Variety's Scores

Select another publication »
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
view
per page
  1. The Other Story
    The screenplay, co-written by Nesher and psychology professor Noam Shpancer, feels well-researched, poignantly highlighting the little things parents do that unintentionally traumatize their children. It also brims with the snappy dialogue that Nesher’s films are known for.
  2. The Specials
    The Specials, in the end, is not a very compelling movie. It’s arduous and rambling and repetitive; it skitters across the surface of the story it’s telling. The film lacks a vibrant structure, but more than that, it never brings us close to the people it shows us.
  3. Maiden
    Shattering a glass ceiling has rarely been more engrossing — or grueling — than it is in Maiden.
  4. Euphoria
    The catharsis feels fake and unearned. Moreover, the film lacks the warmth and respect for all of of its characters displayed in Langseth’s previous work.
  5. Anna
    It’s nowhere near the embarrassment of Brian De Palma’s “Domino,” or any number of recent studio tentpoles. Nor is it fresh enough to pretend that audiences had missed out on something special if it had been buried altogether — except perhaps for Luss, who’s bound to get another shot.
  6. Nightmare Cinema
    If there are no outright duds, there’s no real triumph either. But the whole is certainly diverse, lively and reference-packed enough to please horror fans attracted to this kind of enterprise.
  7. Burn Your Maps
    Burn Your Maps is one of those movies that’s glib and facile and threadbare all the way through, then the ending sort of gets to you (you’d have to be made of pretty stern stuff if it didn’t), so you think back over what you’ve seen — and it’s still a crock.
  8. Ladies in Black
    "Ladies” is let down by a screenplay lacking the sharp wit and emotional depth to bring its characters and themes fully to life.
  9. Swinging Safari
    A cheerfully vulgar, consistently amusing and sometimes hilarious parody of life in a suburban Aussie cul-de-sac in the mid-1970s.
  10. The Feeling of Being Watched
    Equal parts angry and anxious, Boundaoui’s smart, unsettling documentary functions both as a real-world conspiracy thriller and a personal reflection on the psychological strain of being made to feel an outsider in one’s own home.
  11. Child's Play
    This is the new normal for horror movies: The screenplays have to seem hipper than the premise they represent, which puts “Child’s Play” in the weird position of pointing out and poking fun at all the ways it fails to make sense.
  12. The Quiet One
    Murray’s job was to curate the extensive Wyman collection and turn it into a story, and he does so without ever digging too deep into Wyman’s psyche.
  13. In the Aisles
    In the Aisles is unusual in its compassion and respect for its blue-collared characters.
  14. South Mountain
    As highlighted by its pitch-perfect finale, South Mountain demonstrates a realistically complex conception of stock ideas like “vengeance,” “moving on” and “healing,” and Ethan Mass’s cinematography echoes the material’s dualities in its delicate interplay of light and dark. Guiding the material from start to finish, however, is Balsam.
  15. The Edge of Democracy
    The Edge of Democracy makes no claims to objectivity. This is documentary cinema in which facts tangle compellingly with feeling, while passages of solemn, stately mood-building split the difference.
  16. Midsommar
    It’s an admirably strange, thematically muddled curiosity from a talented filmmaker who allows his ambitions to outpace his execution.
  17. Emanuel
    Most of all, Emanuel demonstrates forgiveness is hard work that requires a divine-level of fortitude. Especially when it comes at direct odds with the ones you hold dear.
  18. Daughter of the Wolf
    These filmmakers are eager to explore the delicate facets of a forceful, fully-formed woman, and they do so with imagery that’s both stunning and subtle.
  19. Murder Mystery
    Murder Mystery feels as shamelessly gaudy as paste jewelry — a trinket for nights that aspire to nothing more exotic than a pizza — but Aniston sparkles like the real deal.
  20. Being Frank
    Being Frank isn’t very amusing, which normally would be the most damning thing one might say about an ostensible comedy. But that really isn’t the worst thing about it. There is something ineffably creepy about this contrived and mirthless farce.
  21. American Woman
    American Woman isn’t dull, but the narrative feels more over-stuffed than surprising, and the packaging busy rather than evocative. There’s no unifying directorial tone or stylistic tact to lend the film the symphonic grandeur it sometimes appears to be aiming for.
  22. Toy Story 4
    "Toy Story" ushered in the era of computer-animated cartoon features, and the fourth movie wraps up the saga beautifully. At least, for now.
  23. Shaft
    The movie is product, but by the end you want to see this team again.
  24. Head Count
    This is all a lot more interesting than some guy in a mask running around with a kitchen knife. Though not at all comedic like the “Happy Death Day” films, Head Count similarly plays with narrative perception in clever ways. It’s an admirably disciplined film with committed performances by actors playing characters more complicated than the usual horror casualty list.
  25. Men in Black: International
    The connection between Tessa Thompson and Hemsworth is what saves the day, not anything their characters do onscreen.
  26. This One's for the Ladies
    The whole affair is vastly entertaining — and far from indecent or intimidating.
  27. Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story by Martin Scorsese
    Rolling Thunder Revue celebrates the let’s-try-it-on, let-it-all-hang-out spirit of the era, and as a time capsule the film is a gift that keeps on giving.
  28. Papi Chulo
    An egregiously miscalculated rent-a-companion comedy from Irish writer-director John Butler (“Handsome Devil”).
  29. Fire Will Come
    You know exactly what climax is coming in Oliver Laxe’s rustically beautiful rural parable, but its dreamy, mesmeric power lies in the waiting.
  30. The Lavender Scare
    Essential and absorbing documentary.
Page:

Top Trailers

See all »
See all trailers »