Washington Post's Scores

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For 11,478 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 46% higher than the average critic
  • 2% same as the average critic
  • 52% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 5.2 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Movie review score: 60
Highest review score: 100 Oppenheimer
Lowest review score: 0 Dolittle
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 6,014 out of 11478
  2. Mixed: 3,069 out of 11478
  3. Negative: 2,395 out of 11478
11478 movie reviews
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  1. The Danish Girl
    For all of the virtuosity of Redmayne and Vikander’s performances, and for all its sensitivity and aesthetic appeal, The Danish Girl is content simply to present the ambiguities and contradictions of Lili and Gerda’s story, rather than delve into their gnarlier corners.
  2. Hitchcock/Truffaut
    Hitchcock/Truffaut would be a stronger film had it spent more time with its title figures and less with the contemporary directors.
  3. Youth
    Youth is intoxicating, I’ll admit. Had I never tasted this wine before, I could easily see myself yearning for another glass. But this time it feels like an old vintage in a new bottle, one that’s grown slightly stale rather than better with age.
  4. In the Heart of the Sea
    It’s a tentative, half-realized tale that ultimately suffers from a significant identity crisis.
  5. A Royal Night Out
    The script, written by Trevor De Silva and Kevin Hood, falters when farce gives way to melodrama, but the movie regains momentum with a climax in a ballroom.
  6. Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict
    As this film’s engrossing character study makes clear, this woman of extraordinary tastes and appetites was ahead of her time, in more ways than one.
  7. Janis: Little Girl Blue
    Although Joplin’s brief life was eventful, its contradictions would stymie a tidy biopic.
  8. James White
    James White gets up close and personal in often discomfiting ways, but it’s never exploitative or glib. It hits the highs, and the rock bottoms, and all the damnable stuff in between.
  9. Chi-Raq
    The through-line of Chi-Raq is a sense of crisis that Lee refuses to reduce to binary causes, but interprets in terms of history, economics and psychology, as well as the personal, political and spiritual.
  10. Theeb
    As the quiet, compact vessel for roiling fears and ambivalence, Al-Hwietat’s Theeb winds up being a strikingly memorable character, whose deceptively simple tale possesses both haunting power and a whiff of prescient pessimism.
  11. The Wonders
    Structurally, The Wonders suffers from awkward bulges and sags, especially toward the end. Still, it’s a beautiful, richly imagined ride that doesn’t end as much as evaporate into a dreamlike puff of smoke.
  12. Legend
    Hardy is extraordinarily good at evoking the fraught fraternal connection between the Krays.... But the film is ultimately unable to plumb the Krays’ deepest souls, if they even have any.
  13. The Good Dinosaur
    The Good Dinosaur is hardly catastrophic. But the movie is a lot like Arlo. On its own, it seems fine; just don’t compare it to its capable siblings.
  14. Creed
    The themes of love, loyalty, ambition, honor and legacy that lend sinew to the story are delivered with such a clean punch that they as feel as fresh as they did in 1976.
  15. Victor Frankenstein
    Even McAvoy’s reincarnation-obsessed Frankenstein can’t breathe vitality into this shallow adaptation, which careens from moments of horror to serious drama to attempts at comedy that don’t quite land.
  16. Olvidados (Forgotten)
    Despite numerous missteps and contrivances, Olvidados succeeds as an indictment of Operation Condor’s horrors.
  17. What Our Fathers Did: A Nazi Legacy
    The film is not just about a very specific and difficult conversation. Ultimately, it is also about the failure of conversation itself.
  18. Victoria
    The acting, especially by Costa, is first rate. Exuding both a childlike openness and a tendency toward the recklessness of young adulthood, the actress backs up even her character’s most questionable choices with conviction.
  19. Criminal Activities
    Just when you’re about to write off your investment in Criminal Activities, the third-act dividend pays off, in spades.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Sembene!
    For a filmmaker who believed in giving Africans their own voice, it seems appropriate to offer such an unvarnished portrait.
  21. Ingrid Bergman in Her Own Words
    As a family-approved document, In Her Own Words is celebratory rather than probing, critical or comprehensive.
  22. Heart of a Dog
    Weaving together stories of death with observations on the post-9/11 culture of surveillance, Heart of a Dog hints that the very language on which Anderson has built her career as a performance artist is finally inadequate in the face of mortality.
