How much do you trust Rotten Tomatoes?
 

I peek at the site every now and then, but I definitely take the ratings with a grain of salt.

The fact that films like Final Destination 5 and Kingdom of the Crystal have "fresh ratings", while films like Blow (or hell even the Hangover sequels) have lower ratings shows how inconsistent the rating system is.

Overall I've noticed these trends on Rotten Tomatoes:

1. The site is biased toward family-friendly films (ex. Disney/Pixar) - pretty much any major animated film will get a Fresh rating; while films with edgier content will often get negative reviews simply for having content which the critic found offensive.

2. The site is biased toward serious films versus "entertaining films". - often films in genres such as action or comedy receive poor reviews for "lacking serious depth" - but it's pretty redundant to go to a movie like Death Race expecting the depth of a film like The Godfather. It would be like visiting a local hamburger or pizza joint expecting to be served fine French cuisine. I believe that "fun films" should be rated within the context of their genre as opposed to being given poor ratings just for "not being serious art", however RT critics seem not to grasp what to me is a pretty simple concept.

Re: How much do you trust Rotten Tomatoes?
 

I don't trust Rotten Tomatoes all that much. I prefer to use Metacritic for reviews and IMDb for movie facts. The main thing that put me off of Rotten Tomatoes was when they got the date wrong for a movie to be released. I was waiting for a movie to come out on DVD for ages and the date on Rotten Tomatoes for it's dvd release was way later in the year, and when I heard that the movie was already at Wal-Mart I was furious

Re: How much do you trust Rotten Tomatoes?
 

Not at all tbh.


I use them alongside many other sites to gauge a rating but tend just to make my own mind up.


Roger Ebert was the same. He'd slam a film and I'd like it... or love a film and I'd think it was utter tosh.

Re: How much do you trust Rotten Tomatoes?
 

I dont use it at all anymore!

Im not so inclined to be on top of things anymore, when it comes to new movies. There are so many old movies that are worth a watch so i cant really say im seeking out the newest new anymore.

I usually use the danish forum im frequenting, which has a lot of arthouse stuff, for recommendations, As well as my local Cinemateque / arthouse theater.

Besides that im reading a danish film critic zine which comes out every half a year and sometimes Sight and Sound.

Mubi is another channel of recommendations i also use,

Re: How much do you trust Rotten Tomatoes?
 

Rotten Tomatoes and IMDB are both good sources for me. Since I joined this forum, I have been using this website's list though.

[quote]The fact that films like Final Destination 5 and Kingdom of the Crystal have "fresh ratings", while films like Blow (or hell even the Hangover sequels) have lower ratings shows how inconsistent the rating system is./QUOTE]

I don't think that's enough proof that the rating system is inconsistent. There will always be movies I hate that have high ratings on RT and IMDB or movies I liked that have low scores.

As for Crystal Skull, I found the movie textbook definition of mediocre. .

Edit-I almost never read the plot summary before I watch a movie. The less I know about the plot, the more surprising an event might be. I only look at the general opinion for guidance. A movie that is on the AFI 100 Movies list is more important for me to see than a comedy that just came out that may or may not be funny.

Re: How much do you trust Rotten Tomatoes?
 

If I need to learn info about a movie I will look on IMDB. I look at Rotten Tomatoes for a general feel for new releases and showtimes. But Rotten Tomatoes Critics ratings I take with a grain of salt. The viewer rating I give more weight to.

Maybe I don't use it as much as I used to, but I still use it pretty regularly. But since my criteria is much different from the critics', I don't trust it that much. There have been instances when a film had a perfect 100% score and I ended up hating it.

There are scores/reviews for old movies as well...

I use it for old movies as much as I do for the new ones. It's quite useful if for example you're looking for a director's highest rated/best reviewed films

Re: How much do you trust Rotten Tomatoes?
 

I use it for ranges. Anything from 40 % to 70% doesn't really tell me if I'll want to see it, but it's pretty hard to find a film creeping up on 90% or better that isn't really good. Similarly, precious few films under 30% are any better than the rating would indicate. So mostly, I just use it to spot those "better than you thought they would be" films at a glance, as well as weed out the really bad ones. I think it's pretty good for that.

