Vulture Article Reveals Pay-For-Review Scheme By PR Firm On Rotten Tomatoes Reviews
Daisy Ridley, in 2018’s Ophelia
Image Source: Wallpapers Den
Film review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes has been one of the foremost websites for film reviews for the past 25 years, with moviegoers and film studios both taking the site’s rating system, the so-called “Tomatometer” as an important indicator of the quality of films, both old and new ones, so influential that a third of adults have looked at the site before going to the theater and movie studios routinely tout positive scores or “Certified Fresh” Tomatometer ratings from the site when they advertise their films. The site also aggregates audience scores based on private user reviews.
The site is not without its critics, however. Director Martin Scorsese feels that the site reduces the filmmaker to a “content creator” and viewers to an “unadventurous consumer”. Brett Ratner has called it “the destruction of our business.” Some people criticize the system that Rotten Tomatoes uses to calculate scores. Rotten Tomatoes classifies reviews as either positive or negative and divides the number of positive reviews by the total number of reviews. The system makes no distinction between overly enthusiastic or negative reviews, meaning that a movie can be “Certified Fresh” even if the positive reviews are good but unexceptional. The site can fail to adequately address more nuanced and “on the fence” reviews and relies on as few as five reviews to calculate a score.
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According to the culture blog, Vulture, there has also been evidence of “bad actors” on the site, the most notable incident involving the 2018 film, Ophelia, a feminist retelling of Hamlet starring Daisy Ridley (Star Wars), and the movie publicity firm, Bunker 15. The film initially received a 46% rating on the Tomatometer. Due to the addition of further reviews to the site, that number shot up to 62% between 2018 and 2019, resulting in it becoming “Certified Fresh” and acquiring a distributor (IFC) for the film. Allegations arose that Bunker 15, which pays for reviews from small and obscure websites, paid for more positive reviews of the movie on Rotten Tomatoes and lobbied against negative reviews of the film. As one Bunker 15 employee stated in an email to a prospective reviewer:
“It’s [Ophelia] a Sundance film and the feeling is that it’s been treated a bit harshly by some critics (I’m sure sky-high expectations were the culprit) so the teams involved feel like it would benefit from more input from different critics.”
Image Source: Observatoriodo Cinema
When asked about the email, Bunker 15 reassured the reviewer that reviewers are free to write whatever they want, but also suggested that “super nice ones” agree to not publish negative reviews on their websites but to seclude them on smaller and less important websites. One Bunker 15 employee suggested that they knew editors of Rotten Tomatoes who were able to get reviews changed. While Ophelia’s production company, Covert Media, declined to comment on the situation, Bunker 15’s founder, Daniel Harlow, vehemently rejected these allegations:
“We have thousands of writers in our distribution list. A small handful have set up a specific system where filmmakers can sponsor or pay to have them review a film.”
In response to these allegations, Rotten Tomatoes has since delisted several of Bunker 15’s films, including Ophelia, which can no longer be found on its site, and issued warnings to their reviewers:
“We take the integrity of our scores seriously and do not tolerate any attempts to manipulate them. We have a dedicated team who monitors our platforms regularly and thoroughly investigates and resolves any suspicious activity.”
The Bunker 15 incident and other aforementioned critiques notwithstanding, there is no indication that the importance of Rotten Tomatoes to movie studios and moviegoers will diminish anytime soon.
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