What Constitutes a 10/10 Movie Review?

Posted by Dominic von Riedemann Aug 24, 2009

A reader recently asked me about my occasional habit of giving a movie a 10/10 (funnily enough, they were all Pixar flicks).

"Is there really such a thing as a perfect movie?" he asked. There was also a discussion of how WALL-E was symbolic of everything wrong with American cinema, but that's another story.

Let's leave aside the argument over whether perfection is attainable on this imperfect planet: what does it mean (to my demented mind, at least) to give a film a perfect score? It means that I think this film is a modern classic, one that will be revered long after the filmmakers are dead and gone.

This is how I rank movies, on a scale of 1 through 10:

1. This movie is probably on continuous loop in Hell.
2. A miserable waste of time.
3. Pathetic.
4. More wrong with this flick than right.
5. Mediocre.
6. More right with this flick than wrong.
7. Not bad. I had a good time.
8. A few flaws but still worth it.
9. I wholeheartedly recommend you see this movie.
10. In the future, film school students will study sequences from this flick.

A film that gets a 10/10 may not be perfect, but I can't think of any way it could be improved.

Finally, these reviews are my opinions: my attempt to put words to a visceral reaction I have when viewing a film.

Like Roger Ebert says in his wonderful book Your Movie Sucks, my reviews are to be read not as gospel, but as an indicator: to give you an idea whether or not you want to see this flick. If you read about a movie I've panned, and decide it's the type of film you want to see, I've done my job. If you see the film and decide you like it, I've still done my job.

Ultimately, it's all good. Here endeth the rant.