Verbal Jazz is a Blog of social commentary and occasional satire written and conceived by Chris Vallancourt.
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The Verbal Jazz Needlessly Complicated Movie Rating System
A more simple, yet more complicated means of reviewing movies, music, and books
Verbal Jazz has long maintained that movie rating systems used by critics, and by online entities, are just a convenient way to gloss over the meat of the review. Although with the online review, there often is not much meat: just a vote for either loving or hating a film or a book.
To further complicate matters, Verbal Jazz has developed a rather hokey means of rating movies. Verbal Jazz frequently changes the time signature on movies. 4/4/ time is the most common, but we have been known to review films in 3/4 time, and, should the film be truly bizarre, we will review it in other time signatures. If the notes in the measure, fill it up, consider it a rave. For example: four quarter notes in 4/4 time is the equivalent of a rave review, or one whole note in 4/4 time is a rave. 2 sixteenth notes in 3/4 time is not. Does this make no sense? Good.
Take, for example, these three films I watched one day while ill:
"Erin Brockovich": 3 quarter noted in 4/4 time. (Good)
"Dogma" 3 eight notes in 3/4 time. (Bad)
"Matrix Revolutions": 11 eighth notes in 7/8 time. (Good)
Now you might ask, where is the meat in these reviews? Well, the rating method is so complicated that the subtle nuances of film reviewing get glossed over while the reader gets to figure out the rating scheme. Occasionally, I may feel compelled to offer a bit of commentary such as this on "Dogma:" the Shit Demon pretty much sums up what this movie offers. Good luck.