| Author |
 Topic  |
|
benj clews 
"...."
|
 Posted - 09/02/2008 : 21:42:09
|
Here's something that's starting to concern me a little: the number of really debatable 'films' that are being added to the site.
IMDB has, as far as I can tell, no idea what it's doing so I'd like to suggest a simple rule to help curb this trend. My feeling is that the majority of the problem entries are TV documentaries and so I'd like to propose that fwfr only feature documentaries that have been shown to an audience in a cinema (somewhere). This would allow things such as Micheal Moore films and The March of the Penguins, but eliminate breast feeding guides and Louis Theroux documentaries (which, I'm pretty sure, never make it off BBC channels).
What does anyone think? Would this rule out any documentaries that somebody feels should feature on a film site? |
|
|
Salopian 
"Four ever European"
|
Posted - 09/02/2008 : 23:32:47
|
| No, I don't agree with this at all. Television documentaries that are not part of a series format are films. As I've suggested before, apply the rule of whether the makers can validly say "I made a film about X." That easily applies to Louis Theroux documentaries etc. in a way that it doesn't apply to Panorama documentaries etc. I'd concentrate on getting rid of things like the Teletubbies exercise video that I posted in the other thread. |
 |
|
|
BaftaBaby 
"Always entranced by cinema."
|
Posted - 09/02/2008 : 23:42:20
|
benj - I think this is a great idea. One of the things that first attracted me to this site was a shared love of film. This isn't the fwtvr!! Thank goodness!!! 
Cinema is a beautiful art form and long may it wave ... on the big screen and right here on fwfr. 
But hey, dude - this is YOUR site and you should do what you think is best. 
|
|
|
|
Salopian
"Four ever European"
|
Posted - 09/03/2008 : 00:06:05
|
| Well, it's not F.W.C.R. either, i.e. it is defined as being about films, not cinema. That is only reasonable since it is quite arbitrary what happens to have been shown at a cinema. There are numerous films that have not been shown at the cinema (were Larry or Sybil ever?) and there have been documentaries very much of a T.V. style that have been (e.g. Seven Up). Short films are particularly unlikely to get a cinema release but everyone in their right mind would agree that they are still films. |
|
|
|
BaftaBaby
"Always entranced by cinema."
|
Posted - 09/03/2008 : 00:15:03
|
Yeah, maybe we should allow dental x-rays, too. After all, they're known as films. 
|
|
|
|
benj clews
"...."
|
Posted - 09/03/2008 : 00:24:05
|
quote:
Originally posted by Salopian
Well, it's not F.W.C.R. either, i.e. it is defined as being about films, not cinema. That is only reasonable since it is quite arbitrary what happens to have been shown at a cinema. There are numerous films that have not been shown at the cinema (were Larry or Sybil ever?) and there have been documentaries very much of a T.V. style that have been (e.g. Seven Up). Short films are particularly unlikely to get a cinema release but everyone in their right mind would agree that they are still films.
Are Larry or Sybil documentaries? (I've never heard or either I'm afraid  )
I should stress that I'm not saying I have a rule that applies to every genre- I'm just trying to tackle documentaries here. I just don't see informative TV or DVD documentaries as films in the sense I originally envisaged the site.
I've heard that a feature film (what I always felt the 'F' stood for) needs to be a minimum of 52 minutes long so, yes- strictly speaking, short films are pushing it a bit appearing here but I'm willing to bend the rules a bit here, especially since the Oscars have a category for them. |
|
|
|
Salopian
"Four ever European"
|
Posted - 09/03/2008 : 00:27:29
|
quote:
Originally posted by BaftaBabe
Yeah, maybe we should allow dental x-rays, too. After all, they're known as films.
Are they?! Must be another Bristol thing. |
|
|
|
Salopian
"Four ever European"
|
Posted - 09/03/2008 : 00:35:23
|
quote:
Originally posted by benj clews
Are Larry or Sybil documentaries? (I've never heard or either I'm afraid )
I should stress that I'm not saying I have a rule that applies to every genre- I'm just trying to tackle documentaries here. I just don't see informative TV or DVD documentaries as films in the sense I originally envisaged the site.
I've heard that a feature film (what I always felt the 'F' stood for) needs to be a minimum of 52 minutes long so, yes- strictly speaking, short films are pushing it a bit appearing here but I'm willing to bend the rules a bit here, especially since the Oscars have a category for them.
No, they're not documentaries. They're well known made-for-T.V. films. I thought you just meant documentaries as the first category to deal with, since they can be either at the cinema or on T.V. just like any other genre. The Oscars also has a documentary category so I'm not sure that's a basis for anything, especially as I bet that the short films nominated have to have been shown at a cinema too.
