Buzz
If you're a movie enthusiast, you're probably familiar with IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes, and Metacritic. These are the top movie review websites globally, where the best movies are highlighted. However, each of these websites has different criteria for evaluation. If you're interested, you can learn about the criteria for rating movies on each website in the article below by SoftwareTips.com.
1. IMDb: Catering to the Masses
Website: https://www.imdb.com/
Perhaps the simplest term to describe IMDb's movie rating website is 'mass appeal.'
IMDb's movie ratings range from 10.0 downwards, aggregated and averaged from reviews by all IMDb members worldwide. Each IMDb account can rate a movie once, and the ratings are recorded and compiled into scores for each movie.
You can also specifically review the number of ratings per account.
To be fair, IMDb ratings are not heavily correlated with a film's quality or artistic merit. As SoftwareHacks mentioned earlier, IMDb's movie ratings are heavily skewed towards popular appeal, so ratings tend to reflect personal preferences.
Currently, people often pass around an interesting saying like this: a movie that makes a lot of money and gains fans isn't necessarily a good movie, but it's definitely marketed incredibly well.
A 'loyal fan' of an actor or movie script might rate the movie 10 stars regardless of whether it deserves such a score.
However, because ratings are based on many viewers, top-rated movies often have multi-dimensional appeal, attracting many fans. Sometimes, highly acclaimed films and even Oscar-winning ones may be too artistic, making it difficult for viewers to fully understand their brilliance and may not receive high ratings.
IMDb is also the most well-known website when people want to find a worthwhile movie to watch or compare the ratings of one movie with another.
2. Rotten Tomatoes: The Audience-Critic Blend
Website: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/
Drawing inspiration from the entertainment era of yore, a poorly-received movie or play would often be met with audiences hurling rotten tomatoes or spoiled vegetables onto the stage. Hence, this movie review website is named Rotten Tomatoes.
Rotten Tomatoes offers two types of film reviews. One type is from reputable critics worldwide, and the other type is similar to IMDb's rating system.
When movies are released, Rotten Tomatoes invites film critics from around the world to review them. The number of critics can range from a few hundred depending on the film's popularity and influence.
Critics' reviews are categorized into two types. One is Fresh, meaning 'good' (a rating of over 60% positive is considered Fresh), and the other is Rotten, meaning 'bad' (a rating of over 60% negative is considered Rotten).
You can see some reviews below, with reviews featuring a red tomato symbol indicating Fresh and reviews with a green smudge symbol indicating Rotten.
Movies certified as Fresh must meet the following criteria:
- Ratings above 75%.
- Must have at least 5 reviews from top critics (meaning the movie must be popular enough to attract attention from critics).
- Widely released films must have a minimum of 80 reviews.
- Limited release films must have a minimum of 40 reviews.
- TV shows must have a minimum of 20 reviews per season.
Because scoring has two completely different extremes, movies on this site are often rated as either 'too good' or 'too bad'. This may seem unfair to mediocre films but are rated poorly like those from DC such as Suicide Squad (2016) at 28%, Man of Steel (2015) at 55%, and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016) at 28%.
In addition to the Fresh/Rotten index, you can see the popcorn icon, which represents the aggregate score from the audience. It combines the mass appeal format of IMDb and the Fresh & Rotten rating method to calculate the final score.
3. Metacritic: Expert Evaluations
Website: https://www.metacritic.com/
Starting in the summer of 1999, the three founding members of Metacritic initially built it as a fun rating system for movies or video games. Their criteria were to help users make informed decisions about how to spend their time and money.
Metacritic uses a 100-point scale for each movie. This scale is determined by aggregating scores from film critics and popular movie review websites.
Each review website has a different scoring scale, so Metacritic adjusts and converts it to the Metacritic scale.
Prominent critics are renowned writers from newspapers such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Chicago Sun-Times, Variety, and The Hollywood Reporter.
Because evaluations come from reputable experts, it is more reliable in terms of artistic appreciation but tends to be subjective due to lacking diverse perspectives, unlike IMDb, which caters to the general audience.
After reading the above sections, you probably have a basic understanding of the rating criteria on IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes, and Metacritic. In general, each site has different criteria, so it's impossible to say which one evaluates more accurately. You can refer to the rating system of each site based on its criteria.
There will be movies that score high on all three sites, such as The Godfather (1972). Such films have received high praise both in terms of audience appeal and artistic merit. They are highly recommended to watch by many, but there will always be some who don't enjoy them because preferences differ - what one enjoys, another might not.
When choosing movies, it's better to pick ones that suit your taste rather than ones that only suit others.
Thank you for reading the article by SoftwareTips about evaluating movies on IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes, and Metacritic. The article has provided a brief overview of how movies are evaluated on these three platforms so that you can find the most suitable movie recommendations. We hope you have the most enjoyable movie-watching experience.