  23. The Hallow
    In a departure from the sexually active teens of most slasher movies, The Hallow plays on more grown-up fears: keeping your family safe and steering clear of a vengeful Mother Nature.
  24. Censored Voices
    Censored Voices is an essential documentary. Its subject is nothing less than loss of innocence, the seeds of hatred and the illusory nature of victory.
  25. The Pearl Button
    The Pearl Button may not answer all the questions it raises, yet it is an absorbing experience — at least for anyone with a taste for beauty over insight.
  26. Secret in Their Eyes
    As the movie wears on, the plot points become increasingly far-fetched, and what started out as a moody if by-the-book thriller becomes increasingly silly. All the while, Roberts gives her all.
  27. The Night Before
    The Night Before is hardly a Christmas miracle, but it’s good for a laugh or two. And that’s not a bad way to get into the holiday spirit.
  28. The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 2
    Most of the pleasure of Mockingjay — Part 2 comes from watching Lawrence, not the story around her. Her aim is true, even if the narrative arc of the movie traces a long, wobbly path toward its eventual, and not exactly happy, resting place.
  29. Kilo Two Bravo
    Few war films are entertaining in a traditional sense. This one is so relentless that recoiling from it is nearly impossible.
  30. In Jackson Heights
    Wiseman’s voracious curiosity and evenhanded approach to his subject ensures that viewers will have a wide range of responses to the material he has collected.
  31. East Side Sushi
    East Side Sushi includes a number of moments that are a little too on-the-nose in their eagerness to convey the obstacles.... But Lucero compensates for such missteps with subtly persuasive visual choices and narrative restraint.
  32. By the Sea
    By the Sea is dazzlingly gorgeous, as are its stars. But peeling back layer upon layer of exquisite ennui reveals nothing but emptiness, sprinkled with stilted sentiments.
  33. My All American
    My All American plays like an extended highlights reel, not a movie.
  34. Spotlight
    For all of its modesty and dedication to process, Spotlight winds up being a startlingly emotional experience, and not just for filmgoers with intimate knowledge of the culture it depicts.
  35. Love the Coopers
    Love the Coopers is one of the most jumbled, tonally misguided holiday movies in recent memory. It is an insult to tidings of comfort as well as joy, and a complete waste of the time and talents of its ensemble cast.
  36. Trumbo
    After a somewhat tedious and overly episodic first half...Trumbo becomes a far more successful movie.
  37. The 33
    The inspirational docudrama nicely evokes the havoc of the initial cave-in, but spends too much time above ground to convey the existential horror of the almost-buried men.
  38. Brooklyn
    Soaring, swooning and gently nostalgic, Brooklyn takes melodrama to a new level of reassuring simplicity and emotional transparency.
  39. Love
    Good camerawork only goes so far. Love drags on and on, alternating between arguments and intimacy, breakups and makeups. The movie never passes the authenticity test; if this is what sex feels like, we’ll all soon be extinct.
  40. Miss You Already
    When Miss You Already works, it’s because of the cast.
  41. Flowers
    The movie, for all its uneventfulness, is intensely memorable.
  42. The Peanuts Movie
    An entertaining combination of humor and tenderness, The Peanuts Movie isn’t just an all-ages crowd-pleaser. It’s the perfect first feature film for a preschooler.
  43. SPECTRE
    We don’t expect a James Bond film to be deep, but at least we should be dazzled by the seductive gloss of its surfaces. Aside from that stunning opening sequence, this installment feels overcompensating and dutiful.
  44. Nasty Baby
    Ultimately, Silva’s uneven command of tone undoes whatever goodwill his actors have managed to generate. They — and we — deserve much better than this.
  45. I Smile Back
    Although the plot is painfully familiar — and not particularly edifying, compared with similar narratives that have gone before — the novelty here is Silverman, who doesn’t exactly erase her comic persona so much as bring to the surface an inherent darkness that has always lurked in the shadows.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    The Cut
    Rahim delivers a fairly strong performance. Yet the last third of the film loses some focus and emotional resonance.
  47. Difret
    This film is a necessary reminder of what can happen when people preserve tradition for its own sake.
  48. The Assassin
    This mesmerizingly beautiful drama ponders themes of duty, patience, isolation and compassion.
