ROTTEN TOMATOES: Scott Tobias

Official Websites:
The Onion AV Club

SCOTT TOBIAS

Agrees with the Tomatometer 79% of the time.

Biography: I see movies, watch DVDs, and read books, then I get paid to write what I think of them. Beats doing stuff.

Favorites: Top 5 (no order): Sansho The Bailiff, Duck Soup, Tokyo Story, Shoot The Piano Player, Taxi Driver

Publications: AV Club, Glyphs Film Guide, rec.arts.movies.reviews, Time Out New York

Critics' Group: Chicago Film Critics Association

Total Reviews: 496

Location: Chicago

LISTING OF ALL REVIEWS & ARTICLES

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Showing 1 - 50 of 496

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Rating	T-Meter	Title \| Year	Add Date (default)

Fresh B-	Fresh 70%	The Road (2009)	" Hillcoat gives the film a remarkably evocative backdrop, but the drama lacks depth and dimension, and the scenes tend to blur together." — AV Club Posted Nov 24, 2009
Rotten D	Fresh 73%	The Blind Side (2009)	" There�s real ambiguity in the Oher case, but writer-director John Lee Hancock papers over it; it�s possible to see the Tuohys as generous, caring people without brushing off their less-altruistic reasons for sponsoring Oher." — AV Club Posted Nov 19, 2009
Fresh B+	Fresh 85%	Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (2009)	" It�s not always easy to sort out the legitimately inspired touches from the merely campy ones, but the film has a deranged, go-for-broke spirit that makes such distinctions irrelevant." — AV Club Posted Nov 19, 2009
Fresh B-	Fresh 85%	Red Cliff (2009)	" The film is both traditional and modern: austere in its engagement with history, and insistent in its showy action beats." — AV Club Posted Nov 19, 2009
Rotten C+	Rotten 58%	Missing Person (2009)	" *Shannon�s performance takes The Missing Person* as far as it goes, but when a real-world tragedy commandeers the story, Buschel�s thin pastiche falls to pieces.*" — AV Club* Posted Nov 19, 2009
Rotten C+	Rotten 30%	Women in Trouble (2009)	" Too much of Women In Trouble settles for banal instances of infidelity, female bonding, or psychoanalysis when it needs to keep the action going. It�s fine to be inconsequential, as long as the charged-up frivolity never stops." — AV Club Posted Nov 12, 2009
Rotten C-	Rotten 50%	Uncertainty (2009)	" The leads are immensely appealing, but the sum of their experiences equals nothing more profound than two earnest people wrestling with a tough decision." — AV Club Posted Nov 12, 2009
Rotten C-	Rotten 18%	The Fourth Kind (2009)	" The Fourth Kind is terminally awkward in the way it meshes fake real footage with faker fake footage. It isn�t required to be convincing as fact, but it doesn�t convince as fiction, either." — AV Club Posted Nov 5, 2009
Fresh A	Fresh 77%	Collapse (2009)	" There are many layers to the man and the movie, and it�s hard not to leave the theater shaken." — AV Club Posted Nov 5, 2009
Rotten C-	Rotten 45%	Saw VI (2009)	" Adding a layer of social significance isn�t the worst strategy for a franchise that keeps piling on the convoluted mythos, yet hasn�t changed its risible mix of mechanized death and tongue-clucking morality." — AV Club Posted Oct 23, 2009
Fresh B-	Fresh 69%	(Untitled) (2009)	" Shelton�s radiant performance as the brothers� elusive object of desire helps rescue (Untitled) from an occasional listlessness that comes as a consequence of Parker�s nuanced, gentle jabs at the art world." — AV Club Posted Oct 22, 2009
Rotten F	Rotten 11%	The Stepfather (2009)	" *Even by horror-remake standards, The Stepfather* sets the bar for pointlessness.*" — AV Club* Posted Oct 18, 2009
Rotten D	Rotten 22%	Law Abiding Citizen (2009)	" *A flagrantly ridiculous thriller that tries to retrofit Saw* to function as a mainstream, semi-respectable vigilante picture about the failings of our justice system.*" — AV Club* Posted Oct 15, 2009
Rotten D+	Rotten 12%	Couples Retreat (2009)	" It�s hard to know if more convincing relationships would have made a difference in a movie so committed to funny accents and potty jokes, but at least it would have shown some effort." — AV Club Posted Oct 8, 2009
Fresh B-	Fresh 93%	The Damned United (2009)	" At this point, the Morgan/Sheen roadshow may have finally run its course, but together they have a knack for understanding the recent past through men who are crafty and irreducible, usually despite all appearances to the contrary." — AV Club Posted Oct 8, 2009
