Village Voice's Scores

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For 11,162 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 40% higher than the average critic
  • 4% same as the average critic
  • 56% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 7.5 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Movie review score: 57
Highest review score: 100 Hooligan Sparrow
Lowest review score: 0 Followers
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 4,708 out of 11162
  2. Mixed: 4,553 out of 11162
  3. Negative: 1,901 out of 11162
11162 movie reviews
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  1. Mifune's Last Song
    Grows increasingly slack and silly.
  2. The Sum of All Fears
    The jerry-rigged result is a trite espionage thriller without the thrills but with a lingering measure of nausea.
    • 22 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    The Tiger and the Snow
    The results are neither profound nor funny, but merely uncomfortable. A hubristic failure at risky humor, The Tiger and the Snow provides Benigni his own Michael Richards moment.
  4. Till Human Voices Wake Us
    Another mystery that gives up its secrets all too quickly, Till Human Voices Wake Us is named for a T.S. Eliot line -- and it proves a woefully evocative title for this snoozy supernatural pastoral.
  5. By the Gun
    By the Gun is a gangster film wholly devoid of suspense, atmosphere, or grit.
  6. Soul Plane
    Coming off a memorable supporting turn in Starsky & Hutch, Snoop Dogg is sadly underutilized as the stoner pilot.
  7. The Burning Plain
    The writer's most successful works--"The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada" and "Amores Perros"--were bolstered by directors who brought genuine emotion to the screen, but The Burning Plain marks Arriaga's behind-the-camera debut, and his obviousness is staggering.
    • 1 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    Not Cool
    Not Cool is a cautionary tale of how being able to make videos that go viral does not necessarily make someone a filmmaker.
    • 35 Metascore
    • 20 Reviewed by
      Ed Park
    The Perfect Score
    "X is to Y, as this shit is to boring."
  10. The Diabolical
    It might be asking too much for The Diabolical to fully live up to its cheesy-ominous title, but the sheer unadulterated inanity of these proceedings suggests that it'll soon be teleported to the far corners of the B-movie streaming-video abyss.
  11. My Lucky Star
    Still, the vibrantly shot Lucky Star could have been a mildly entertaining bit of escapism, were it not for the fact that Sophie isn't naïve so much as infantile, a point driven home by her wardrobe.
  12. Goats
    Incapable of energizing Mark Poirier's leaden script (based on his own novel), Christopher Neil directs with a mechanical blandness made more tedious still by a score of gentle guitar strumming so aggravatingly benign it might inspire you to partake in one of Wendy's climactic, cathartic primal screams.
    • 40 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    Happy Hour
    Every alkie downward-spiral cliché from "The Lost Weekend" to "Leaving Las Vegas."
  14. Getaway
    The smash-and-crash chase scenes are numbingly dull.
  15. Agent Cody Banks 2: Destination London
    It's hard to despise a movie with the balls to posit that its Blair-look-alike PM has been brainwashed by a corrupt CIA operative, but Banks 2 is really pretty hateful.
  16. Commitment
    When Commitment isn't a perfectly forgettable action film, it's either an oil-thin melodrama or a charbroiled treat for meatheads.
  17. 6 Ways To Die
    In its execution, the film becomes a cascading-failure scenario that proceeds from Soumah's intention to bait-and-switch the audience, coupled with a lot of suboptimal acting and amateurish editing choices.
  18. Come Back to Me
    The film's clumsy script elicits groans, but it's the plot that infuriates.
  19. Treasure Planet
    Despite more betrayal and loyalty than a Chris Carabba box set, there's no real good or evil here.
  20. The Corruptor
    That in such a miserable film I could still care whether his character lived or died is, perhaps, the greatest proof that Chow Yun Fat's a movie star.
  21. On_Line
    Indifferently written, passably acted, resourcefully shot in video with enlivening splashes of local color.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    Holy Man
    Holy Man's traipse through the wilds of consumerism and higher purpose must have seemed like a chance for the proverbial stretch, but not even Eddie can save this ill-conceived mess of a movie.
  23. Under Suspicion
    Strangely, there's no thrust and parry to this potentially heavyweight mind game. The effect is more like a tennis match in which every feebly contested point ends with an unforced error.
