Ratings Scales

[Thom]

I wanted to see what people thought of the rating scales... Particularly, how well we critics are making use of them. Obviously, some of us will rate higher or lower than others. That's part of the beauty of this site, I hope. But perhaps we give out popcorn points too easily, or smart points to conservatively. Or vice-versa.

Personally, when I rate a film, I think like this:
* Popcorn points are easy. If I was thoroughly entertained sitting down and watching a film, I have no problem giving a film a 90-100% Popcorn.
* Smart points are more difficult. An average film earns about a 50%. Only a film which is, for all its intended purposes, perfect, can earn 100%. I had rated Contact a 100% Smarts, but deducted a point when I realized (thanks in part to Dante) of a flaw in the writing. It was a minor point and rather technical, but still made the film less than perfect.

What does everyone else think?

[Iron Paws]

Thom,

I agree that this site is unique and special in the way that it presents
different points of view as to the quality of a movie. I might have a little harder time giving out higher points than most, looking at the X2 reviews, I'd have say that I definately do. I loved that movie, just not 95% range. As for the the way I grade films, it's basically along the same lines as you (though I disagree with Contact being a great film )
_________________
"Keep the skoal baby, that's what I'm talkin about"

[Dante]

i, too, disagree about contact being a great movie.
And, as Thom knows, I do think the ratings are given out way too freely here. I am often guilty, myself, but I could justify every one of my ratings. As far as x2 goes.. i gave it 78 smarts and 88 popcorn, I don't think there's any way to rate it 100 smarts though.. but, to me, that's part of what makes the site great -- reviewing for everybody. I would hate to see everyone give movies the exact same rating i do.
_________________
so, you're saying we don't review the new Jenna Jameson movie here?

I am so out.

[Thom]

Good. I think we all see that the unique and diverse presentation of opinions is this site's big strength, and I'd like to think it a potentially huge strength.

I think one of the weaknesses is, hey... None of us are real "critics". I mean, a lot of us are capable of critiquing pretty well, but... At least speaking for myself, I'm still a big fan of some of these films. Even those that I'm not, I don't know exactly what to look for when critiquing. I probably haven't seen the "worst film ever", and maybe I haven't seen the "best", either.

I think I'm learning, though, and I think many of us are. I look back at some of my earlier reviews and I'd probably rate them differently now that I've had a little more experience.

But then again, I guess I shouldn't be too concerned. I think part of what could keep this site fresh is that our reviewers can be both fan AND critic. On one hand, we aren't some Roger Ebert type that's pretty detached from most of the films, source materials, etc. On the other hand, we're not a bunch of Harry Knowles clones, exploding over the web in some fanboy joygasm every week. Just as our ratings system considers films from two points of views, so will we.

[Arcturus]

I think that one aspect that should be taken it account when rating films "smart" score is their longevity- take for example "x-men 2", I fail to see how this can get a "smarts" score over and above say 70% mainly due to the fact that it breaks no real new ground in what it covers. I personally strongly feel that only films which are in essence "re-inventing" a genre, (take LOTR for example) should be getting smarts ratings above 90%. This is why i was slightly harsh on pirates of the caribbean- i get a bit annoyed when people keep on going on about it being "one of the best movies ever" etc. it simply doesnt rank up their amongst the trully great movies in history, and therefore it smarts rating should reflect that- its a purely joyous, entertaining ride of a film, nothing more- i kinda feel the same way about x-men 2 (i.e. smarts 65% entertaining 85-90%).

[Arcturus]

errr that rant may have come over as a tad agressive... if so sorry!- lol!

[Thom]

[the_swede]

I just think sometimes people give far too high ratings for movies, I mean Daredevil got wonderful entertainment value from everyone and quite good art calue. Movies like Val Helsing, Daredevil and so on should get much less than 50% on art and it isn't close to be a masterpiece when it comes to entertainment, which anything+ 90% is. The reviews should be not much different from other reviewers, less than 10% of the films should be between 90 and 100% in art OR entertainment value. So I think overall, the ratings should be much lower, but that is just my opinion.

[Thom]

Hey the_swede,

Are you from the IMDb boards? I know there are a few swedes on the boards I frequent over there.

Anyhow, I get what you're saying about the ratings. The first year or so of reviews were written by very inexperienced critics, myself included. As for the most recent reviews... We've tried to avoid collecting the stereotypical "art-house snob" critics and reviews, as we do feel those people are overly critical at times and simply don't know how to enjoy many movies that the average moviegoers enjoy. In the apprehension of those sort of critics, I think we've been too generous with undeserving films. It would help to acquire a few more frequent critics with a diversity of tastes--our two most frequent contributors right now are actually married to each other. (CONGRATULATIONS!)

I'm working on a major project for the site (you'll know it when you see it) so I've been out of commission for reviewing lately. When I'm done with the project, hopefully by the end of the week, I will jump headfirst back into reviewing and put in double effort, so I wouldn't be surprised to see those averages take a hit in the near future.

