How much about a movie do you need to know before . . .

Cafe Society
1

. . . you decide to see it?

I’ve been thinking about this ever since the discussions over certain recent political and/or religious movies (which shall remain nameless.) :wink: During these discussions, many people said words to the effect that “you can’t judge the movie if you haven’t seen it.” During these discussions, I always thought to myself “but I judge movies before I see them all the time, it’s how I decide if I’m going to spend my time and money on it.”
So my question is, what do want to know about a movie before you decide to go to it. What makes you decide if your going to see it opening night? on video/DVD? on free tv? Are there any things that ensure your that you’ll skip it?
For me, there are a few:

  1. R rated movies aren’t verbotten, but it has to be very well recommended to get over my initial reaction that I don’t want all the violence & language.
  2. screwball comedies have 2 strikes against them in theaters, but I’ll rent them if I hear they are good.
  3. “Intellectual” or “Important” or “Oscar-Worthy” movies, I generally wait until video. I want to be able to pause, rewind and think.
  4. Well-reviewed (by my friends) special effects based movies (i.e. Spider-man 2) are usually the only things that gets me to a noisy, uncomfortable movie screen. I’d usually wait to get them on video/dvd.
  5. I used to go to any Kenneth Branaugh (Sp?) movie, but that stopped with Wild Wild West.

How about you? And please, refrain from a rehash of old arguments about the aforementioned certain recent political and/or religious movies.

2

You’re conflating two different meanings of “judge.”

I’ll judge whether to go see a movie based on any reason whatsoever, rational or irrational. As you say, it’s my money and/or time and of no business to anyone else.

But there is no value to my spouting off to others on a movie I haven’t seen based on secord- or third-hand reports. I’m not adding anything of value to the conversation. In fact, I’m lowering the IQ of the crowd by acting so stupidly.

Two entirely different things.

3

If I’m considering (but not completely committed) to seeing/avoiding a movie, a trip to Rotten Tomatoes is usually enough for me to cement a decision. Between the review excerpts and the tomatometer, I get enough of a feel for the movie’s overall worthiness to decide either to avoid the movie or to make an effort to see it.

4

I hardly go out to see any movies at all, so the only ones I’m going to go see are part of a franchise that I know I like. So, I’ll go see movies in any of a group of series–James Bond, Star Wars, Star Trek, Harry Potter, etc., and I don’t have to know anything about them except that they’re part of the franchise.