  49. The Armor of Light
    The Armor of Light is a fascinating little piece of storytelling.
  50. Suffragette
    Suffragette is an absorbing, ultimately moving portrait of thwarted ideals that rings all too true today.
  51. Burnt
    It’s not pretty, but it captures something that few cooking movies do: reality.
  52. Our Brand Is Crisis
    The movie turns out to be something we’ve seen before: an underdog tale mixed with a redemption narrative.
  53. Tab Hunter Confidential
    Hunter proves to be an engaging if low-key narrator, whose greatest asset is his refusal to take himself too seriously.
  54. Experimenter
    Experimenter’s most striking quality is the way it encourages us to think deeply, from the first frame to the last, even if it’s just to consider what on Earth an elephant is doing on screen.
  55. Truth
    Truth would have been more compelling with less sanctimony and tougher self-examination.
  56. Room
    As wrenching as Room is, especially during its grim first hour, it contains an expansive sense of compassion and humanism thanks to the sensitive direction of Abrahamson.
  57. Rock the Kasbah
    Sexist, racist, overlong, dull, visually ugly and, worst of all, unfunny, “Kasbah” squanders its cast.
  58. The Last Witch Hunter
    As Kaulder, Diesel does what he does, rumbling out lines of silly dialogue in his subwoofer of a voice. As far as acting goes, there’s not much.
  59. Breathe
    In some ways it plays like a horror movie, in other ways it’s almost a documentary. The most interesting thing about the movie is the balance of tone that Laurent strikes between recognition and repulsion.
  60. Jafar Panahi's Taxi
    Some of the characters make more of an impression than others, and the vignettes aren’t always entirely thrilling or well-acted. But Panahi’s movie remains a political coup considering his significant constraints.
  61. Goosebumps
    It’s occasionally funny and sometimes suspenseful, but it isn’t particularly imaginative. Then again, neither are Stine’s popular novellas.
  62. Beasts of No Nation
    Fukunaga imbues this study of ma­nipu­la­tion and manufactured loyalty with an unsettling degree of visual richness and lush natural detail.
  63. Crimson Peak
    The film by the stylish fantasist Guillermo del Toro looks marvelous, but has a vein of narrative muck at its core.
  64. Steve Jobs
    Propelled by an ingenious script by Aaron Sorkin, given vibrance and buoyancy by director Danny Boyle, Steve Jobs is a galvanizing viewing experience.
  65. Bridge of Spies
    Bridge of Spies expands from being a smart, engrossing procedural to a carefully observed character study of Donovan, a particularly intriguing, heretofore overlooked American figure.
  66. Labyrinth of Lies
    Labyrinth of Lies is an eye-opening story about the importance of seeking the truth — even when it’s complicated, ugly and buried beneath years of secrecy and deceit.
  67. In My Father's House
    In My Father’s House offers lots of interesting raw material, but it could use a disinterested observer’s remix.
  68. Yakuza Apocalypse
    Miike sets up entire sections of Yakuza Apocalypse like an endurance test. If the film’s title and the promise of ear fluid are not deterrents, then maybe you’ll be able to appreciate the sheer energy and audacity of his unapologetic vision.
  69. Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead: The Story of the National Lampoon
    Douglas Tirola’s documentary is brisk and entertaining, if not especially thoughtful.
  70. Big Stone Gap
    Big Stone Gap suffers from some hokey moments, including an ending that’s both implausible and too heavy on the sap.
  71. Freeheld
    A lugubrious cloud of mediocrity sets in early in Freeheld, a dreary dramatization of a pivotal gay rights case that paved the way for marriage equality.
  72. The Final Girls
    Simultaneously violent and droll, The Final Girls is a way to have your blood-soaked cake and eat it, too.
  73. He Named Me Malala
    If there’s a quibble with the film, it’s that it glosses over what it’s like to grow up in the glare of worldwide celebrity.
  74. Pan
    Pan doesn’t deliver on its own promise. The movie doesn’t so much enhance our understanding of the flying boy as it demonstrates how little thought went into crafting his back story.
  75. Shanghai
    Shanghai is an exercise in retro glamour, alluring decadence and tough-guy posing, all of which it delivers in sufficient quantities.