  24. Funny Games (2008)
    Professional obligations required that I endure it, but there's no reason why you should.
  25. 14 Cameras
    Unfortunately, Archambault’s churlishly over-the-top performance makes it impossible to take 14 Cameras seriously, no matter how you interpret Gerald’s actions.
  26. Don't Ask Don't Tell
    The would-be cult classic Don't Ask Don't Tell may be a "refried film," but that's no excuse for stale jokes.
  27. Careful What You Wish For
    Allen attempts to build a sense of mounting anxiety via the increasing suspicions of a tenacious insurance investigator, unexpected testimony from eyewitnesses, and Lena's squirrelly behavior, but pop star Jonas is incapable of making simple facial expressions, let alone evincing existential dread.
  28. The Transporter Refueled
    it's overstuffed, undercooked, and needlessly complicated.
  29. Like Sunday, Like Rain
    When Reggie advises Eleanor, a former cornet prodigy, to protect her artistic "gift," Like Sunday, Like Rain finally achieves maximum phoniness.
    • 25 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    Modigliani
    Sadly, instead of situating the l'amour fou in the artistic ferment of the period (1917-1920), Davis twists the period to fit the story.
  31. Cherish
    The only flicker of thematic interest -- AM radio obsession as psychopathology -- is duly subsumed into a sea of desperate soundtrack come-ons.
  32. Evolution
    Sodden mess, a mutation-invasion movie that passes "Attack of the Killer Tomatoes!" going south.
  33. The Blue Tooth Virgin
    In case we don't get that this is pretentious bullshit, David mentions how much he likes Bergman's "Persona." Later, to hammer it home, he admits that he's been trying to be a cooler person by succumbing to peer pressure by seeing "art films" and listening "to certain bands that actually suck."
  34. Wild Grass
    An insufferable exercise in cutie-pie modernism, painfully unfunny and precious to a fault.
  35. DSKNECTD
    It's an over-the-top cautionary doc less convincing than the weight-loss ads on Facebook.
    • 22 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    Don't Tell
    Spectacularly incompetent, Don't Tell races into self-parody before the end of the opening credits.
    • 31 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    Don't Tempt Me
    Imagines Heaven and Hell as places so deeply mired in the business-as-usual hassles of earthly life that the battle between good and evil becomes a downright dull affair.
    • 52 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    300
    It's a ponderous, plodding, visually dull picture, but the blame shouldn't be put on Snyder's skills per se, and has nothing to do with his ambition to blur the distinction between CGI and photography. Frankly, it's the slavish, frame-by-frame devotion to Miller's source material that's the problem.
  39. Love the Coopers
    What a difference a comma makes — or would make, in the case of Jessie Nelson's lumpy, wretchedly unfunny Love the Coopers, whose title commands us to love people it's impossible even to like.
  40. Just One Time
    An arthritic exercise in self-pleasurement.
  41. Condemned
    So what do the tea leaves say? They're hard to read through the over-the-top grossness and weak acting, but it's probably that gentrification is good, poor people and assorted lowlifes don't deserve prime real estate, and Sean Penn's baby girl needs a better agent.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    American History X
    A mess of a film.
  43. Yoga Hosers
    Yoga Hosers is lazy, unfunny, and self-indulgent.
  44. Christmas with the Kranks
    Cringe-worthy spectacle.
  45. Blue Iguana
    From the characters to the purposely perplexing plot, it’s all hollow and artificial to the point of being downright grating. Blue Iguana is another exercise in sarcastic, self-referential, postmodern pulp whose time has so come and gone.
  46. Breaking Through
    For a movie all about passion and the need to express yourself artistically, it is the most halfhearted "you got served" to hit theaters this year.
  47. Ocean's Thirteen
    See it if you must, but don't forget to pack the Air Wick. These breezy doings are mustier than a Glitter Gulch casino at 4 a.m.
  48. Russian Doll
    The cheesy idiot-twin of Pawel Pawlikowski's superb "Last Resort."
  49. X-Men Origins: Wolverine
    The X-Men franchise takes a giant leap backward and off a cliff with its fourth offering.
