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. The Astronaut Farmer
    Thornton carries the film with relaxed authority, though the earnest tone doesn't let him explore the nuttier aspects of a character who, from any reasoned distance ought look more screwy than heroic. Madsen is radiant.
  2. Reno 911!: Miami
    All of which goes to demonstrate that while it's easy enough to slap a colon on a lowbrow cable TV show, additional punctuation by itself isn't sufficient to actually transform it into a movie.
  3. The Abandoned
    Minimally plotted but beautifully atmospheric nightmare.
  4. Amazing Grace
    Picture reflects the no-nonsense storytelling skills of prolific helmer Michael Apted, whose career-long mix of feature and documentary work holds him in good stead once more.
  5. Gray Matters
    Scripter/helmer Sue Kramer's awkward freshman outing eventually coasts on the genuine charm of its leads. A strong vehicle for Heather Graham, who has never looked lovelier, "Gray" scores most convincingly in its reinvention of Carole Lombardian sexual screwiness as head-spinning gender confusion.
  6. Starter for 10
    Showcasing the considerable talents of ubiquitous thesp James McAvoy ("The Last King of Scotland," "Penelope") and several other up-and-coming Brit actors, picture garnishes fairly standard college-set plot with wit, warmth and unexpected turns.
  7. Glastonbury
    While one can appreciate helmer's resistance to a conventional, chronological overview, what emerges is a long, structureless muddle that does justice to neither the stellar acts nor changing countercultural times event has encompassed.
  8. Cocaine Angel
    Pitch-perfect central perf (by scribe and co-producer Damian Lahey), total lack of dramatic artifice and surreally situational humor make for a minor-key vignette of unmistakable, if unstable, authenticity.
  9. Breach
    Just as somber as "The Good Shepherd," the most recent domestic spy drama, but more tightly focused, Breach absorbingly zeroes in on how the FBI nailed the most damaging turncoat in American history.
  10. Bridge to Terabithia
    Some literal-minded attempts at magical realism are redeemed by the film's emotional texture, winning chemistry between the tyke leads and scrupulous adherence to a childlike point of view.
  11. Ghost Rider
    Though the superhero's fans have long awaited his close-up, the Devil's bounty hunter -- complete with a burning skull for a head and a killer motorcycle in flames --materializes in a movie that never measures up to his infernal potential.
  12. Antibodies
    Not content with a straight psychological police procedural, Alvart mixes in distracting -- and unconvincing --Biblical symbolism in a curious bid for weightiness.
  13. Avenue Montaigne
    A well-oiled script is nicely served by a multigenerational cast, a bittersweet and consistently entertaining mainstream comedy that tackles the big themes of Life and Art with unpretentious brio.
  14. Close to Home
    Mixes humor, tragedy, tenderness and political acumen into a well-observed coming-of-age format.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Grbavica: The Land of My Dreams
    Central performance by Mirjana Karanovic is instantly endearing. Unfortunately, film coasts on thesp's ability to evoke sympathy and leaves her stranded in this yarn that's all setup and little payoff.
  16. Eklavya: The Royal Guard
    The pic often plays like a Cliffs Notes version of a longer movie: Pacing and continuity aren't choppy, but there's enough material here for a full-length drama that would go deeper into the characters and their backgrounds. Eklavya is good as it is, but lacks tragic heft.
  17. Daddy's Little Girls
    Chockfull of cathartic moments, Perry's storytelling is best when it defies convention. Like the black man's Frank Capra, Perry tells stories in which every conflict is a test of faith and every victory a testament to the American underdog. Instead of following the proven formulas of screenwriting books, he earnestly shepherds his own messy structure.
  18. Music and Lyrics
    Grant carries the day as the fortysomething lad still living off his youth and just about getting away with it.
  19. Bamako
    Rather miraculously, picture succeeds in painlessly educating its viewers about global politics and economics while it describes contemporary Africa with freshness and clarity.
  20. Hannibal Rising
    This upmarket slasher is a well-produced but slow-moving thriller that never quite roars to life.
  21. Norbit
    Murphy's story lacks even the basic form that held most of "The Nutty Professor" together.
  22. The Last Sin Eater
    Michael Landon Jr.'s respectfully sincere but only fitfully involving film.
  23. Samoan Wedding
    The big, burly Samoan Wedding is a shrewdly written, impeccably timed and audaciously played romantic comedy.
  24. Black Friday
    Despite its large cast and complex criss-crossing from past to present, the movie rarely catches fire as an involving human drama.
  25. Notes on Marie Menken
    Handsome tribute is paid to the eponymous experimental filmmaker in Notes on Marie Menken, the fourth feature by Austrian docu helmer Martina Kudlacek, who previously made "In the Mirror of Maya Deren."
  26. Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience
    Excerpted interviews with WWII and Vietnam veterans suggest that every war is hell, yet it is the specificity of the Iraq War combatants' reminiscences that makes their writing resonate so profoundly.
  27. Burning Annie
    Pic relies on nerdy world-weary irony to carry the day, but doesn't convincingly draw its characters.
  28. The Decomposition of the Soul
    A thorny subject is handled with care in this meticulous reconstruction of life inside the East German police state, as boiled down to the experiences of just two ex-inmates -- one man and one woman --- of a notorious Stasi prison. Overall effect is poetically thought-provoking, not depressing.
  29. Because I Said So
    An exercise in canned cuteness, Because I Said So pushes its normally appealing stars, Diane Keaton and Mandy Moore, over the edge of sitcom hysteria.
  30. The Messengers
    Though the Pangs prove culturally adaptive on a visual level, they seem completely clueless as to the tonal modalities of Mark Wheaton's admittedly undercooked, all-American script.
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