Does the I.M.D.B. use the F somewhere or is it somewhere else? If the former, then it surely stands for film, not feature film. I really can see no sense in allowing cinema fictional films, T.V. fictional films, cinema biopics, T.V. biopics, cinema short films, T.V. short films and cinema documentaries but not T.V. documentaries. It would just be bizarre in the extreme. I maintain that one can say in a perfectly straightforward fashion that some of the documentaries you mean are films. There is a clear difference in style from ones that are part of a series format. |
Edited by - Salopian on 09/03/2008 00:45:47 |
|
|
|
Salopian
"Four ever European"
|
Posted - 09/03/2008 : 00:44:04
|
| Another issue is whether the I.M.D.B. is clear about whether a film has had a cinema release, and whether this is reliable. I bet that many just appear at one or two film festivals. |
|
|
|
w22dheartlivie
"Kitty Lover"
|
Posted - 09/03/2008 : 01:51:49
|
| I can see where it could be cloudy in determining what factors make a television product a bona fide documentary vs., say, a one hour special. Films made for television seem a lot more distinctive and have their own categories at awards ceremonies. Having said that, I don't have a strong opinion on this, one way or another. |
|
|
|
benj clews
"...."
|
Posted - 09/04/2008 : 13:51:13
|
quote:
Originally posted by Salopian
The Oscars also has a documentary category so I'm not sure that's a basis for anything, especially as I bet that the short films nominated have to have been shown at a cinema too.
Do those documentaries not need to be screened in a cinema somewhere? If not then it's bad example by me.
quote:
Does the I.M.D.B. use the F somewhere or is it somewhere else?
Not that I'm aware of. In any case, I was referring to the second F in FWFR.
quote:
If the former, then it surely stands for film, not feature film. I really can see no sense in allowing cinema fictional films, T.V. fictional films, cinema biopics, T.V. biopics, cinema short films, T.V. short films and cinema documentaries but not T.V. documentaries. It would just be bizarre in the extreme. I maintain that one can say in a perfectly straightforward fashion that some of the documentaries you mean are films. There is a clear difference in style from ones that are part of a series format.
Can you give me some examples then? This is what I was asking for really- something to persuade me from using this ruling to determine if a documentary belongs here or not, as I can't think of any examples myself.
Right now I don't see it bizarre in the extreme to disallow Louis Theroux documentaries and breast feeding guides from a site that features reviews for big blockbusters. My interpretation (misguided as it may well have been) when I first came up with the site was that the 'Film' in FWFR equated to Feature Film. I also don't watch a Panorama investigation on TV and think I must write an FWFR for it- I see that as something else completely. |
|
|
|
BaftaBaby
"Always entranced by cinema."
|
Posted - 09/04/2008 : 14:51:58
|
Just as a point of information:
Most of Theroux's docos were all part of a series and not made as stand-alones. They're all under contract with the BBC, which hasn't so far as I know issued theatrical releases of its non-fiction stuff.
1st series was called Louis Theroux's Weird Weekends
2nd series was called When Louis Met ...
3rd - current - series is untitled but consists of 6 episodes, one to air this autumn
Actually he HAS made a couple of docos called 'specials' - but they're still made for telly not for commercial release.
They are:
Louis and the Brothel, Louis and the Nazis, and Louis and Michael.
Hope this helps!
|
|
|
|
benj clews
"...."
|
Posted - 09/04/2008 : 14:56:54
|
quote:
Originally posted by BaftaBabe
Just as a point of information:
Most of Theroux's docos were all part of a series and not made as stand-alones. They're all under contract with the BBC, which hasn't so far as I know issued theatrical releases of its non-fiction stuff.
1st series was called Louis Theroux's Weird Weekends
2nd series was called When Louis Met ...
3rd - current - series is untitled but consists of 6 episodes, one to air this autumn
Actually he HAS made a couple of docos called 'specials' - but they're still made for telly not for commercial release.
They are:
Louis and the Brothel, Louis and the Nazis, and Louis and Michael.
Hope this helps!
Not really- now I'm even more confused
I usually site Louis Theroux because whenever I've seen his stuff it's just out of the blue. There isn't another one the next week and there wasn't one the previous week. In fact, I won't have seen one for maybe a year and then suddenly there'll be one. This makes it a series? Just how far apart do episodes have to be to be one offs?  |
|
|
|
BaftaBaby
"Always entranced by cinema."
|
Posted - 09/04/2008 : 15:07:28
|
quote:
Originally posted by benj clews
Just how far apart do episodes have to be to be one offs?
The one-offs are usually longer which makes them one-offs - like 1� hour Xmas Specials of a sit-com.
I think with this latest LT series they're aired quarterly since they take quite a while to shoot and edit, and they're the usual series ep length. I suspect the 'series' grouping is to qualify for awards and such as well as the arcane system the Beeb has for allocating budgets.
But the main point is they're t.v. docs and not the same as March of the Penguins. We don't review eps of the Attenborough series, do we? So who are we to question the Beeb's scheduling of when eps of a series are shown? Surely that's not the criterion for fwfr, is it?
I agree the site works best when dealing with feature films as you intended. Anything else you want to include - well, I support you whatever cause you know you're my hero. 
But tv dos intended for tv with no theatrical release ... dodgy, benj ... dodgy!!
|
|
|
|
Whippersnapper. 
"A fourword thinking guy."
|
Posted - 09/04/2008 : 15:24:13
|
What harm are they doing exactly?  |
|
|
|
Josh the cat
"ice wouldn't melt, you'd think ....."
|
Posted - 09/04/2008 : 16:08:23
|
quote:
Originally posted by Whippersnapper
What harm are they doing exactly?
I believe that Benj is concerned that they affect the integrity of a film review site, which he now possibly wishes he called FWFFR.
Benj, IMHO the Louis T docs are tv programmes not films or feature films so bin them I reckon you do have a precedent for this in the A&E docs.
Just my humble opinion!
Cheers
Josh the cat |
|
|
|
Topic |
|
Classifying non-films
