How do you rate your movies?

Tindie

How dose everyone else rate there movies, I was thinking of posting this last year but total forgot about it. I am just really curious

For me they will go like this!

1/10 -Abysmal (Terror Toons)
2/10 -Really Bad (Shark Attack)
3/10 -Poor ( Dismal )
4/10 -Worth watching (Pet Sematary II)
5/10 -Average (Reeker 2)
6/10 - Good ( Insidious)
7/10 - Really Good ( Critters)
8/10 - Great (The Others)
9/10 - fantastic/brilliant (Scanners)
10/10- Masterpiece (The Birds)

Sometimes I think I am little harsh rating!

That is my rating system

How do you rate your movies?

e_e

I rate films/music on a site called rateyourmusic. A link to my movie ratings is in my signature.

I kinda use the late Roger Ebert's system of rating things out of 4:

4 stars = Amazing
3.5 = Excellent
3 = Very good
2.5 = Good/solid
2 = Mediocre
1.5 = Bad
1 = Terrible
0.5 = A film I absolutely hated for one reason or another.

In the case of that site's ratings I just use 4.5 and 5 for my personal favorites.

Sad Professor

I'm a cinephile, not a film critic, so I rate a film based purely on my personal response to it. How much it engaged me, how much I was personally moved by it, etc, rather than whether I thought it was a good or bad piece of cinema. Citizen Kane might be (in the words of Harvey O'Brien) a "richer text" than Vertigo, but it doesn't move me like Vertigo does, so it only gets 3 stars from me where as Vertigo gets 5.

I find this a better way of approaching a film rather than trying to objectively evaluate it. It also makes it easier to revisit the film and re-consider it without feeling like I'm backtracking on my earlier opinion. Sometimes a film which left me totally cold the first time can reveal wonders on subsequent viewings.

I use LetterboxD. Excellent site which recently came out of beta. It uses a 5 star system, including half stars.

krudler

Take them on their own merit I say, I'd rate both say, I dunno, The Thing and Goodfellas as 5 star classics, but for very different reasons.

SebBerkovich

I have a system of rating movies developed to combat a problem i have in my movie tastes. That is that i love great bad movies. I also love really good movies... problem is a friend might ask what i think of a movie and i'd say i'd give it an 8 out of 10. We'd watch it and my long suffering friend would realise that they're stuck watching a terrible movie which i enjoy.

so he's what i came up with this:

I rate movies from -10 to 10.

-10 is a BRILLIANT bad movie like Troll 2 or Buffalo Rider something that so bad in every way that it's amazing.

0 is a movie that i personally feel requires that people involved should face criminal charges. like Avatar or Red Road

10 is a BRILLIANT movie that is practically perfect in every way. Casablanca.

then you fit the movie in-between somewhere.
So that when i tell a friend i'm watching a movie i'd give "-8", they can politely decline the invitation to watch it with me.

johnny_ultimate

For my own reasons, I try to avoid number based systems entirely. It's just reductive to me. I like to be able to articulate my response in a more in-depth manner, as I think it's an altogether more fulfilling method for talking and writing about cinema.

Not that I don't see the use in ratings in certain regards. It's a handy enough shorthand in certain respects and I see their wide appeal (almost too wide, TBH, and why I value publications that avoid them). But a star / number system is too simplistic to be of much meaningful use, and again its just my preference to try and articulate my thoughts in a more in-depth manner just to advance my own ability to think about film.

e_e

Sad Professor wrote: »

I'm a cinephile, not a film critic, so I rate a film based purely on my personal response to it. How much it engaged me, how much I was personally moved by it, etc, rather than whether I thought it was a good or bad piece of cinema. Citizen Kane might be (in the words of Harvey O'Brien) a "richer text" than Vertigo, but it doesn't move me like Vertigo does, so it only gets 3 stars from me where as Vertigo gets 5.

Yep, case in point I have The Room at 4 stars for entertaining me more than most movies.

Footoo

SebBerkovich wrote: »

0 is a movie that i personally feel requires that people involved should face criminal charges. like Avatar or Red Road

:eek: Red Road is great.

SebBerkovich

Footoo wrote: »

:eek: Red Road is great.

yeah....I watched it in the IFI when it came out all those years ago.... i hated it, but i could see how people might see more into it than i did.
That whole criminal with a heart of gold plot point made me roll my eyes into another dimension.

