Variety's Scores

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For 17,782 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: 9,136 out of 17782
  2. Mixed: 7,010 out of 17782
  3. Negative: 1,636 out of 17782
17782 movie reviews
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  1. How to Train Your Dragon
    A thrilling drama interspersed with amusing comedic elements (rather than the other way around).
  2. All About Lily Chou-Chou
    For all its digressions and occasional flat moments, Iwai's movie is a remarkable, acutely involving one, working on an emotional level that can only really be expressed through music -- a strong component in all of Iwai's pics.
  3. End of the Century
    At the picture’s best, it recalls Michael Winterbottom's "24 Hour Party People" in its tribute to the music of the times and the way in which that music provided a voice to a generation of social misfits.
  4. Trolösa
    Liv Ullmann, directing her second Bergman screenplay (after 1997’s “Private Confessions”), extracts every nuance from the tantalizing material.
  5. Mule Skinner Blues
    Above all a rousing entertainment.
  6. How to Draw a Bunny
    Debuting helmer Walter assembles an aptly colorful package, with stylistic integration of elements from Johnson's delightful visual art. A major plus is the skittering percussion score by bebop jazz great Max Roach.
  7. Manito
    Furiously paced -- just shy of the sensory-overload point -- pic duly merits comparison to its spiritual granddaddy "Mean Streets," not in the usual imitative sense but rather in the freshness, character acuity and low-budget high style brought to a different NYC ethnic milieu.
  8. Tell Me Something
    A crackerjack serial-killer chiller in "Seven" mold, Tell Me Something cleverly disguises its thoroughly generic content and leaps of logic with highly honed technique and an involving approach to narrative.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Asphalt Zahov
    With its remarkably intimate look at Israeli Bedouin culture, a subject heretofore little treated, Danny Verete's Yellow Asphalt is a deeply affecting and brutally uncompromising anthology of three unrelated stories.
  10. The Hard Word
    Hard-boiled entertainment in the Tarantino mold is leavened with a distinctively Aussie sense of humor in The Hard Word.
  11. Painted Fire
    Grounded by a vigorous, physical performance from Choi Min-Sik, who brings both earthiness and grandeur to the central role, the film vividly evokes the world of an obsessive natural talent.
  12. The Cider House Rules
    A touching, old-fashioned charmer that ultimately satisfies.
  13. Liam
    This depiction of the trials and tribulations of a working-class Catholic family during the Depression is a far more intimate viewing experience than the similarly themed "Angela's Ashes."
  14. The Cat's Meow
    Playful and sporty, with just a small twist of the knife, The Cat's Meow is good, uncomplicated fun.
  15. Suddenly
    A delightfully unpredictable sleeper that proves new Argentine cinema really exists, Suddenly, by 26-year-old Diego Lerman, starts scary, moves through deadpan comic and comes out with a whimsical tenderness for its characters.
  16. Big Night
    This unlikely collaboration between actors Stanley Tucci and Campbell Scott is extremely well directed, making for a smartly made, delightfully acted period piece whose sensibility neatly straddles art films and the mainstream.
  17. Off the Hook
    Building blocks of tale are not new, but there's an appealingly rough-hewn and convincing tone to the proceedings.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Downtown 81
    Extraordinary real-life snapshot of hip, arty, clubland Manhattan in the post-punk era.
  19. Tortilla Soup
    A warm-blooded winner with equal emphasis placed on taste buds and heartstrings.
  20. Into the Arms of Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport
    Heartbreaking yet truly inspirational.
  21. La Ciénaga
    An atmospheric and cumulatively impressive feature-length debut from Argentine writer-director Lucrecia Martel.
  22. History Lessons
    Offers radical sexual politics in a jester's surprise package of impudent humor and Situationist-style found-footage monkeyshines.
  23. Little Voice
    A small picture with a big heart.
  24. Swingers
    Engaging, refreshingly human in its humor and becomingly modest in its aspirations, this hip look at being out of it announces some promising new talent and will play well with young audiences looking for comfortable entertainment that doesn't feel manufactured.
  25. Princesa
    A thoughtful, restrained, refreshingly nonjudgmental melodrama that reflects on interesting questions regarding sexuality, identity and self-acceptance.
  26. Pauline and Paulette
    Heartfelt and heart-rending performances make all the difference in Pauline and Paulette, a delightfully bittersweet story.
    • 46 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Bobby G. Can't Swim
    Gutsy, unconventional, bursting with raw urban energy, this surprisingly suspenseful drama portrays New York Hell's Kitchen residents whose lives are governed by the immutable circumstances of their tawdry existence.
  28. Evelyn
    The star plays Doyle as just rough enough around the edges to warrant the character's setbacks, but not so unpleasant that the twinkle in his eye is extinguished.
  29. The Kid Stays in the Picture
    Opulently produced, fittingly enough, and quite entertaining as a surface ride through the up, down and somewhat up again life of one of the New Hollywood's most colorful characters.
  30. Won't Anybody Listen
    Richly satisfying both as subversive, music-biz primer and as gritty, true-life underdog story.
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