  76. Prophet's Prey
    It’s hard to say what is most difficult to digest about Prophet’s Prey.
  77. Peace Officer
    Peace Officer piles up evidence of outrageous excess, provoking what is likely to be a response, from its audience, that is far less measured than that of its main subject.
  78. Addicted to Fresno
    While director Jamie Babbit, who cut her teeth on indie comedies, is an equal- opportunity offender, some jokes land better than others. Still, strong lead performances and an energetic supporting cast elevate the uneven material.
  79. The Keeping Room
    The Keeping Room raises difficult moral questions, yet it wallows so relentlessly in gloom that it is a challenge to care about what happens to its characters.
  80. 99 Homes
    99 Homes isn’t just a straightforward drama. It’s a suspense movie.
  81. Mississippi Grind
    Mississippi Grind winds up being an improbably satisfying, even heartwarming character study.
  82. The Martian
    What’s being marketed as a sober, straightforward sci-fi drama (the words “Bring him home” superimposed on an unsmiling Matt Damon inside a space helmet) is instead a smart, exhilarating, often disarmingly funny return to classic adventures of yore.
  83. Nostalgia for the Light
    Gracefully moving between the infinite and the practical, the celestial and the implacably grounded, Guzman has created a sensitive, richly textured portrait of time and place that transcends both those conceits.
  84. The Walk
    The Walk satisfies as an absorbing yarn of authority-flouting ad­ven­ture and as an example of stomach-flipping you-are-there-ness. The journey it offers viewers doesn’t just span 140 feet, but also an ethereal, now-vanished, world.
  85. Goodnight Mommy
    It’s a masterful example of genre filmmaking’s ability to transcend its limitations, leaving a viewer not just frightened, but also changed.
  86. The Second Mother
    The Second Mother feels lovingly handcrafted. All the elements of the story fit impeccably together for a humorous and occasionally wrenching examination of relationships.
  87. Finders Keepers
    As Finders Keepers gets weirder, it also gets better and deeper. Somehow, Carberry and Tweel have managed to fashion an inspirational tale out of what one local newscaster calls a “freak show.”
  88. Sicario
    Every scene of calm, potentially, is trip-wired for an explosion. But for all its chilling tension and horrific imagery, Sicario is also a beautiful movie.
  89. Stonewall
    It’s a shame that the beginning of a movement that has come so far, so fast has been reduced to a trite, calculatingly manipulative reenactment.
  90. The Intern
    Meyers seems content to make a nice movie about nice people doing their best to be nice to each other despite one or two not-nice things that happen along the way. That’s all very nice, but not particularly the stuff of potent or rousing entertainment.
  91. Hotel Transylvania 2
    If you enjoy Sandler’s brand of obvious humor and don’t mind noticeable Sony product placements, this inoffensive sequel is, like its predecessor, just enough for a Halloween treat.
  92. Sleeping with Other People
    The romantic comedy boasts two winning leads in Jason Sudeikis and Alison Brie, as well as some sweet, funny moments amid the Aaron Sorkin-esque dialogue — courtesy of writer-director Leslye Headland — that’s a little too clever for its own believability.
  93. Pawn Sacrifice
    Overall, the movie presents a worthy and historical look at the link between genius and mental illness.
  94. The New Girlfriend
    In Ozon’s confident hands, The New Girlfriend has moments that juxtapose gentle humor and surprising depth of feeling.
  95. Meet the Patels
    With its appealingly conflicted hero and generous sense of humor, Meet the Patels has the breezy touch of a scripted romantic comedy.
  96. Cooties
    It’s Rainn Wilson who steals the show as the cocky physical education teacher who takes charge when the pint-size monsters corner him and his fellow educators.
  97. The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution
    If “The Black Panthers” has been designed to leave viewers outraged and energized in equal measure, it succeeds with admirable style. It counts both as essential history and a primer in making sense of how we live now.
  98. A Brilliant Young Mind
    A Brilliant Young Mind is less stuffy than the usual cinematic ode to British smarts and schooling. But that still can’t save this tale of eccentric genius from being profoundly conventional.
  99. Time Out of Mind
    The movie sometimes dillydallies, but the unhurried rhythms ultimately have a hypnotic effect.
  100. Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials
    It’s not a bad movie. It’s like several pretty good ones.
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