jonsefcik

My personal IMDB account that I mostly use to keep track of every film, TV series, internet series, and short film I have ever seen. I only rate TV and internet series whenever I've seen enough episodes to get an idea of what the show is all about. Some of these titles are things I haven't seen in several years and those numerical ratings are very arbitrary. Unless I've either written a review of it on IMDb or made a video on it on my YouTube channel, don't take my ratings super seriously. Consider the out-of-10 ratings as more of a general indication. If I give something an 8 or 9, you can probably infer that I thought it was good. A 5, I probably didn't think much of it. A 2 or 3, I probably thought it was bad. My personal scale goes something like this:

10: Basically Perfect
9: Outstanding; Fantastic
8: Great; Excellent
7: Good
6: Above Average; Decent
5: Average/Forgettable or A Totally Mixed Bag
4: Below Average; Mediocre
3: Bad
2: Awful
1: Horrendous
0: This Movie Should Not Exist

A 10 means the film is basically perfect. I personally cannot think of any way I would change it that could objectively make it better. Any tiny flaws it may have are very minor and are negligible in the big picture. A film must fulfill at least 2 of the 3 following requirements for me to consider giving it a 10:

1. I have to walk out of it going "holy sh#$, that was f&^%ing awesome!". Not just great or excellent, but absolutely mind blowing. A lot of movies that do this tend to be ones where my expectations are subverted in the best possible way, not just doing something different to be different.
2. It must get better on subsequent watches. Most films I enjoy best on first viewing, but their flaws become more apparent on subsequent watches. The difference between a good film and a great one is when you find more to appreciate on subsequent rather than things that break my immersion.
3. Similarly to the last one, if a film doesn't totally wow me on first watch, and I think about it over the following days, everything has to make more sense the more I think about it.

A 5 is either forgettable or average. In the case of a mixed bag, any good aspects I like are about equally cancelled out by the bad.

A 0 means this movie is an absolute abomination of cinema that should not exist. I save this score for only the most detestable, pointless, and just plain incompetent pieces of garbage I've ever seen. There are no redeeming qualities. There is no possible way I can conceive of anyone enjoying this. A movie has to be either particularly insulting to its audience or especially unpleasant and morally reprehensible for me to give it this score. My 0/10s are in a list below.

All other ratings fit appropriately between these three benchmarks.

Since a 5 is average, I use a 5 as my baseline. A film's achievements will raise the score and any flaws or missed opportunities to objectively improve the film will lower it. For example, a film can be technically perfect with no flaws on the filmmaking level but if nothing noteworthy is done with the story, characters, or presentation of said story and characters, I'd give it a 5 since nothing was done with those tools. A good example to illustrate this idea is one from Adam Johnston from YMS: If you make a film called Paint Drying where the camera is turned on right after a fresh coat of paint is applied to a wall and lasts two hours, the only way you could technically screw it up is if for some reason the camera wasn't pointed directly at the wall and it wasn't two hours. While the movie technically didn't do anything wrong, I'd still give it a 5/10 since it didn't do anything clever or noteworthy with the idea. An example would be the Disney film The Rescuers Down Under, where everything is perfect on a technical level but the plot, tropes, and characters are very standard. Conversely, I allow some tiny flaws for a 10/10 film since the achievements of a film with an incredible story, characters, and presentation will greatly outweigh any tiny flaws it does have. If I were absolutely strict with the definition of what a 10/10 movie was, where it would have to be absolutely perfect, then almost nothing would get it.

Another big factor I consider is a film's timelessness. How well will this hold up 5, 20, 50 years from now? There are films like Rosemary's Baby which still feels fresh half a decade later and the Aaron Seltzer parodies which were dated before they even came out.

I try to be objective, but my personal enjoyment may factor into the score by as much as one entire point. I've seen 1/10 movies I've loved and 9/10 movies I've hated. Movies I give a 6/10 or lower that I personally love go in my Guilty Pleasures list.

I'm also a little more lenient on TV shows, shorts, and internet series than regular films. My mentality for shorts is that because they're more concise, they're easier to digest, and make for a more enjoyable viewing experience. TV and internet series I give a little extra credit simply because of all the additional effort needed. Making a single 2 hour film is one thing, but it's quite another to create the equivalent of dozens of films worth of runtime over the course of several years where the actors age with their characters and the writing evolves with that too. A show that keeps building upon and exploring everthing in satisfying and interesting ways is worthy or some extra credit in my book.

Right now my average rating is between a 6 and 7 but that's because I usually only go out of my way to see things I think will be good. If I saw every single thing I possibly could, my average rating would be closer to a 5.

Update: I'm thinking of adopting a letter grading system instead of a numerical one. The system translates to something like:

A+: 10
A: 9
A-: 8
B+: strong 7
B: generous 7
B-: 6
C+: 5
C: 4
C-: strong 3
D+: generous 3
D: strong 2
D-: generous 2
F: 1, 0

I like using both since there can be multiple numerical scores associated with a letter grade and multiple letter scores associated with a numerical grade.