WEEKEND THREAD | 3-DAY ESTIMATES: Pirates - 62M ; Baywatch - 18M; Alien - 10.5M (71% drop) like. F8 crosses 1B OS.

[John Marston]

I like Prometheus. Alien Covenant had some good moments but nothing really of consequence happens

[MovieMan89]

Just now, John Marston said:

I like Prometheus. Alien Covenant had some good moments but nothing really of consequence happens

Agree on both. 

[Napoleon]

It's weird that Fandango shows the RT score when people go buy tickets on their website. It's like owning a store and having labels telling consumers which products are not good. It doesn't make sense.

[The Futurist]

Prometheus and Alien Covenant deserve each other.

If you ever wondered the definition of hubris when it comes to a filmmaker, that's your answer.

 

 

 

[WrathOfHan]

1 minute ago, The Futurist said:

Prometheus and Alien Covenant deserve each other.

If you ever wondered the definition of hubris when it comes to a filmmaker, that's your answer.

 

 

 

As are American Hustle and Joy.

 

[75Live]

I think it would be good, at or least hilarious if they decide to not do reviews until the movie opens  

[The Futurist]

1 minute ago, WrathOfHan said:

As are American Hustle and Joy.

 

 

I actually doesn't disagree with this.

But AH & Joy had a better xenomorph.

Edited May 28, 2017 by The Futurist

[grim22]

3 minutes ago, Napoleon said:

It's weird that Fandango shows the RT score when people go buy tickets on their website. It's like owning a store and having labels telling consumers which products are not good. It doesn't make sense.

 

This comment... actually makes a lot of logical sense. Fandango hurting themselves a bit with that for sure.

[The Futurist]

4 minutes ago, Napoleon said:

It's weird that Fandango shows the RT score when people go buy tickets on their website. It's like owning a store and having labels telling consumers which products are not good. It doesn't make sense.

 

Post of the day.

 

It really is weird they are doing this to themselves.

[Chewy]

The RT scores are just a click away anyway

[Celedhring]

Just now, Napoleon said:

It's weird that Fandango shows the RT score when people go buy tickets on their website. It's like owning a store and having labels telling consumers which products are not good. It doesn't make sense.

 

Fandango sells tickets through RT already. If Fandango removed the convenience of having said scores on their own website, RT would be offering more value to Fandango customers, than the Fandango site itself. Now that wouldn't make sense.

[ChrisTelclear]

Rotton Tomatoes flaw is there's no middle ground. Calling a movie that gets a 55 "Rotten" is harsh, and unfair.  It's not rotten, it's just meh. This is where Metacritic got it right.   If you notice a lot of rotten movies on RT fall into the mixed to average review category on MC, because MC has a middle rating. What RT should do is keep the ratings, but create a soft landing zone for movies in the middle. Perhaps as simple as just a score with no rotten associated with it, reserve the rotten designation for really bad movies, like those that score below 40.

 

Of course none of this would've helped Baywatch or Pirates at they scored terribly, whether it was deserved or not.

 

Another problem is that RT doesn't require all the critics to review based on the same scale.  Some are using 5 stars, some 4, but whichever they use they all have to convert it to the 1-10 score.  That's a tricky calculation and if not done fairly can create inconsistencies.  I've seen a 3 out of 5 star review listed as Rotten, and then another 3 out of 5 listed as Fresh, and this is for the same movie!  There's no quality control at the site at all, they need to clean up their act.  I'm not sure it makes a huge difference, but you should still do a thorough job and make sure it all is done fairly.

 

Don't kid yourselves, I'm hearing the complaining about RT from studios more and more lately.  If things get bad enough the studios will attempt to bypass the critics, and for some movies it probably will work quite well. This is about money, and if it will help me sell tickets I'm doing it, I'm not going to worry about pissing off some critics who probably weren't going to like this type of movie anyway. In a world where the OW is where you make a lot of your money there is incentive to do just that, and the last thing anyone wants to see happen is to have film critics sidelined.  RT should listen and take some steps to even out the playing field.

 

Anyway, with some tweaks RT would be a quality tool for aggregating reviews.

 

I never understood why the Fandango branch went along with posting the RT scores. Why would you post something that might hurt ticket sales when your job is to sell as many tickets as possible?  It's like a mall posting Yelp scores at the entrances for restaurants in your mall.  Why would anybody do that?

Edited May 28, 2017 by ChrisTelclear

[DAJK]

I feel like we need some middle ground on WOM. Anyone on this site only ever suggests "fantastic WOM" or "toxic WOM" and nothing in between

 

A- cinemascore equals "fantastic WOM!"

B+ equals "toxic WOM!"

[grim22]

I have started seeing Vudu and other online movie rental services put the RT score next to the title. That is actually hurting yourself as a lot of viewers may not watch a movie which is rated low

[Noctis]

The problem is that the consensus of a film on RT is far more nuanced and accurate than the %. Just leave rottens for films below 40% or below a 4.5/10 average. The average rating should be given more importance as well. 

[Johnny Tran]

3 hours ago, grim22 said:

I do think that later reviews have a bandwagon effect. Not that people will give a high score or anything to a movie they didn't like, but if they are mixed on a movie and it has a large number of recommends on RT i.e. a high RT score at that point, then the later critics might be more prone to put it in Fresh because of the larger consensus. The early momentum can dictate how the later "on the fence" reviews are classified.

 

Alien: Covenant was certified fresh 80 reviews in. It was actually at 77% sometime on the first Saturday I saw it.  Now it's all the way down to 71%.  I feel some late critics are piling on. 

[vc2002]

Holy mother of Great Scott @ that Alien Conenant drop!

 

Now I bet Fox regret having Ridley sitting in the director's chair instead of letting Blomkamp direct his Alien movie.

[Ozymandias]

All future Blomkamp flops will have "From the Director of District 9" in their trailers. 

Edited May 28, 2017 by Ozymandias

[Johnny Tran]

Here's the thing that bothers me about this critic conversation.  Yes, I do have much respect for many critics and their opinions they've been around a long time, I used to read/watch Ebert and Roeper and Siskel before that when I was a kid so I've always had respect for what they do. A professional critic. When I'd listen to Ebert I felt like he had copious knowledge of film, techniques, tropes, storytelling devices, etc.. etc..  

 

Those days are gone. There are still professional critics, those whose opinions I value but many of the critics factored into RT are bloggers, people I've never heard of, people popping up from who knows where, their own websites,  and when I read some of their reviews I'm not reading Ebert. I feel like I'm reading a paragraph written by one of my friends on social media. Which is fine I guess, but I don't have the same trust in their words as I would a professional critic.  

 

So I completely disagree that critics these days get it "right" more often than fans or the average person.  They are in a lot of cases just a guy with a website. 

 

If this guy with a website is making money off reviews then he is by definition a professional, but not by my definition. 

Edited May 28, 2017 by Johnny Tran

[TalismanRing]

19 minutes ago, Johnny Tran said:

 

Alien: Covenant was certified fresh 80 reviews in. It was actually at 77% sometime on the first Saturday I saw it.  Now it's all the way down to 71%.  I feel some late critics are piling on. 

 

Nah.  They certified it too early.  The avg is the same as it was 100 reviews ago -  6.4 which indicated it would be hard to stay in the mid to high 70s.  It was getting a lot of borderline Fresh but that happen a lot with these kind of moves. Similarly Life had a 5.9 avg and is at 68% (while having a 5.5/ 46% among top critics).   Meanwhile Beauty & The Beast has an avg of 6.6 (and 7 among top critics) and it's at 71%.

 

 

 

 

Edited May 28, 2017 by TalismanRing