Since the early 1990s, I’ve been rating every movie I see according to the DTMTBD system: how it compares to Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead. DTMTBD  is my movie equivalent of what sports statheads call a “replacement-level player” – what you could expect to pick up off the waiver wire if your starter went down.

Best Movies of the Year

• Silver Linings Playbook
• Magic Mike
• Chronicle

Much Better than Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead

• The Hunger Games
• Cloud Atlas
• The Perks of Being a Wallflower
• The Queen of Versailles
• Haywire
• Life of Pi
• Beasts of the Southern Wild
• Wreck-It Ralph

Better than Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead

• Snow White and the Huntsman
• Wanderlust
• Ted
• The Secret World of Arietty
• Pitch Perfect
• Django Unchained
• Argo
• Looper
• The Man with the Iron Fists
• The Five-Year Engagement
• 21 Jump Street
• Friends with Kids
• The Campaign
• Men in Black III

About as Good as Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead

• Rock of Ages
• The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
• The Avengers
• Brave
• Skyfall
• The Dark Knight Rises
• Prometheus

Worse than Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead

• Celeste and Jesse Forever
• Bachelorette