I sometimes submit ‘user comments’ which eventually get published, and even register my votes for different movies. I am often dismayed, however, at the movies I see which don’t attract enough votes to give a rating (it is only 5). The user base is many thousands.
I therefore think that my tastes in movies are largely irrelevant, with the majority of viewers satisfied with special effects, violence and sex rather than anything approaching a plot, acting ability and artistry.
I haven’t submitted anything recently, but for a while I sent in informaton like crazy, particularly on Japanese movies and performers that probably never got any exposure in the States (not that much in Japan, either). I also tried to regularly submit the entrants in the annual Japan Indie’s Movie Festival (yeah, that apostrophe’s wrong. Tell the festival organizers). I don’t know how much I’ve sent in all together, but I’m on their top 20 list for plot summaries.
I submit goofs when I spot them and someone else hasn’t spotted them first. Currently I am pleased that the entire goofs list for Wonder Woman (including the one for Who’s Afraid of Diana Prince?) is mine, and there are more submitted and under review.
I get entirely too much joy out of spotting the goofs in the theatre and am entirely too crushed to discover upon returning home that someone else beat me to them.
So far I’ve only submitted one user comment, about Firefly, because some jagoff popped off about how the plots were so simple and stupid that only a child of 8 could possibly be engaged by them! That cheesed off a lot of fans apparently because the same day my comment appeared a couple dozen others beating up on the guy also appeared.
A couple of years ago, I was looking up information on that cheesy '60s movie “The Girls On The Beach”. They didn’t have a screenshot of the title, but said they were soliciting one. Well, I could make a screen cap and send it in. Except that they wanted me to pay them for the privilege of contributing to their database!
Before we make comparisons to a certain message board, this was something stupid like $15, for each contribution! As far as I know, they still don’t have a screen cap for that movie.
Seems a really backwards way to get people to help you out, if you ask me!
I’m proud to say that I recently persuaded IMDB to remove a blatantly wrong trivia item for Rudy. IMDB had two mutually contradictory items about the real-life game at which the stadium scenes were filmed; I did a little research to find out which was correct, and got the wrong one out of there. For the record, those scenes were shot during halftime of the 1992 Notre Dame-Boston College game (with a few shots during the 1992 ND-Penn State game), and whoever told IMDB that they were filmed during the 1991 ND-Tennessee game was wrong.
Some of mine can be found in a previous thread. Most recently: Good Morning Vietnam: goof deleted. Someone thought a news report in the movie was calling Pete Rose a rookie (his rookie year was '63; Adrian Cronauer was in Vienam in '65) when in reality the report called him an All-Star Rookie (his first All-Star appearance was in '65). Shrek 2: movie connection added. (Love Potion No. 9.) Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory: reworded the trivia item concerning Jean Stapleton. The Shawshank Redemption: goof added (still in review). The number of bullet holes in Tommy’s back don’t match the shots fired. The Natural: trivia and fimiling location for War Memorial Stadium added.
So that explains why I hear the Penn State fight song playing during that scene!!
To stay on topic, I do not contribute, but only because I have no info that they don’t have. It is a great resource to me however. To all of you that do contribute, keep up the great work and many thanks!
Just a few contributions there Dan? I could never work out why they would charge for pictures and things like that- they should be grateful for the contributions.
I found that they had incorrect information about an obscure British actress called Renee Clama. I have e-mailed the corrections- it will be interesting to see if they incorporate them.
If you look at an actrss- say Anita Page from the other thread- there is no picture submitted. If you click on ‘Add a picture’ you get the charges listed. Example. They maintain that it is promotion, although how that applies to a person who has retired- or is dead is a bit of a mystery.
I’ve submitted some info, mostly about Allman Brothers Band-related stuff; most of the rest was about people I know who have IMDb listings. (I was also one of probably ten million people to tell them that Walter Matthau’s real last name was not Mattachuskyanskyasky; I seem to remember that they had that up there as a real biographical fact for a while.) It can be very frustrating to use their forms to try and explain when they’ve screwed something up.
Oh, that’s part of their IMDb Pro service, which is geared toward agents and PR people. They sign up and get all kinds of useful contact info for other actors and directors and so forth.
IMDb probably doesn’t have the time or manpower to upload pictures of deceased actors - and doing so might even violate someone’s copyright, or something. Anyway, it’s not something we freeloading peons should be concerned with.
The majority of data in the IMDb on U.S. features released 1911-1920, and about 80% of the data on U.S. films released 1890-1903, was submitted by me. I submitted 29,206 lines of data in 2003 alone.
I’ve submitted 30 or 40 trivia items, goofs, or corrections of goofs, and for some reason, only half of them have been accepted. I can’t figure out why they haven’t accepted the others. It’s not just time, most of them have been in for more than a year. It’s like they’re saying they don’t trust you or like you. Very annoying.
I filled out all the Columbo episodes/movies without plot synopses, did a few trivia and corrections for shows/movies I like (e.g. both Antiques Roadshow trivia bits are mine).
Leaper- do I now blame you for having Antique Roadshow on television all the time?
Walloon, I have a collection of silent films (very limited I must admit), which I really enjoy. I can only watch them when I am home alone as Mrs Cicero thinks I am insane for watching such things. sigh
Sometimes virtue is its own reward. I mentioned that actress Renee Clama. Well, I not only notified the IMDB, I also sent an e-mail to the owner of a site specialising in British Movies. I received a nice response from him:
Dear Cicero,
Thank you very much for the information. That’s a really fascinating site. I had no idea she married Maurice Ostrer. Even the Encyclopedia of British Film doesn’t have that or a date of death for her.
