every one of the performers delivers a topnotch portrayal.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Jailhouse Rock
    The production carries a contrived plot but under Richard Thorpe's deft direction unfolds smoothly. Director has been wise enough to allow Elvis Presley (in his third starrer) his own style, and build around him.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Three Faces of Eve
    It is frequently an intriguing, provocative motion picture, but director Nunnally Johnson's treatment of the subject matter makes the film neither fish nor foul. Johnson shifts back and forth - striving for comedy at one point and presenting a documentary case history at another.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Man of a Thousand Faces
    As Chaney, James Cagney has immersed himself so completely in the role that it is difficult to spot any Cagney mannerisms. Jane Greer, as his second wife, is particularly appealing in her devotion to her ‘difficult’ spouse.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    3:10 to Yuma
    Aside from the fact that this is an upper-drawer western, 3:10 to Yuma will strike many for its resemblance to High Noon. That the climax fizzles must be laid on doorstep of Halsted Welles, who adapts Elmore Leonard's story quite well until that point.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    An Affair to Remember
    Adding comedy lines, music, color and CinemaScope, Jerry Wald and Leo McCarey turn this remake of the 1939 Love Affair into a winning film that is alternately funny and tenderly sentimental.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Love in the Afternoon
    Under Billy Wilder's alternately sensitive, mirthful and loving-care direction, and with Maurice Chevalier turning in a captivating performance as a private detective specializing in cases of amour, the production holds enchantment and delight in substantial quantity.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Curse of Frankenstein
    Peter Cushing gets every inch of drama from the leading role, making almost believable the ambitious urge and diabolical accomplishment.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    A Face in the Crowd
    Elia Kazan and Budd Schulberg, who teamed to bring forth On the Waterfront, have another provocative and hardhitting entry, based on Schulberg's short story The Arkansas Traveler. It's a devastating commentary on hero-worship and success cults in America.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Gunfight at the O.K. Corral
    Producer Hal Wallis has taken the historic meeting of Wyatt Earp, a celebrated lawman of the West, his brothers and Doc Holliday, with the Clanton gang in the O.K. Corral of Tombstone, Arizona, and fashioned an absorbing yarn [suggested by an article by George Scullin] in action leading up to the gory gunfight.
    • 97 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    12 Angry Men
    Perhaps the motivations of each juror are introduced too quickly and are repeated too often before each changes his vote. However, the film leaves a tremendous impact.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Incredible Shrinking Man
    Director Jack Arnold works up the chills for maximum effect.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Wrong Man
    Alfred Hitchcock draws upon real-life drama for this gripping piece of realism [from the Life magazine story The True Story of Christopher Emmanuel Balestrero by Maxwell Anderson]. He builds the case of a NY Stork Club musician falsely accused of a series of holdups to a powerful climax, the events providing director a field day in his art of characterization and suspense.
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