  50. Happily N'Ever After
    Director Paul J. Bolger and screenwriter Rob Moreland have drained the affectionate wit out of the Shrek franchise's satire, giving us instead a barely sketched out story line and quantities of unimaginative CGI.
  51. Hacker's Game
    The acting is community-theater-level, and the sets look phony, but there's unintentional humor in counting the clichés as they mount.
    • 39 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    Provoked: A True Story
    Short-changing issues of race and wearing its heart way out on its sleeve, it's the film's amateur exposition that's most dumbfounding -- poised to provoke more sarcasm than righteous indignation.
  53. Hit by Lightning
    It's a black-comedy plot without any blackness or actual comedy, unless mugging and bro-heiming by Mad TV's Will Sasso counts as hilarious.
  54. The Gospel According to Philip K. Dick
    Writers are only interesting for what they've written, and for that you'll have to go read.
    • 34 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    The Haunted Mansion
    Lamer than Tiny Tim on a damp London day.
  56. The Price of Air
    Culminates in a second bing-bang-boom triple shoot-out that effectively cancels out the shreds of remaining plot but is shot and cut like a sixth grader's Super-8 struggle for Woo-ness.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 20 Reviewed by
      Ed Park
    Better Housekeeping
    Too stupid to be satire, too obviously hateful to be classified otherwise, Frank Novak's irritating slice of lumpen life is as reliably soul-killing as its title is nearly meaningless. ("Good Housekeeping" magazine's legal muscle forced a last-minute change.)
  58. Tycoon: A New Russian
    Though a relatively sober essay on criminal organization, Tycoon is also thoroughly pulpy -- that is, crass, unimaginative, corner-cutting, and simplistic, with the visual vocabulary of daytime soap.
  59. Knucklehead
    A schmaltzy family comedy that won't pass the smell test for kids, parents, or even stoner second cousins, Knucklehead is too sluggish for young attention spans, and not inventive enough to keep adults engaged.
  60. 17 Again
    If this is one small step for the actor (Efron) toward becoming a leading man, it is, for Hollywood movies, one more giant leap into infantilism.
  61. Oh My God
    The drubbing score leaves one nearly insensate to the fact that Rodgers has nothing original or even interesting to say about his subject, flattening fine points of scripture to recommend interfaith group hugs.
  62. A Love Affair of Sorts
    It is part of the film's premise that the movies are only a pretext to serve personal needs. Given how little the murky finished product offers an outside audience, this comes across all too convincingly.
  63. The Prosecution of an American President
    So unabashedly one-sided that the documentary is problematic even when the facts and figures check out.
  64. Crave
    Hey, Crave, the jerk store called, and they're running out of you.
  65. Bad Company
    Predictably soulless techno-tripe, this Bruckheimer-in-a-can thriller is leavened only by the ludicrous notion of Chris Rock playing separated twins.
  66. Hanging Up
    So hackneyed and so condescending to its potential audience (adult women) that even Lifetime might hesitate before running it.
  67. Jurassic Park III
    Drama is minimal and character nonexistent.
  68. Love Sick Love
    Attempts to transform meet-cute romance into an absurdist fatal-attraction thriller, but ends up neither fish nor fowl.
    • 15 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    Darkness
    Rarely has a film's tagline been more fitting: "Some secrets should never come to light."
  70. Final Destination 3
    Rote sequel that surely no one was waiting for: Like the serially thwarted Death (the only "character" to return from the first two Final Destination movies), audiences are required to endure banal exposition and junior-high-level foreshadowing before being treated to the nauseatingly detailed scenes of CGI slaughter.
  71. The Banger Sisters
    For a few brief moments, it's the bravest work this Hollywood gargoyle (Hawn) has ever done.
  72. Endless Love
    This film is a sunny, overlong pastiche of tropes, the kind that suggest love involves nothing more than holding hands and jumping off a dock into a lake, or having slow, teary-eyed sex in front of a fireplace, inexplicably blazing in mid-June.
    • 31 Metascore
    • 20 Reviewed by
      Ed Park
    Green Card Fever
    Though it's high time for a probing drama that illuminates the labyrinth of America's immigration system, those responsible for Green Card Fever should have their artistic licenses revoked.
