Wikipedia talk:Notability (movies)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Wikipedia:Notability (movies) guideline proposal

• Steven, I see a few minor things in the proposed guideline as it is. In note (1) "A prize usually confirms that a movie is notable,…", wouldn't it be better to say an 'award' instead of prize? In the "See also" section, did you intend to change the section title to "Related pages"? In that section (See also or Related pages) did you want to add the Help:Notability you worked on? One feature is that it has a complete list of Notability guidelines, both ours and enwiki's. Once this movie guideline is up and running, it needs to be updated to show this guideline instead of the enwiki guideline for films. Regarding the "Question for review:" I'd suggest for the time being, no exceptions. Then consider exceptions, as they might be needed. It might actually be some time before a situation comes up that an exemption might rectify. Lastly, if you do not hear from Auntof6 on this, I'd ping her to see if she has anything to add. This is one of her areas. Thanks. User:Rus793 (talk) 17:19, 21 July 2015 (UTC)

  Thanks for your input, Rus. If I don't hear from Aunt in a couple of days, I'll surely ping her.

  • Prize/award: good question. Based on US/Academy Award usage, I'd go for "award". Based on Cannes usage, "prize." Maybe I'll include both. I'll wait to hear from others on this first.
  • Will change section header, and add "Help:Notability", as soon as I finish this response.
  • I'm inclined to go for no exceptions for the moment myself. But let's see what others say. StevenJ81 (talk) 18:33, 21 July 2015 (UTC)

• There could be a problem with the first entry in the Resources section. The The Internet Movie Database, or commonly IMDb, is not considered a reliable source either here or at enwiki. The way it is written here could be mistaken for recommending it. Some readers may not read both sentences completely and could mistake the fact it is mentioned as a resource for a recommendation. Mining a source, which is what you are referring to, is not something the average editor knows how to do. Perhaps there's an idea for another project; a help file based on en:Wikipedia:How to mine a source. Anyway, there is a note worth mentioning in Wikipedia:Guide to layout#Other_websites. It says "Sites that fail to meet criteria for reliable sources yet still contain information about the subject of the article from knowledgeable sources can be linked here." Links to the IMDb are often used in the 'Other websites' sections of movie articles as it does often contain valuable information. So if you take IMDb out of Resources but still want to discuss it, that might be a place to mention how it can be used in Other websites. There are a number of books including encyclopedia of films in the title at Google Books. A search there often finds a lot of sources on movies. For example, the New York Times movie reviews are bound into several references with previews. See The New York Times Film Reviews 1999-2000 (there are other year collections) and The New York Times Guide to the Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made. Thanks User:Rus793 (talk) 02:22, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

I take your point on that, Rus. IMDb was included at exactly this point in the enwiki guideline I was simplifying, so I didn't move it. Let me take a shot on clarifying IMDb's usability here first, and we'll see where that goes. StevenJ81 (talk) 13:10, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

Semi-arbitrary break for editing purposes

• With music and books there can be some inherited notability - a book or recording by a notable artist should meet the criteria. So should there be a similar guideline for directors for example?--Peterdownunder (talk) 10:00, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

I would say not. A director might direct a flop that isn't notable. @Peterdownunder: I wasn't aware that a book or recording by a notable writer or artist is necessarily notable. Is that written somewhere? I know I have deleted and redirected articles about albums by notable artists, because the article didn't show or even claim notability. However, I don't claim to know all the notability rules inside and out, so I'm willing to be educated. --Auntof6 (talk) 04:09, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Here is the quote from the music guideline: "In general, if the musician or ensemble is notable, then their officially released albums may also have enough notability to have individual articles on Wikipedia". It also notes that very few individual songs would be notable. My thought would probably be that if a notable movie director produced a flop, then that in itself would be notable.--Peterdownunder (talk) 23:34, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