But thats the thing about movie rating its incredibly subjective. :P

Sarxos

On my site I rank films 0 to 5 in 0.5 increments based on 5 criteria:
Direction
Cinematography
Acting
Screenplay
Score
The overall score out of 5 is then the nearest integer based on these five.

SebBerkovich

Sarxos wrote: »

On my site I rank films 0 to 5 in 0.5 increments based on 5 criteria:
Direction
Cinematography
Acting
Screenplay
Score
The overall score out of 5 is then the nearest integer based on these five.

What if a movie didn't score high on anything, but you still enjoyed it a lot?

Sarxos

SebBerkovich wrote: »

What if a movie didn't score high on anything, but you still enjoyed it a lot?

That's reflected in the review itself. The bottom line section usualy has whether I believe people will enjoy it or not.

e_e

I don't believe film criticism should be entirely objective. It should be personal to the writer while being passionate and emotive. If they hated a film in spite of it being a worthy technical achievement than so be it, a reader can still decide on whether they'll want to see it or not. I don't find this "See this if you liked x" form or writing to be of much use either, or analyzing it in terms of plot, character and direction in an almost mathematical way. It's impersonal and dull to read imho.

A great example of this would be Ebert's 1 star review of Blue Velvet, it admires the film's craft while showing a personal problem with the content of the film. It makes for a very interesting read but crucially it's not just telling the reader what they should think (a common misinterpretation of critics) and allows for some discourse.

SebBerkovich

I've always like reviewers who backup their like/dislike with examples from the movie itself.

Movie Bob on the escapist website is brilliant at that... it means as the reader/viewer you can question his conclusions from the evidence he gives.

I wouldn't bother with numbers or stars, just whether or not I enjoyed a film and if I enjoyed it a lot it only takes another sentence or two to say so.

chuky_r_law

Sarxos wrote: »

On my site I rank films 0 to 5 in 0.5 increments based on 5 criteria:
Direction
Cinematography
Acting
Screenplay
Score
The overall score out of 5 is then the nearest integer based on these five.

why dont you just mark it out of 10? if you think a movie is worth 3.5 out of 5 why dont you just go 7 out of 10?

The Princess Bride

I keep it simple.

I ask myself whether I'd watch it again or not-
A definite yes or a no way (otherwise known as the Avatar category!)

SVG

I do a one to five system- no halves, integers all the way- with one being dismal and five being masterpiece (I give a lot of fours and I'm really stingy with fives). I don't see it as reducing a film to a numerical value but instead I use it as a way of clarifying my own reaction to a film. I like to make a snap decision after watching something and then seeing how it changes with thought and time and rewatches.

I kinda like the idea of SebBerkovich's minus scale. It has too many numbers from me but I'm glad someone is cataloguing the watchability of terrible films:).

pixelburp

Can't say I've ever used any form of system, numerical or otherwise. Where's the point - hell, where's the fun in that? It's lazy and too reductionist by half - and it implies a scientific method where absolutely none exists. Who says my '7' isn't someone elses '3'? If anyone asks me for thoughts on a film, I'm erudite enough that I can provide a quick review, without resorting to glib numbering (though my own personal bete-noire are mash-up comparisons by way of review; such as "Ooh, it's like Weekend at Bernies meets The Shining" and so on...)

BOHtox

My wife rates her movies by how many tissues she goes through during it. Ironically, I too have a similar system

e_e

pixelburp wrote: »

and it implies a scientific method where absolutely none exists. Who says my '7' isn't someone elses '3'?

Nobody, which is what's good about rating systems. They can be really fun in sussing out what you personally look for in a film and I think the idea that it silences all discussion is kind of a false dichotomy. Especially since it's currently a topic of conversation in itself.

As for the "scientific" argument, it's a bit of a fallacy since I find it impossible to grade art objectively anyway yet I still really enjoy making ratings and lists. It's more of a love/like/indifferent/dislike/hate scale for me which is far from objective really.

Renn

A great example of this would be Ebert's 1 star review of Blue Velvet, it admires the film's craft while showing a personal problem with the content of the film. It makes for a very interesting read but crucially it's not just telling the reader what they should think (a common misinterpretation of critics) and allows for some discourse.

Still can't get my head around what he was on about with that review. Naive to say the least.

pixelburp

e_e wrote: »

Nobody, which is what's good about rating systems. They can be really fun in sussing out what you personally look for in a film and I think the idea that it silences all discussion is kind of a false dichotomy. Especially since it's currently a topic of conversation in itself.

