Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Decided to review films AND books.

And I've come up with formats for doing each type, quickly, so I don't have to think about what to say first or about being consistant - it will sort-of be built in.

For FILMS.
Title:
Genre(s):
Director:
Actors:

[Brief plot summary, minimal spoilers]

Visuals*: 1-5 stars
Audio**: 1-5 stars
Acting***: 1-5 stars
Direction: 1-5 stars
Screenplay: 1-5 stars

[Brief review, noting particular hightlights/lowlights]
Overall: 1-10 stars [to eliminate need for half stars]

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For BOOKS
Category: [Nonfiction, Fiction]
Subcategories: [e.g. For NONF: Geology; For FICT: Drama, Romance, Victorian]

[Brief description, minimal spoilers]

Reading level: [Easy, Medium, Challenging]****
Writing quality: Poor, Average, Above Average, Excellent*****
Content: Poor, Average, Above Average, Excellent
Tilt: A subjective statement about the book as a whole.

[Meta-comments: Explain the tilt, basically. What did I like or dislike most? And so on; most of the subjective 'review' goes here.]

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Footnotes:
*Includes cinematography, costuming, CG, animation - anything visual.
**Likewise includes soundtrack, sound quality, sound effects, foley work.
***Overall acting. Individual performances can be notes in meta-comments.
****Based on an adult who reads fairly often. Pre-teens and PhDs in English will likely find the scale needs to be shifted, but should hold relative to itself.
*****Includes command of language, style, clarity, effectiveness, charisma.

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OK, enough of the preliminary stuff. Let's knock out some reviews, eh?