Really? I find the opposite problem. Ratings are inflated and even utter trash on IMDB is 6 or 7 out of 10.

I think part of the problem is that the scale is not used properly. On a scale of 1 to 10, I would consider 5 to be average. Most movies seen are average. Average is well worth watching. 5 is a decent rating as far as I am concerned. I'll even watch a 4 or a 3 if someone tells me that some aspect of the movie was worthwhile. But most people seem to treat the scale as if they only are willing to watch 8 and above, and that anything below a 7 is trash.

It would be much better if there was a site to input your ratings and for it to match you to users and critics similar to your taste. I used to use Last.FM like this for music but haven't found anything similar for movies or TV. Ratings alone are useless because critics and users alike will swing all over the scale for the same movie. Tastes need to match.

I'll be the contrarian and say IMDb ratings are pretty accurate for me. The two exceptions are super inflated Cinema™ ratings and middling ratings for comedies. A 9.3/10 silent era movie gets too much credit for having functional lighting while a 6/10 comedy gets panned for its shallow character development.

Fuck ratings and reviews. I've watched terribly rated movies that are gold, and award winning films that are absolute dumpster fire.

Too many times other people insist on inserting their opinion when it is not requested. A lot will also just go with the tide as well. If others are giving good reviews, then they will do the same.

I prefer to read a summary of the plot and give it a watch to form my own opinion.

i stopped thinking imdb or rating for entertainment as "how good it is" but rather "the odds of me liking it" i've seen plenty 5 or 6 imdb but i absolutely love it. and 9s as meh.

Not IMDB, but Rotten Tomatoes is dead to me after their score for Boondock Saints was 26% despite a user rating of 91%.

Maybe it's not a cinematic masterpiece, but it's a solidly fun movie.

I don't trust IMDB after Amazon bought it. Maybe a company that makes movies shouldn't be in charge of rating them? Conflict of interest maybe?

Is it just me, or is IMDB becoming shittier and shittier?

A lot of criticism here for numerical scores, but consider the popularity of tier list ranking videos. Maybe we should be ranking movies relative to one another. Not sure how that works as a UI though.

I saw "The Bride" in theaters a few months ago and the fact that that movie ISN'T a 0 on imdb invalidates the whole concept of critic reviews for me. Worst movie I have ever seen (and I've seen "The Room" twice)

Sad that IMDB now hide the user opinions behind their login screen. A score alone isn't helpful at all.

It never affects my enjoyment of a thing. But if I'm already questioning whether or not I want to continue, that rating makes a difference.

Do people really trust ratings for things? It seems like we are so far removed from those number meaning anything useful I've long been ignoring them.

I feel IMDB ratings for new movies are ridiculously gamed / paid-for. Like the amazon reviews scandal all over again.

I can't think of many examples so my comment is worthless, but for years I had this experience with Rotten Tomatoes and hated the site/community for it. Some of the most artistic and impactful films I had seen would get a 30% or something, and I'd be like how?!

I guess one more recent example that I do have was The Northman while it was still playing in theatres. It scored well enough on Rotten Tomatoes over time, but initial reviews were trash and I was hard-pressed to find a single person online who enjoyed it. Just endless shitting all over it. Comments sections full of folks calling it the worst/dumbest thing they've ever wasted their money on.

My wife and I went into it blind and were honestly blown away. It was like John Wick with Norse mythology. From the very beginning where Willem Dafoe is howling and going into a crazy shamanistic fire trance to the big otherworldly climax at the end, we were floored by how fucking cool that movie was. A genuine piece of art. Got us both playing Valheim again soon after.

Not sure what changed, but despite the 90% Tomatometer, the 64% Popcornmeter still shows that audiences were fairly divided. But that spread was way worse a few years ago. The part that perplexed me most is that most people's criticisms of the movie could just as easily be applied to Mad Max: Fury Road (which I ironically thought was hot garbage).

We need two ratings, how objectively good the movie is and how much you enjoyed it. Currently most user reviews are a mix of both and critic reviews are often very biased or financially motivated.

We don't have to agree always. There where movies I liked, and people where saying otherwise.

I learned in my youth not to read reviews of things I like. It's unpleasant and pointless to read someone savaging your favorite albums or books.

(More critical analysis can be fine, but regular Internet reviews are not so worthwhile)

https://xkcd.com/359/

IMDB reflects popular opinion. Everyone has unpopular opinions, heck I liked the Emoji movie. Also, for some niche movies the ratings are wildly skewed since only die hard fans are voting on them. And for some movies where there are strongly held opinions, many people will pile-on and vote on them without even having seen the movie.

All that said, IMDB is a useful tool for getting read on popular opinion on movies. Also, IMDB is standing behind me with a gun to my head. Send help, please.

I use them by genre. A drama or action movie needs a very high score for my tastes.

Comedies usually a 6 or 7 is going to be good for me and a very high score usually means it's a dramery.

Horror movies with very high scores are usually mainstream over produced like the conjuring. Good horror movies usually are 6-7 like the witch or hededitary

And also, if a movie has a very high meta critic but a very low user rating it usually means the movie will be weird af

Hudson Hawk, widely panned, is fun; just refuses to take itself seriously.

• iMDB: 5.7/10

• RT: 30/100

• Metacritic:17/100

I don't care. That's what I think of any film rating system. It's a report, but not the experience itself.

See also: the Southland Tales, The One (2001), Lost Souls (2000). All are, objectively, bad films. And yet... I remember them to be re-watchable.

This write-up is on a site for and app and ends up shilling for that app, but it makes some useful points, confirmed by my years of poking around:

Trust Metacritic most for prestige drama, arthouse cinema, and Oscar contenders.

Trust IMDb most for genre films.

Use the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer as a quick pass/fail for critical reception.

Use the Rotten Tomatoes Audience Score cautiously.

Full disclosure: I don't have the app, don't want the app, and don't care about the app. Also, I skimmed the article in 2 minutes while watching my kids bounce on a trampoline.

Over time I learned to distinguish marketing hype from "it's actually a good movie/show" hype. The ratings are mostly meaningless. Highest grossing movies are usually shit and get good ratings because most people like watching something they are already familiar with or because they fall for the hype and just like something because everyone likes it. Same with "bad" movies. People will give low ratings to movies they don't understand or are too original for them. I learned to pick up movies and shows that are mentioned organically from time to time and ignore the ones everyone starts talking about suddenly. One thing indicates there's actually something interesting there, the other just good marketing.