My New Rating System

Welcome back everybody, can you believe another week has flown by? I certainly can’t because that upcoming post I mentioned in The Blogger being recognised post, has unfortunately been pushed back yet again. On the bright side I do now know it’s going to be three parts and the first part should be up sometime this coming week. (The other two parts are still uncertain.)

While on the news of uncertainly and brighter sides, some of the big movies are coming back late in August, maybe. This will all depend on where you live in the world of course, but for me the new Christopher Nolan movie Tenet is coming to cinemas at the end of the month, which should be pretty cool. Early September the new Bill & Ted movie and New Mutants are also coming to cinemas, but again I’ll believe it when I see it. Lastly that new Mulan movie is skipping cinemas in favour of Disney+, but to watch it you have to pay triple the monthly price of the entire streaming service. A case I’m choosing not to focus on because I might save it for another time.

The possible return of big movies has inspired me to update my rating system which, if you didn’t know, was just a basic 10/10 deal. Pretty much since I started reviewing movies I was never a big fan of the 10 out of 10 thing due to how open to interpretation your score can be. It got worse when I started splitting them into 5 to 6 out of 10 because I have 3 or 4 scores that basically all say your movie is average! Also looking back on some old scores for reference got a bit messy.

With this new rating system the goal is to be a lot more straightforward and if it does it’s job well you shouldn’t have to refer back to this post for an explanation of the ratings, which is what I’m going to do right now.

In the photo above is my template for the new rating system. (If you didn’t know it’s a rating system I made specifically for that retired series The Watchlist.) Similar to that, the ratings are now based on a recommendation from 1 to 5 plus a few exclusive ranks for very special movies, which we will go through together in descending order.

The first and only positive exclusive rank is a +5 score meaning that this particular movie is amongst the best to come out of cinema and it earns my approval seal, which is still here and it also earns a spot in my all time favourite movies list on Letterboxd.

An example for this rank would be: Marriage Story, Parasite and The Incredibles.

Here is the top of my official 5 score rating. I created this spot in mind for those very exceptional movies that aren’t quite 5+ or the best thing ever made material, but still great enough for the BC approved seal and worth you seeing as soon as humanly possible.

An example for this rank would be: Uncut Gems, Jojo Rabbit and Lilo and Stitch.

So this is one of the new badges I created for this new system. This basically means it’s not the greatest thing since Ben-Hur, but it’s worth watching as it’s still very solid, thus thumbs up approval from me.

An example for this rank would be: Ford v Ferrari, The Invisible Man and Get Out.

 

This is the tail end of the positives and that’s pretty much the reason why there is no badge here. You see I honestly don’t see the point in working extra hard in putting together a nice little badge to reward a movie that left so little impression on me. This rating also recommends you wait for a serious price drop before checking this out.

An example for this rank would be: Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga, Sonic the Hedgehog and Looney Tunes: Back in Action.

 

Now we’re on the negative scores. A 2 rated movie also gets no badge because it’s not good enough for one, nor bad enough to get the one below it. The only reason the caption says Only If Interested is because I found movies that land at this spot, despite their glaring flaws, normally have some redeemable qualities that convince me they do have some value. Unlike the next two ranks.

An example for this rank would be: Bloodshot, Charlie’s Angels (2019) and Pocahontas.

Now for the worst ranking in the main rating system. As the caption suggests this time I’m just telling you to stay away from this movie. It might have a few things going for it that help it qualify as a film, but it’s still plain old bad. It gets a thumbs down from me, but it’s still a light version of it as there is one more rating that is much worse than this.

An example for this rank would be: Artemis Fowl, X-Men: Dark Phoenix and The Black Cauldron.

Now this is the second last exclusive rank and this is for the movies that are so appallingly terrible that I don’t get how anyone came together to make this irredeemable thing that they call a movie. This is an exclusive rank for movies you put on to literally torture yourself. I wouldn’t recommend that, but what I do recommend is…

Also an example for this rank would be: Dolittle, The Haunting of Sharon Tate and Justice League.

 

This is the final exclusive rank and might be my favourite out of all of these. As the card suggests this terrible movie is certified ironic entertainment so it’s free from the Epic Fail seal because it’s too awesome for it. It also falls under Blog Complainer approval because these special movies are normally good for a great laugh or several.

Finally, some great examples for this rank would be: Cats, Anaconda and The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl.

That’s the end of that, I probably won’t be using these until some major movies come out. In the meantime I’m open to any necessary constructive criticism or much needed questions in the comments to hopefully improve my brand new rating system. Other than that, hope to see you all again very soon. Blog Complainer done!