All critics find their own way to rate a work. Ratings (be they numerical or otherwise) are a convenient and accessible way to get one’s opinions out there, and give some sense of objectivity to an otherwise entirely subjective form of writing. It’s easy to scan a newspaper (I’m sorry, I meant scroll a webpage) and get a quick idea of how good a movie is. Some critics might argue that a rating system lends itself to readers skipping the review and looking only at the stars (admittedly, I’m guilty of this crime), but for those truly interested, a rating can only say so much and instead functions as an “Inquire Within” sign.
Roger Ebert, on numerous occasions has expressed disdain for ratings, despite using a four-star system himself (in addition to creating the most basic of all movie criteria: the Thumbs Up). Ebert argues that, to the reader, equivalent ratings suggest equivalent quality in a film when in fact not all four-star movies are made alike. If, for example, the most recent Francis Ford Coppola film was a disappointment and received 2 stars and the latest Adam Sandler comedy was surprisingly decent (receiving 3 stars), is that suggesting that the latter is of higher merit than the former? Perhaps, but I’m a firm believer in taking each movie for what it is, not holding it to lofty standards.
That being said, I’d like to take a look at the many types of rating systems out there for both film and music (another area of criticism I have some interest in) before settling on my own standards I’ll be using for this blog.
Stars are classic. They’re what I’ve grown accustomed to in both reading and writing film criticism. Since as long as I can recall I’ve always made a quick note in my mind of how many stars a film gets after watching it. It’s a fun way to review things, and there’s just something nice about seeing four stars (or five if that’s your thing) next to the title of a movie I truly admire.
Often this can become problematic however, as it assumes all stars weigh the same. Clearly, the four stars for Casablanca aren’t the same as the four stars for The Dark Knight, right? In reviewing music, this problem arises often. David Bowie, for example released a number of full-score albums in his prime, but he’s still releasing solid music now, so should I compare the new to the old? As obvious as it might seem to do so, I’d avoid the comparison, otherwise no one would listen to his new stuff because it would be viewed as inferior to the old. The music website Pitchfork seems to have a reliable 10-point system that avoids this exact situation. This larger scale offers a wider range to be more specific in one’s quality assessment. Marching to a different tune entirely, I know a guy who runs a rather good music review site by timing the amount of good minutes an album has to create an overall percentage of how much of a record is worth listening to. This is pretty ambitious, and maybe a little crazy, but hey, it works and nobody else is doing it.
There are also the letter grades, as Entertainment Weekly uses for all media reviews, which take genre expectations into account. I know, for example what I’m going to get from a B- comedy or an A horror film.
One of my personal favorite critics, A.O. Scott for The New York Times, uses no rating at all, yet his essays are among the most concise and insightful I’ve ever read. All critics for the Times along with other publications do this as well, and I respect the practice.
The best of all however are the aggregate sites (Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic). By compiling the average of many different rating systems from professional and significant online reviewers, these sites’ percentages are very insightful and I rarely disagree. It’s been a while since I’ve gone to see a movie I know will be rotten.
For my purposes here, however, I’m going to remain a classicist and use a four-star scale. Below are rough definitions of what these ratings mean but, in the end, it’s the words on the page that truly matter.
4 stars: A perfect, or near-perfect, film that elicits some additional mental or emotional response that pushes it into a category that, in film, is best described as “great.”
3 ½ stars: A perfectly, or near-perfectly, executed film where all aspects (direction, writing, acting, cinematography, etc.) exemplify the highest quality.
3 stars: A good to very good film worth a recommendation, containing some weakness or limitation that goes beyond nitpicking individual scenes.
2 ½ stars: A film that, despite its (possibly many) problems, I feel some level of admiration for. Worth a rental recommendation.
2 stars: A film with as many problems as strengths, with the bad unfortunately outweighing the good.
1 ½ stars: A bad film.
1 star: A bad film that I feel some level of hatred for.
½ star: A bad film that borders on offensive in its lack of respect for its audience.
0 stars: Manos: The Hands of Fate.
- Steve Avigliano, 6/27/09