• With the guidelines for notability in music, I tried to get it into a type of checklist to make it easier to make a decision. That would be good to do for movies as well.--Peterdownunder (talk) 10:00, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Notability (music) (for convenience). Yes, that would be a good way to approach it. I like there are several sections for various types. In movies that could be Feature films (or movies, films is the usual term though), Documentaries, Indie movies, shorts, etc. User:Rus793 (talk) 13:21, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

A couple of responses to the above, if I can:

1. In principle, I don't have a problem saying that a movie by a notable director is notable. (With music, of course, that is true, but the opposite is not: a notable recording does not automatically make a notable artist.) Do see below, though.
2. In terms of checklist, this would require a major rewrite and a major discussion, as that's not really the approach here. Most of this guideline focuses on what sources constitute reliable sources for movies to prove notability. There aren't nearly as many objective criteria for movies as there are for musical recordings. (The only ones specified, in fact, are Oscars and Cannes Prizes, plus one for small countries.) I'm not sure what kind of checklist to build. And, frankly, I'm not really a movie person. I'd far sooner have someone else take a whack at that if you really want to go there.
3. One of the critical pieces of this guideline is how to handle pre-release movies, and I don't think any of the above affects that. I don't think a future movie project even of a notable director can be presumed notable on that ground until it starts production, for reasons stated in the guideline.

1. I've tried to minimize the use of "film" in favor of "movie", because I think "film" is mostly an academic/art-film-junkie term. It doesn't mean it shouldn't be used sometimes, but I've consciously tried to favor the term "movie" when possible.

Thanks for further responses to this. StevenJ81 (talk) 13:52, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

It is our practice to use "movie" because it's simpler and not ambiguous. The only place we wouldn't use it is when "film" is in the name of something, such as the Sundance Film Festival. --Auntof6 (talk) 04:09, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

• Some comments from me:
  • I think general info not related to movies doesn't need to be included here, such as:
    • The list hear the top of "other rules that can affect an article"
    • Reliable sources section: isn't this information already on some other page we can link to? We don't need to duplicate it here.
  • Some simplifying is still needed, including changing "film" to "movie" in some more places. Let me know if you'd like me to do some.
  • I think we should say "show notability", not "prove" it.

--Auntof6 (talk) 04:09, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

@Auntof6, thank you. Didn't quite realize how many times I failed to change "film" to "movie." Fixed, I think. Also, while I said "prove" notability above in the discussion, that only appeared once in the guideline, and I changed that to "show" notability.

• I'd keep the general list at top. It exists in the enwiki version and on our own music notability page, and most others like them.
• I take your point on the reliable sources section. The real main issues on sources where movies are concerned are significant coverage and independent coverage. I think we could trim the reliability part down along the following lines:

How's that?

I think we're getting there. However, instead of independent wouldn't it be better to write independent of the source? Then, "a routine listing" might be better termed "showtimes". That's a common term in US newspapers. Cinema listings is, I believe, common the UK. Perhaps you could rework in one or both. For example, "Routine movie showtimes (cinema listings) in the same newspaper cannot be used to help show notability." Thanks. User:Rus793 (talk) 14:16, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

I'd also appreciate your view on the question I posed in the yellow box at the bottom of the page. StevenJ81 (talk) 13:12, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

All: Is there someone who wants to try to boil this down to a list as @Peterdownunder suggested? Otherwise, I'd like to get this out, and we can worry about moving to a list format later. StevenJ81 (talk) 13:12, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Get it out, changes can always be made.--Peterdownunder (talk) 23:34, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Yellow box: I agree we should probably not list exceptions. It might be better to treat this on a case-by-case basis and in talk pages. If the same "exception" keeps coming up in the future, then listing it here might be a good idea. As to turning this into a list format, let me take a closer look. I'll get back to you here. Thanks User:Rus793 (talk) 14:31, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

I looked it over and some sections just don't lend themselves to a checklist layout. I wish they did. Perhaps with some changes down the road they will. User:Rus793 (talk) 03:31, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Thanks to all for your contributions. Based on the above, I will try to make final changes, then publish by COB today (US Eastern time). StevenJ81 (talk) 11:52, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not change it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No more changes should be made to this discussion.