Variety's Scores

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For 17,765 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: 9,125 out of 17765
  2. Mixed: 7,004 out of 17765
  3. Negative: 1,636 out of 17765
17765 movie reviews
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    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Them!
    This science-fiction shocker has a well-plotted story [by George Worthington Yates, adapted by Russell Hughes], expertly directed and acted in a matter-of-fact style.
    • 90 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Monsieur Hulot's Holiday
    Though not as funny as Fete, due to a lesser story peg, this one generates a load of yocks, with fine observation of types at a vacation resort.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Dial M for Murder
    There are a number of basic weaknesses in the setup that keep the picture from being a good suspense show for any but the most gullible. Via the performances and several suspense tricks expected of Hitchcock, the weaknesses are glossed over but not enough to rate the film a cinch winner.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Salt of the Earth
    Salt of the Earth is a good, highly dramatic and emotion-charged piece of work that tells its story straight. It is, however, a propaganda picture which belongs in union halls rather than theatres.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Wild One
    Inspired by an episode when a mob of youths on motorcycles terrorized a Californian town for an entire evening, this feature is long on suspense, brutality and sadism. Marlon Brando contributes another hard-faced 'hero' who never knew love as a boy and is now plainly in need of psychoanalysis.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Knights of the Round Table
    The carefully developed script plus knowing direction by Richard Thorpe give the legendary tale credibility. It’s storybook stuff – and must be accepted as such – but the astute staging results in a walloping package of entertainment for all except, perhaps, the blase.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Hondo
    Hondo is an exciting offbeat western. The stereoscopic 3-D cameras and WarnerColor successfully capture the vast natural beauty of Camargo, Mexico, where the picture was filmed on location.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Calamity Jane
    Giving such Wild West characters as Calamity Jane and Wild Bill Hickok a workout in a tuned-in western doubtless had strong possibilities but Warners comes close to missing the stagecoach. Colorful settings and costumes add the entry some sparkle but the 'book' is lacking in originality and the players simply are uneasy.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Mogambo
    The lure of the jungle and romance get a sizzling workout in Mogambo and it's a socko package of entertainment, crammed with sexy two-fisted adventure.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    A Lion Is in the Streets
    The Adrian Locke Langley novel was a long time coming to the screen since first purchased by the Cagneys for filming. Along the way it lost a lot of the shocker quality and emerges as just an average drama of a man's political ambitions.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    From Here to Eternity
    An outstanding motion picture...It’s still raw, tough dramatic stuff of great entertainment pull for adult ticket buyers. Only a few will find it too strong for their effete tastes. Importantly, the distaffers will like it.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Roman Holiday
    [William Wyler] times the chuckles with a never-flagging pace, puts heart into the laughs, endows the footage with some boff bits of business and points up some tender, poignant scenes in using the smart script and the cast to the utmost advantage.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The War of the Worlds
    A socko science-fiction feature, as fearsome as a film as was the Orson Welles 1938 radio interpretation of the H.G. Wells novel.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Caddy
    Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis dig a lot of divots among the fairways of The Caddy. It's an amusing romp [from a story by Danny Arnold] that, while not always parring previous M & L successes, comes close enough.
    • 93 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Band Wagon
    Astaire, as the film star, shows his ability with a song and dance character.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Lili
    Aumont is delightful as the magician and his act with Gabor, staged almost as a production piece, is a high-light.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Stalag 17
    The legit hit about GI internees in a Nazi prison camp during the Second World War is screened as a lusty comedy-melodrama, loaded with bold, masculine humor and as much of the original’s uninhibited earthiness as good taste and the Production Code permit.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    It Came from Outer Space
    Direction by Jack Arnold whips up an air of suspense and there is considerable atmosphere of reality created, which stands up well enough if the logic of it all is not examined too closely.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    House of Wax
    Andre de Toth's direction, while uneven, nonetheless gears it to the medium.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Shane
    George Stevens handles the story and players in a manner that gives his production and direction a tremendous integrity. The casting is exceptionally good and the male stars have never been seen to better advantage.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    I Confess
    An interesting plot premise holds out considerable promise for this Alfred Hitchcock production, but I Confess is short of the suspense one would expect.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Ivanhoe
    Ivanhoe is a great romantic adventure, mounted extravagantly, crammed with action, and emerges as a spectacular feast.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Peter Pan
    James M. Barrie's childhood fantasy, Peter Pan, many times legit-staged, and previously filmed with live actors, is a feature cartoon of enchanting quality.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Niagara
    Niagara is a morbid, cliched expedition into lust and murder.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Bad and the Beautiful
    The screenplay of the George Bradshaw story is exceptionally well-written.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Road to Bali
    There’s no story to speak of in the script [from a story by Frank Butler and Harry Tugend] but the framework is there on which to hang a succession of amusing quips and physical comedy dealing with romantic rivalry and chuckle competition between the two male stars.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Star
    A strong performance by Bette Davis, in a tailor-made role, gives a lift to The Star that it might not have had otherwise.
    • 50 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Million Dollar Mermaid
    This is a gaudy, conventional biopic based on the career of Australian swimmer Annette Kellerman, appropriately tagged ‘Million Dollar Mermaid’.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Limelight
    Departing from most forms of Hollywood stereotype, the film has a flavor all its own in the sincere quality of the story anent the onetime great vaudemime and his rescue of a femme ballet student from a suicide attempt and subsequently from great mental depression.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Snows of Kilimanjaro
    The script broadens the 1927 short story considerably without losing the Hemingway penchant for the mysticism behind his virile characters and lusty situations.
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