The People Have Spoken: Letter Grades are Baaaaack
Hopefully this conversation has gotten us somewhere
I'm such a pushover aren't I? However, I think by not adding letter grades to this weekend's five movie reviews and having the conversations that took place on Friday and again earlier today we may have gotten somewhere when it comes to a complete understanding of the value of letter grades. However, I must say I never expected the response I received.
As of the posting of this article 210 people voted in a poll I expected no more than maybe 50 interested readers to add their input. But even more surprising is the fact 82% of those people wanted me to reinstate letter grades with my movie reviews. This is a number you cannot argue with, especially when people are making legitimate arguments in the comments section.
Here are a few comments that weighed heavily into my decision to bring grades back, on top of the poll results:
"Sometimes when I'm at the movies I go on to your site by iPhone and I used to see all the grades. Now it's difficult for me to use your site to decide sometimes because at one point there can be 3 or 4 movies coming out this weekend and if there and haven't decided yet it'll be a bit hard to choose." ~ MovieLover
"The grade allows me to get your general opinion on the film without robbing me of the joy of finding a movie's joys and thematic depth by myself. Then, once I have seen the movie and written a review myself, I can come back and read your full review." ~ John O'Neil
"I believe you should reinstate some form of grade, not necessarily a letter grade. so that we at least have the gist of how good/bad a movie is, without having to 'pick apart' a review." ~ Jeremy Baril
"While I do read most of your reviews, I do like the convenience of the letter grade, for do or die situations where there isn't enough time to read the entire review." ~ Cory
"We need grades so that we could personally know what we are getting without actually knowing its contents in the review…" ~ Topy
Beyond those statements, there is one major scenario I can identify with; here's an example…
Let's say you have no interest in seeing Zombieland, but at the same time you have a favorite reviewer that gives it a B+ review (not me, I only gave it a B-). Suddenly you are now interested to see what you may have missed based on the marketing and click over to read the review. If the review doesn't sell you, you can now go back to ignoring Zombieland, but perhaps something catches your attention and you're now willing to give the film a shot. In this case the grade served as a valuable jumping off point as opposed to being looked at as some final verdict on a film's quality.
I can also sympathize with the quick snapshot scenario in which someone may bring up the site on their mobile phone and look at the grades and go from there. Considering the argument to remove letter grades relies heavily on nothing more than seeing a select few emails and comments as a nuisance doesn't justify eliminating them altogether, ultimately eliminating their value to so many readers.*
Movie reviewing is not an exact science and the finality of a letter grade is something that personally frustrates me, but a lot of that displeasure has come at the efforts of a few that try to compare Movie X to Movie Y by letter grade alone. However, through the variety of comments, even by those that wanted the grades to remain absent, I noticed a lot of understanding about the value of the letter grade, which beyond a minor snapshot opinion is pretty much zero.
I still hope to come up with a different process in the future, but for now I have reinstated the grades and they can be found on the homepage, in all five of this weekend's reviews (find those here) and in the movie review archives. I just hope those of you that have shown understanding when it comes to the value of letter grades that you keep that in mind before trying to compare the "D" I gave one film and the "B-" I gave another. Neither film has anything to do with the other.
Thanks for all of your input. Seeing how I am writing these reviews for you, it's important for me to make sure you are getting what you want.
* I intend to keep my word and begin posting a weekend round-up of all the new movies coming out every Friday in an effort to give you one quick snapshot along with a few notes on each film.
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