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Absolutely. It's nothing new that the definition of a metric can be crystal cleae but set up in such a way that its results are bound to be misused. That's exactly what has been happening with RT% and for anything, this current example fits perfectly well in it since the % of positive reviews is being (willfully or not) confused with how good the movies might be.

While the metric is clear and indeed perfectly defined, it still isn't a linear metric like the thumbs up/down from Ebert, which is precisely how taking the % as if it's representative of the average score (like pretty much everyone else is doing, and actually like the Ebert thumb was) is misleading. But because are used to a linear metric, that's just what they do anyway : a 98% movie has got to be almost perfect. But actually no, it can only have a 7.5 score. Meanwhile, this 80% looks less good, despite possibly having the same or an even better score.

That's how the % is used, and that's most certainly precisely why it was setup this way. As swo put it, it's efficient as reflecting the likelihood of a movie being OK or not, but people are now simply simplifying it to how good the movies are. And if you indeed look at the MCU or DCEU movies, you'll see how un-correlated the meters and the scores will be. All it does is transforming mediocre scores into very good meters, hence the biases. But I'm sure those Marvel movies do love their meters more than their scores.

tenia wrote: Fri Apr 30, 2021 9:05 pmAbsolutely. It's nothing new that the definition of a metric can be crystal cleae but set up in such a way that its results are bound to be misused.

And as if right on cue, The Telegraph publishes an article with the headline: Rotten Tomatoes is Right - Paddington 2 is the greatest film of all time.

It's definitely a click-bait headline, so I don't want to overstate its importance. The article is mostly harmless and fun. But that headline does show how people, even professional writer people, misinterpret the Tomatometer.

I now feel compelled to vote for Paddington 2 in next year's decennial SIght & Sound poll, just to make it official.

The first one's cute enough but I did really enjoy the second. And it was actually a delight to see that Hugh Grant, who I always understood is/was a bit of an ass, is at least self-aware.

I think I prefer the 1st movie in the end. The 2nd one feels like it has a better story and Grant is wonderful in it, but last time I rewatched it, it felt like dragging a bit, something I don't recall the 1st movie having an issue with.

MichaelB wrote: Sat May 01, 2021 4:41 pm I now feel compelled to vote for Paddington 2 in next year's decennial SIght & Sound poll, just to make it official.

I expect these Best Movies of all Time polls to all be updated to reflect how perfect the movie seems to be.

I'm not sure if this would be the best place to post this but I saw Paddington in Peru recently and while it certainly loses a bit of what made something like Paddington 2 so special, I still found exceptionally lovely. First things first, while I prefer Paul King's direction overall, this is still packed with gorgeous settings and nice little visual flourishes (I especially like how the credits sequence reflects key moments in the prior Paddington films) while constantly revving up the action. The cast is also good here too with the obvious highlights being Olivia Coleman as the Reverend Mother of the Auntie Lucy's retirement home and Antonio Banderas who hams it up as not only the main villain but his greedy descendants as well. And though I wish Sally Hawkins returned, Emily Mortimer still brings a fun enough role to the story that I can easily forgive the film for. Overall it's a good enough movie to sit back and have a fun time watching (with a lot of great gags/good emotional moments in it) but imo its predecessor is still unbeaten.