[the_swede]

No, I'm not from the imdb boards, even if I frequently visit imdb for info about movies and so on.

I have been visiting this site for quite a long time now, to know what movies to rent for DVD, I find some reviewers here really good and eliable, so most times it ends up with a good movie night. Anyway, I don't think I would be appopriate as a movie reviewer as neither my knowledge of movies or the english language is good enought for that. But I would be glad to hang around in the boards and put my comments on the movies.

[Thom]

That'd be awesome. Personally, the one thing I've felt missing from this site is a good community presence in the forums, so we'd love to have you around on the boards.

A word of warning: we may be rearranging the boards in the near future, and that may or may not require re-registration.

[Macabre Stalker]

Well I can confidently say I stand by my ratings with ease. I'm hardly generous with high ratings. But I certainly agree that many of the early reviews were abysmally rated. Of course, Thom and I recently nixed a fair chunk of the old reviews. Since you've been reading awhile, you might have noticed swede.

I don't think it's as large a problem now.

Of course all of my % ratings are conversions of the letter grading I do to all movies using my 300 point grading scale. The numbers sometimes don't speak as well as letters. A friend of mine doesn't like seeing 50s or 60s even though that translates to B-/Bs which mean the film has some merit or might be enjoyable to watch but is flawed to be sure. He can't shake the grade school mentality of 100 point scales where anything under a 60 is an F. Perhaps some of our other readers are like that as well, but they're just gonna have to get over it.

Ah well.

[Thom]

Well, our new swedish friend was saying he felt a lot of the movies were being graded too high, so I don't think he's making the grade-school misconception.

The problem here, I believe, is the mindset that if a movie isn't a GOOD movie or even a GREAT movie, then it has absolutely NO value. I disagree with that school of thought... That's why I created the 100-point scales instead of taking the typical ten-point, five-star, or grade-letter route. There's not a lot of room between an A+ and an F, between ***** and *. But there's plenty of room between 100 and 0... CERTAINLY between 10,000 and 0 (when you consider both scales). I think it forces us, as critics, to evaluate each film in greater detail.

To acquaint the reader with the nature of the system--and this is something I need to make more explicit--we offer "mascots" to accompany certain combinations of scores. For instance, a film is considered "Smart Popcorn" and gets our Prof. Popcorn seal of approval when the sum of the Smart and Popcorn ratings exceed... Something like 160 or 165. A "Smart Popcorn" film should keep the interest of a wide audience. "Candy Corn" is for entertaining yet less intellectual or artistic films, "Wry Cobb" is for those art house films that simply don't please, and what not. Anything that doesn't fall in one of these three categories is simply considered an "average" movie, or worse.

[Macabre Stalker]

Yeah..another thing is...I often update my scores when I add a new film to the database. That might bother some people (though I doubt many would notice). But I have every movie I've graded in a database and I actually rank movies of equal grades by which I think is better.

So on S-P, when I add a new film to the database, I can compare it's numeric score to every other film in the same league as it on my personal rankings and that sometimes leads to minor tweaking of movies I put in the system some time ago.

The score never dips out of the 10 point range it was first established...but if for some reason someone wants to compare my opinion of Last Samurai to...say...Moonlight Mile, they'll see that while I feel roughly the same way about both works, I hold Last Samurai in a slightly higher regard.

I think it's a good exercise...though I can't really expect everyone to do it.

[Bachalon]

Now my one (minor) complaint about the ratings scales has to do with perceived point value.

I'm still learning how to grade this. I can understand how if a movie is in the upper echelons of smarts, but isn't quite as good as it could be, you know, straddling 85% and 90% you'd want to go with something like 87 or 88. But therein lies the problem and the beauty of the system: precision

Could you honestly tell me the difference between a 72% and a 73% in either smarts or popcorn? It's a very fine line to tread and maybe I'm just not good enough to get it.
_________________
"Life is your chance, Arthur! Grab it! Squeeze the milk of life into your dirty glass and drink it warm!"

[Reel Monkey]

[Bachalon]

Awesome. Thanks for the advice.
_________________
"Life is your chance, Arthur! Grab it! Squeeze the milk of life into your dirty glass and drink it warm!"

[Macabre Stalker]

Yes...the grades are all about comparison. Not only us but our readers as well should be able to compare our opinions on two movies and see how they stack up to one another. Do most readers care about these details? Unlikely. But I, for one, am that type of reader amongst other critics, so I'm sure there are more like me. The Incredibles and Garden State have virtually the exact same score from me, but Garden State has that one little point above The Incredibles. Not coincidentally, on my end of year countdown, GS was ranked 6th, Incredibles 7th.

It's for people who care about rankings and comparisons and obsessive compulsion for the most part. But it's great in that regard.

[Thom]

[Bachalon]

Groovycoolawesome.

I'm not embarassed to say I'm not good at this yet.
_________________
"Life is your chance, Arthur! Grab it! Squeeze the milk of life into your dirty glass and drink it warm!"