Disney's newspaper advertisement for "Up" featured the kind of blurbs typically associated with a critical hit, with Roger Ebert, Leonard Maltin, and the Wall Street Journal's Joe Morgenstern among the reviewers quoted. But a closer look at Saturday's full-page ad revealed a more unusual endorsement: a 98% "fresh" rating from the website Rotten Tomatoes.
The studios are always searching for new ways to sell movie tickets, and they are now looking to review aggregators such as Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic and newcomer Movie Review Intelligence to generate box-office buzz by amplifying the sound of the critical chorus. As the sites grow more prominent, however, they also are attracting questions about their methodologies, and who exactly qualifies as a film critic in the Internet age?
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Wednesday, June 17, 2009 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 4 National Desk 2 inches; 91 words Type of Material: Correction
Movie review websites: An article in Saturday's Calendar about websites that aggregate movie reviews misstated the percentage and type of positive reviews needed to earn a "certified fresh" rating from Rotten Tomatoes. The story said that the rating is given if a movie gets favorable notices from 60% of the critics it surveys. In fact, for a film to be certified fresh it must be reviewed by 40 or more reviewers, with at least five considered top critics by the website, and 75% or more of the reviews must be positive.
In a way, the review aggregators are to movies what TripAdvisor is to hotels and the Zagat guides are to restaurants -- one-stop sites for consensus opinion. Whereas TripAdvisor and Zagat base their marks on consumer ratings, the movie aggregators generally use professional critics, although Rotten Tomatoes includes a number of citizen-reviewers who write on obscure websites, like Georgia's self-proclaimed "entertainment man" Jackie K. Cooper.
Movie marketers say they like the sites because they can boost movie admissions.
"Are they the driver? No. Can they help drive business? Yes," says Mike Vollman, MGM's marketing chief. "People want to know what the consensus is. I am a huge believer that in today's culture, people don't pay as much attention to individual voices as to the aggregate score."
Adds Peter Adee, the marketing head at Overture Films: "I definitely think that if you're fresh, it helps sell the movie. Reviews matter for an older audience, and certainly matter for an older female audience."
Rotten Tomatoes (a reference to what moviegoers once hurled at screens showing bad movies) is by far the most popular of the three aggregator sites, attracting about 1.8 million unique visitors monthly, according to comScore. As soon as the site deems a movie "certified fresh" -- meaning that at least 60% of the roughly 400 critics it surveys give a movie a favorable notice -- studio executives call Rotten Tomatoes, asking for the small trophies the website dispenses to commemorate the accomplishment. Rotten Tomatoes also is considering adding its mark to DVD packages for movies scoring well.