As for the "scientific" argument, it's a bit of a fallacy since I find it impossible to grade art objectively anyway yet I still really enjoy making ratings and lists. It's more of a love/like/indifferent/dislike/hate scale for me which is far from objective really.

I wasn't really arguing for the scientific method, just that their use often tries to imply its existence; heck sites like metacritic are based off the idea that you can create numerical sliding scales of quality (admittedly, numbering systems are more prevalent in other media such as gaming). Clearly & obviously it's a pointless exercise with something inherently objective / artistic as film, and to me there's more fun to be had in enjoying a well-written review that tries to inform and entertain. I certainly wouldn't advocate using ratings to exclusively judge something, but I've seen it done, and people hanging on something so arbitrary as marks out of 10 / 5 etc.

I give this thread 7.5 out of 10!

Renn

It's more like What have you watched recently: Electric Boogaloo meets Netflix - Recommendations *READ OP*.

Optimalprimerib

For action movies I have a two way rating system:

The Matrix
Not the matrix.

Seriously though, I find it very hard to be consistent with my ratings as I may love a movie after first viewing and find it painful the second time round for example looper.

Excedion

I don't bother with numeric or star ratings.

I rate films as either-

- Very Good (Well worth watching and re-watching. Recommend to a friend.)
- Good (Worth watching but not too many times. Something to watch if someone you are with hasn't seen it)
- Ok (Alright if you're bored with nothing else to watch.)
- Bad (Not even worth watching)

And as a special rating
- Birdemic ( Worst of the worst, only reason to watch is if you enjoy painfully bad films)

Bipolar Joe

Excedion wrote: »

I don't bother with numeric or star ratings.

I rate films as either-

- Very Good (Well worth watching and re-watching. Recommend to a friend.)
- Good (Worth watching but not too many times. Something to watch if someone you are with hasn't seen it)
- Ok (Alright if you're bored with nothing else to watch.)
- Bad (Not even worth watching)

And as a special rating
- Birdemic ( Worst of the worst, only reason to watch is if you enjoy painfully bad films)

Anyone who thinks Birdemic is the worst film ever has never seen Zombie Chronicles. You could laugh at Birdemic and how bad it is, but ZC has absolutely zero redeeming features. Just God awful.

I like the -10 to 10 system, that's genius. Might steal it.

I don't rate films, really, but I'll judge it by what it is. You wouldn't put Crank in the same category as Falling Down when you're judging it, or The Amateur Monster Movie as Dawn of the Dead. I think I described that OK.

Carlos Orange

In theory 1-5 allowing half points. In practice most stuff is 3/3.5 with a little 2/2.5/4 thrown in. I post it on Facebook with my Cineworld app so I can keep track of it.

Excedion

Bipolar Joe wrote: »

Anyone who thinks Birdemic is the worst film ever has never seen Zombie Chronicles. You could laugh at Birdemic and how bad it is, but ZC has absolutely zero redeeming features. Just God awful.

Perhaps I worded my rating for that wrong, It should be films that are so bad they are good, not the worst films.

Birdemic isnt the worst film ive seen, but I did have a good laugh at it (especially the coat hanger scene). I'd say Iron Hero was another one like that, 98% of the movie was utter **** except for one scene that had me in stiches

I don't even know what the worst film I've ever seen was, maybe Jack and Jill. Ugh. I have a problem with "cringyness"

ScumLord

I use the BER energy rating scale, so an excellent film is Green A1, and a really bad film is Red G.

AnonoBoy

Two ratings for me:

Better than It's Alive III: Island of the Alive
Worse than It's Alive III: Island of the Alive

e_e

Funny you should say that, I use "But is it as good as Die Hard?" as a criteria for judging movies. Even those by the likes of Godard and Bergman.

johnny_ultimate

AnonoBoy wrote: »

Two ratings for me:

Better than It's Alive III: Island of the Alive
Worse than It's Alive III: Island of the Alive

What happens if the film is It's Alive III: Island of the Alive? What happens if it's on the exact same level of It's Alive III: Island of the Alive?

quickbeam

1-10. Probably over 50% of my films get a 6. It's the score for a film that was worth seeing once but not all that memberable.

10s are very rare, less than a dozen in total I'd say. Even 8 or above is only about 100 films. Like the OP, I sometimes think I'm a bit mean with my scoring.

AnonoBoy

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

What happens if the film is It's Alive III: Island of the Alive? What happens if it's on the exact same level of It's Alive III: Island of the Alive?

