Criteria for Film Discussion

Despite the news (false, apparently) that he's not allowing ABC to use his "thumbs-up/thumbs-down" designation, Roger Ebert's reviews have been published with a series of stars lately. This story (with a really, well...sad picture of Roger) outlines the battle over the catch-phrase that launched a thousand stinkers.

To that end, I'd love to open up a discussion on how we should assign value to a film.

Stars are so '80s.

Popcorn tubs are lame.

Tomatoes are so '90s.

The thumbs up and down thing is way too general to offer any real advice. And I don't want to get sued.

So we can draft our own scale. Words are fine, but again they're pretty vague (bad, poor, good, excellent). Blah (picture curmedgeon shaking fist)!

A numerical scale(1-4; 1-5?) is fine, but we need to come up with an appropriate unit of measurement.

It would have to be something that can be applied to both good and bad films, though. Saying The Godfather earned five Brittany Crotch Shots is a far cry from awarding one BCS to Showgirls.

See what I mean?

I'm also cool with the partial designation. I mean, Brittany's Crossroads probably gets a BCS and a 1/2 (I'm guessing--haven't seen it).

So let me know what you think in the comments section. I'll ponder the subject over the weekend and hopefully we'll have some suggestions to discuss.

In the meantime, I hope that Michael Clayton earns at least three Kool-Aid attacks .