  74. Fighting for Freedom
    None of these TV-movie trappings does Freedom's topical subject any favors, but they do confirm that those most passionate about something often require some sort of creative filter when making art about it.
  75. Town & Country
    Limps into theaters at long last, practically begging, with every arthritic pratfall, to be put out of its misery.
  76. Civil Brand
    Without a scorcher like Pam Grier, the sub-NYPD Blue dialogue and acting dilute what could have been a shrieking wake-up call about for-profit prisons.
  77. Towelhead
    Ball, who can't conceive of human motives beyond the hypertrophic, smutty sexuality that's his stock in trade, primly divides his characters into avatars of Sick Repression or Healthy Liberation.
  78. Love Forbidden
    Cryptic, pseudo-poetic asides come across as merely pretentious: Repeated cutaways to statues will not make your film "Contempt," nor will fleeting references to serial killers make it "Don't Look Now."
  79. Maelstrom
    Wanders all over the map thematically and stylistically, and borrows heavily from Lynch, Jeunet, and von Trier while failing to find a spark of its own.
    • 21 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    Emerald Cowboy
    The filmmakers may have aimed for doc-like authenticity, but the result is more like a QVC fabulous fake.
  81. Kate & Leopold
    The shabby metaphysics and complete absence of internal logic are perhaps meant to charm, but only add to the eye-gouging irritant factor.
  82. Aftershock
    Aftershock is incompetently made and morally muddled, but since talent, morality, and Mr. Roth have never been on speaking terms, we're not exactly surprised.
  83. Hick
    Too odd to be funny, too cold-hearted to be tragic, Hick is an infuriating muddle.
  84. America the Beautiful
    The scattershot America the Beautiful recapitulates vintage "Beauty Myth" trumpery.
  85. Eulogy for a Vampire
    This is one gay vampire film that's surprisingly anemic.
  86. Say It Isn't So
    Elicits not the voluptuous discomfort stirred by the boys' (Peter and Bobby Farrelly) best corporeal shenanigans but creeping embarrassment for everyone on screen.
  87. A Piece of Eden
    Mushy and musty itself, A Piece of Eden takes an eternity...this time to cheat and shortcut its way to lesser Frank Capra moments without the gritty touch of, say, a Garry Marshall.
    • 44 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    Chandni Chowk to China
    Alas, Chandni Chowk to China, directed by Nikhil Advani, is asymmetrical in the extreme: shapeless, shameless, and slapdash.
  89. Death in Love
    Someday, a wise and potent film will be made about the Holocaust's legacy on succeeding generations. Posing as a study in evil, Death in Love is claptrap that confuses bile with art.
  90. Onegin
    Unable to capture either its wit, psychological acuity, or formal rigor, the movie essentially reduces the schematic, seesaw narrative to doomy clichés.
  91. 7 Year Zig Zag
    Green, saucer-eyed, cokey, frying in flop sweat, gives the viewer the shrill thrill of being in someone else's nightmare. But the songs? Swung, man, swung.
    • 27 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    Now & Forever
    At least the title's accurate: This is a viewing experience that feels like it will never end.
  93. Hating Breitbart
    A shapeless, uncritical documentary.
  94. Great Directors
    Ten interviews with 10 "name" American and European directors--including Todd Haynes, David Lynch, Bernardo Bertolucci, and Catherine Breillat--diced into a documentary as asinine and fawning as its title suggests.
  95. Supercapitalist
    Even caped do-gooders couldn't save Supercapitalist, a dramatic dud whose title refers not to some big-business hero but rather to wheelers and dealers living lives of swank suits, fast cars, loose women, plentiful drugs, and goofy corporate-espionage spy games.
  96. Homefront
    Director Gary Fleder seems to sometimes suspect Homefront could pass as comedy.
  97. DysFunktional Family
    It's nauseating, unfunny stuff, unmitigated by the revelation that Griffin's mom physically abused him.
  98. Brief Interviews with Hideous Men
    As a film, Brief Interviews With Hideous Men is a disaster.
  99. Lila Says
    A misguided tale of sentimental education.
  100. The Ranger
    By the time the killings start, the film already feels draining, with no characters worth caring about, much less watching.
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