I'm starting to prefer Metacritic more and more, as well.

Can you please give me some examples? Some for me, off the top of my head, are The Last Picture Show, The Bank Dick and Leave Her to Heaven.

Edit-Looks like that movie's score changed since the last time I check. :)

Though I didn't hate it, I didn't like Meet Me in Saint Louis.

Re: How much do you trust Rotten Tomatoes?
 

The Third Man

*hides*

Can you please explain why?

Just didn't work for me, for several reasons. It sounded like something right up my alley but it failed to deliver. I doubt my feelings would change if I rewatched it, but one day maybe I should

I love how you pointed out the crappiest examples of anything ever.

Final 5 got a 61% which is 2 percent above a rotten...:rolleyes:

I have no problem with Crystal Skull sitting at 78%. I wouldn't say it would get the much of a pass in my personal rating, but it's better than most silly action films (I'd include Death Race in that, but more on that later).

Have you ever heard of Delgo? Or Epic? Or The Nut Job? Or Alpha and Omega? Or Igor? Or Cars 2?!?!?!??!?! I'd say they're easy on animated films (though I don't think they really are), because they know the audience for animated films isn't made up of film geeks and art-house aficionados.


Show me even one critic who went to Death Race expecting The Godfather. This entire paragraph is nonsense. Death Race is pure and utter crap for any expectations.

And to counter your point, there's plenty of silly or fun films that get good ratings, or have you not been paying attention to this years offerings? Try X-Men: Days of Future Past. Or Guardians of the Galaxy. Or Gozilla. Or Edge of Tomorrow. Or 22 Jump Street.

To answer the question of this post, I love Rotten Tomatoes and find that I agree more than I disagree. I tend to lean more towards Yoda's view of it and if I see something going higher than an 80% or so I'll take a look even if it's something I wasn't originally interested in watching.

Bottom line, not only do I like RT and Metacritic, but I disagree with the bulk of your original post...

Crystal Skull is a "silly action film". :lol: A guy swinging on vines at catching up to a fast moving jeep? Hiding in a fridge and getting blown miles away by a nuke and still surviving? lol.

Not at all - it's an action film done right with an entertaining cast, and definitely meets exceptions (though you said yourself above that the genre is silly so I doubt you're giving an objective review of the film - just hating on the genre as a whole. Too many critics on the site though pointed out essentially how the film was "all action" without a lot of depth and used that to factor in a lowered score - which is dumb, because that's coming to a movie with false expectations.

If action makes someone squeamish nothing's stopping them from watching My Little Pony: The Movie, or Pee Wee's Big Adventure but simply having content that makes someone squeamish is a poor reason to bash a movie.

Most of the above films aren't my type (I'm not big on Superhero films, or monster films) . But I'd been thinking about checking out 22 Jump Street. In a way though this address what I said about the reviews being inconsistent.

Re: How much do you trust Rotten Tomatoes?
 

The Critic rating can be very skewed, why? because if say all the critics think a film is say 6/10 they give it a fresh rating and it will come out as like a 90% score because the critics aren't giving a score, just a fresh rotten/review which adds up to a total %. I tend to look at the average rating score or the average score on IMDB/Metacritic. Also the user reviews, if 30,000 people have given a film a rating of over 4/5 as an average I tend to take that figure over 100-200 critics.

Re: How much do you trust Rotten Tomatoes?
 

I haven't been on the RT website in about 6 years. The critics are a load of clowns who don't know their arses from their elbows.

Re: How much do you trust Rotten Tomatoes?
 

I don't trust reviews from anywhere!!
Lots of people loved winter soldier I thought it was extremely boring.

Re: How much do you trust Rotten Tomatoes?
 

Never use it. I use imdb for dates/actors etc but prefer to read either people here where at least I know their taste, or friends and family. I do read reviews in newspapers too by critics I like