Rotten D	Rotten 29%	Free Style (2009)	" Establishing some rooting interest in an underdog like Bleu�s character is essential for movies like this, but not to the point where needless subplots about his mother�s relationship with the local sheriff is more vital than putting rubber to dirt." — AV Club Posted Oct 8, 2009
Rotten C+	Fresh 73%	More Than a Game (2009)	" Belman doesn�t look into the bigger problems of James� team jet-setting across the country during the school year, or the spectacle allowed to build up around him." — AV Club Posted Oct 1, 2009
Fresh A-	Fresh 76%	Afterschool (2009)	" The passing of time and the evolution of technology may give it an expiration date, but more likely, Campos� film stands to be an essential document of what it was like to be a young person in the late �00s." — AV Club Posted Oct 1, 2009
Rotten C+	Fresh 82%	Whip It (2009)	" It�s virtually impossible to hate the film, but Barrymore�s presence behind the camera suggests more calculation than vision; like a lot of actors who direct, she tends to the performances, but her style never rises above bland proficiency." — AV Club Posted Oct 1, 2009
Rotten C	Fresh 65%	Coco Before Chanel (2009)	" Headstrong women might have been hard to find in turn-of-the-century Europe, but heroines like Tautou�s are a dime a dozen in costume dramas, and there isn�t enough material detailing what makes her Chanel a special case." — AV Club Posted Sep 25, 2009
Rotten D+	Rotten 31%	The Burning Plain (2009)	" Arriaga�s achronological, everything-is-connected screenplays lost their originality and surprise, and started to become more like shtick." — AV Club Posted Sep 18, 2009
Rotten D+	Rotten 45%	Jennifer's Body (2009)	" Cody will stop a scene cold for the chance to shoehorn �move on dot org� into a sentence." — AV Club Posted Sep 18, 2009
Fresh A	Fresh 95%	35 Shots of Rum (2009)	" French director Claire Denis is one of the most magical filmmakers in the world." — AV Club Posted Sep 16, 2009
Fresh B+	Fresh 89%	No Impact Man (2009)	" The film, like Beavan himself, leaves an unholy mess of contradictions in its wake, but most productively, a great deal of those contradictions are our own." — AV Club Posted Sep 10, 2009
Fresh B+	Fresh 63%	Extract (2009)	" Ten years after Office Space flopped in theaters, only to find the passionate following it deserved down the line, Extract finds Judge returning triumphantly to the workplace comedy." — AV Club Posted Sep 3, 2009
Rotten C+	Fresh 70%	American Casino (2009)	" The film doesn�t come to life until too late in the game, when it takes the original tack of exploring the housing crisis through abandoned backyard swimming pools..." — AV Club Posted Sep 3, 2009
Fresh B-	Fresh 87%	At the Edge of the World (2009)	" It�s frequently a rousing adventure." — AV Club Posted Aug 27, 2009
Rotten C+	Fresh 70%	My One and Only (2009)	" Director Richard Loncraine applies a period gloss to the proceedings, but adds little momentum; the film never gets on Zellweger�s batty wavelength." — AV Club Posted Aug 20, 2009
Fresh B+	Fresh 90%	District 9 (2009)	" District 9 fuses science fiction mayhem and biting social commentary as well as any film since Starship Troopers. It�s the rare alien invasion story that has the aliens running scared." — AV Club Posted Aug 13, 2009
Fresh B-	Rotten 58%	A Perfect Getaway (2009)	" Even if you know what�s coming, it�s a neat bit of meta-thriller filmmaking, as much about the mechanics of storytelling as a reasonably satisfying example of it." — AV Club Posted Aug 6, 2009
Fresh B+	Fresh 81%	Beeswax (2009)	" Bujalski�s funny, diverting character piece has a lived-in quality that�s no small achievement." — AV Club Posted Aug 6, 2009
Rotten	Rotten 0%	Foolish (1999)	" The miserable production values�the cardboard sets rival a Little Rascals talent show�and P's stone-faced delivery are merely amateurish, but as a vanity project for Griffin, Foolish is downright appalling." — AV Club Posted Aug 3, 2009
Rotten C-	Rotten 25%	The Collector (2009)	" The early scenes promise a potentially novel cross between heist and extreme horror, but those hopes are quickly dashed." — AV Club Posted Jul 31, 2009
Fresh B-	Fresh 100%	You, the Living (2009)	" You, The Living, if only by virtue of a more intimate scale than Songs, benefits from a lightness of touch and even a thin sliver of optimism in some sequences." — AV Club Posted Jul 30, 2009
Rotten D	Rotten 15%	The Ugly Truth (2009)	" Heigl and Butler have real chemistry together, but The Ugly Truth is the sort of rom-com apparatus that no relationship can overcome." — AV Club Posted Jul 23, 2009