Dunno. I've never seen Alive III: Island of the Alive.

biko

It was good
It was ok
It was ****e

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

Sad Professor wrote: »

I use LetterboxD. Excellent site which recently came out of beta. It uses a 5 star system, including half stars.

I just discovered this yesterday. I had been using MUBI. More to keep track of what I was watching rather then to rate everything, but as these sites work that way I give them ratings.
LetterboxD seems a much better site than MUBI, the half star ratings and the fact that you can give zero stars if you want comes in very handy when reviewing Leap Year. :mad:

I think ratings are a very personal thing anyway. Whether it's food, books, hotels, films, music etc. it's all down to personal taste. I've had people recommend things to me before based on something else I said I liked and I've hated them. Likewise I've heard things written off and terrible that I've really enjoyed.
Then of course there's the fact that some films might be very deep and meaningful and really make you think about them for days, and then others might be a great bit of escapism that you really enjoy at the time but don't give much thought to after.

An example.... Tyrannosaur, a great piece of film making, a real gut wrenching experience to watch, emotionally draining even and not a film you'd ever say you enjoyed watching.

On the other hand... How To Train Your Dragon... a fantastic animated film about Vikings and dragons and so much fun to watch, the kind of thing you'd pop in every now and then just for the shear joy of it.

Personally I'd give both films the same rating if I had to rate them in terms of films I like, but you can't really compare them. If I said to you, "oh you liked Tyrannosaur, you should definitely watch How to Train Your Dragon." You'd think I was nuts.

This got very rambley, I'm not sure where I was going with it....

indough

letterboxd is the best movie site out there at the moment. it's just a shame they eventually chose to go for a subscription model for premium features

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

indough wrote: »

letterboxd is the best movie site out there at the moment. it's just a shame they eventually chose to go for a subscription model for premium features

What are the premium features? I've only started using it and haven't got it all figured out yet. The basic features seem fine for what I want.

indough

there are some features where it plays nice with netflix (although us only version i believe) and a couple of other things i can't remember

Tipsy McSwagger

I think when rating a film you have to put it up against the best of that particular genre.

Action - Die Hard, Predator, Terminator 2
Animation - Wall-E, Beauty & the Beast, Spirited Away
Horror - The Exorcist, Halloween, Psycho
Comedy - Some Like it Hot, Blazing Saddles, Airplane
Gangster - The Godfather 1 & 2, Goodfellas
Sci-Fi - Alien, The Empire Stikes Back, Back to the Future

These are only a few 'masterpieces' from each genre but they set the bar really high for any new film to reach.

johndoe99

i don't take any note of numbering systems, i've watched films in the past that sites such as IMDB had given a low rating and i thought was great, so after a while gave up on them.

It really comes down to personal tastes, l like to watch low budget films too, websites and critics give them ratings based on how they sum up against the greats in there genre. Its comes down to one thing, did I enjoy it or not.

Sad Professor

The only advantages of subscribing to Letterboxd at the moment is Netflix integration, CSV importing and a personalised year in review. When they originally launched subscription accounts they placed limits on how many lists, etc you could make with a free account, but the reaction was so negative they rolled back within days. It's a great site, though, and it's worth subscribing just to support them and save them from having to go the ad route. (There's enough Google/Facebooks in the world.)

Mubi's social network used to be great and it's still good for its indie/arthouse focus, but it's starting to look a bit antiquated with no mobile site, etc.

ancapailldorcha

Depends on how much I enjoy the film to be honest. If it's good enough, I tend to not notice plot holes and the like that people seem to be obsessing over nowadays.

Galvasean

Tipsy McSwagger wrote: »

I think when rating a film you have to put it up against the best of that particular genre.

Action - Die Hard, Predator, Terminator 2
Animation - Wall-E, Beauty & the Beast, Spirited Away
Horror - The Exorcist, Halloween, Psycho
Comedy - Some Like it Hot, Blazing Saddles, Airplane
Gangster - The Godfather 1 & 2, Goodfellas
Sci-Fi - Alien, The Empire Stikes Back, Back to the Future

These are only a few 'masterpieces' from each genre but they set the bar really high for any new film to reach.

That's my line of thinking. For me a 10/10 needs to be a definitive genre classic. A pet peeve of mine is seeing good, but not amazing films getting 10/10 reviews. Take the first Iron Man as an example. Is it as good or enjoyable as Terminator 2 or The Empire Strikes Back? Nope. So it can't really be given the same score as them. Some might call that snobby. I'd call it sensible. When 10/10s start getting flung at every very good film that comes along the whole out of ten system is devalued.