Fresh B-	Fresh 87%	500 Days of Summer (2009)	" It goes down smoothly, thanks in large part to Joseph Gordon-Levitt�s grounded lead performance and Marc Webb�s slick direction, but it seems like every other scene coughs up a dispiriting clich�." — AV Club Posted Jul 16, 2009
Rotten C-	Rotten 20%	Blood: The Last Vampire (2009)	" Every scrap of footage here has been done better somewhere else." — AV Club Posted Jul 9, 2009
Rotten D	Rotten 15%	I Love You, Beth Cooper (2009)	" I Love You, Beth Cooper tries to exploit and explode broad stereotypes, but it never transcends the labels it applies." — AV Club Posted Jul 9, 2009
Fresh A-	Fresh 75%	Humpday (2009)	" *In scene after scene, Humpday* carefully raises the stakes until it hits a finale loaded with humor, tenderness, and delicious ambiguity.*" — AV Club* Posted Jul 9, 2009
Fresh A-	Fresh 98%	The Hurt Locker (2009)	" *For the first hour or more, The Hurt Locker* boldly forsakes any conventional narrative hook beyond the ongoing tensions between these men and the terrifying grind of defusing bombs day after day.*" — AV Club* Posted Jun 25, 2009
Rotten C-	Rotten 47%	My Sister's Keeper (2009)	" *It would take a heart of stone not to be affected by My Sister�s Keeper, but the film�s unceasing manipulation has a Medusa effect on the organ." — AV Club* Posted Jun 25, 2009
Rotten D+	Rotten 54%	The Stoning of Soraya M. (2009)	" The Stoning Of Soraya M. crawls forward in excruciating slow motion toward the inevitable day when sinners cast the first, second, third, and fourth (etc.) stone, stacking the deck at every turn along the way." — AV Club Posted Jun 25, 2009
Fresh B-	Fresh 66%	Dead Snow (2009)	" Once the action broadens to the open snow and the victims start to fight back, the Nazi-zombie premise finally pays off." — AV Club Posted Jun 18, 2009
Fresh B-	Rotten 47%	Whatever Works (2009)	" Dusting off an ancient script intended for Zero Mostel three decades ago, Allen tweaks the material enough to supply David with bilious rants about the stupidity and meaninglessness of man and the universe." — AV Club Posted Jun 18, 2009
Rotten D	Rotten 38%	Imagine That (2009)	" Given his growing track record of odious kiddie fare, it�s no surprise to see Eddie Murphy squandering his talents as another in a long line of movie dads who are too wrapped up in their jobs to pay attention to their kids." — AV Club Posted Jun 11, 2009
Fresh B	Fresh 68%	Tetro (2009)	" It�s the product of a great dreamer and aesthete, rather than an authentic emotional experience -- a gorgeous, crystalline bauble that really catches the light." — AV Club Posted Jun 11, 2009
Fresh B+	Fresh 66%	Away We Go (2009)	" Though Away We Go lacks the screwball unpredictability of something like Flirting With Disaster, it compensates with a unexpected depth of feeling, a novelist�s (or memoirist�s) sense of detail, and a panoramic view of what home means." — AV Club Posted Jun 4, 2009
Fresh B	Fresh 80%	Unmistaken Child (2009)	" Baratz�s apparent willingness to accept everything at face value papers over some of the more troubling aspects of Tenzin�s mission, but Unmistaken Child allows the mysteries of the process to be preserved without judgment." — AV Club Posted Jun 4, 2009
Rotten C+	Fresh 90%	24 City (2009)	" *Mostly, 24 City* falls into the same Jia trap of inadvertently drawing the viewers� gaze past his human subjects and to the poetic images of a country in painful metamorphosis.*" — AV Club* Posted Jun 4, 2009
Fresh A-	Fresh 92%	Drag Me To Hell (2009)	" This is junk filmmaking at its finest." — AV Club Posted May 28, 2009

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A	Rachel Getting MarriedOffsite
A-	StuckOffsite
B+	RepriseOffsite
B	Encounters At the End of the WorldOffsite
B-	Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the...Offsite
c+	The RockerOffsite
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A	35 Shots of RumOffsite
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A	The Assassination of Jesse James by...Offsite
A	Knocked UpOffsite
A	ZodiacOffsite

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F	NorbitOffsite
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D-	Prom NightOffsite
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D	The Blind SideOffsite
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SCOTT TOBIAS

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