The Movie Fight Presents: Championship Bouts!

Hey everybody.

Today, I’d like to introduce a new game that I’m going to try out over the next few weeks. To go along with our normal voting, and the upcoming tournaments that are coming down the pipeline, I’d like to start a new side project that, for now, I will call “Bouts!”

Generally on the site, we have fights between movies that last one round. The movies go up, you vote on them for 6 days, and then the results are tabulated.

OK, so after discussing this further, I’ve decided to change this to more of a SURVIVOR SERIES Type thing. Each actor gets 10 performances in. They battle in 10 rounds. When a performance loses it has been eliminated. When the first 10 fights are over, Those movies that are still alive fight again until all of one actor’s movies have been eliminated, thus being crowned the winner!!

Kinda crazy, but I think you’ll get it when you see it in action. Point is, I need your votes more than ever! So stop by and vote!

NEW! Movie Fight: New Release game!

Hey everyone,

So, I’ve been trying to come up with a cool and fun way we can discuss the new releases for the weekend or what is in theaters now. I’ve decided to just shoot from the hip and try a few things…. If they don’t work out, so be it; I’ll try something else. If they do, great!

So… Here’s how the game is going to work…

On an average weekend, there are usually 3 main new releases that you can consider seeing. So, each weekend, starting with Friday, we’ll throw up a post for each movie…

In this post will be a listing of the movies that I want you to rank in order of preference. If you haven’t seen em, thats fine, just make your best guess and go from there. There may be lists based on directors, or stars, or keywords… you can rank any of them. I’ll try to lead the way for a little while, but I’d really love for everyone to participate. After a few days, I’ll tabulate the votes and these rankings will go live.

My hope is that this will create a little more participation for the site. Commenting is super easy, just drop in your rankings and go on your merry way.

Maybe it’s a little hard to explain here, but hopefully it will be clear when you see it for yourself…

Also, if you’d like, just let me know what you think of this idea. If you have a great way to make it better or more interesting, I’d love to hear it. I’ll try to start it this afternoon…

About The Movie Fight: MF#

I just want to take a moment to discuss one of the finer points of The Movie Fight, The Movie Fight Number, or MF#. I figure it would be useful for us to be on the same page as to what this number is, how it effects the rankings, and then maybe get some feedback from you the voters!

You may see this number on all of the different rankings. In each ranking, the movies have their win-loss record, the vote differential for all of the fights this movie has been in, and lastly the MF#. This mythical MF#, is a primary factor in deciding where every movie is ranked. I guess the best place to begin is to reveal the equation that creates this number:

MF# = IMDB User Rating + (Wins – Loss) + (.1*Vote Differential)

So, what this equation takes into account is the current IMDB rating (out of 10), then it adds or subtracts based upon the movie’s records, then it weighs the number slightly to take into account lopsided wins and losses. Here’s my thought process behind this methodology. I felt that the rankings needed to be weighted by something instead of everything going in equal. It didn’t make much sense for every film to be unranked going in when there is plenty of data that can get us started on the right direction. So, I am taking the ratings from a website that I respect, IMDB. Then, as wins and losses occur, this effects the rankings fairly, but significantly. Lastly, I felt that close wins and large wins should effect the movie’s rankings differently, so I added a weight for that vote differential.

I think that fairly explains the number and how it is generated. Its fairly straight forward, but if you have any questions or concerns, I’d really love to take any criticisms and improvements that we can generate.

Now, there is another interesting point that needs to be brought to life. You may be scanning through the rankings and see a MF# for a movie out of order! This can happen from time to time. Yes, the rankings are primarily based upon the MF#, but there is a more important aspect that must be followed more primarily.

In my opinion, if Movie A has defeated Movie B, Movie A should from that day forward be ranked higher than Movie B. Case closed. However, it is completely within the realm of possiblities that Movie B has a higher MF# than Movie A. It’s my opinion that Movie A’s victory overrules the MF#. So, on occasion, you may see a MF# out of order. That is due to a direct contest between those movies that is not allowing the lower MF# to fall any lower in the rankings.

As of this post, You can see one example of this in The Comedy Rankings. Notice how UHF at #9 has a MF# of 8.4, while Anchorman at #10 has a MF# of 9.4. Why is UHF ranked higher? Well, this is because these two movies have fought in the past, and UHF won that fight. So, no matter what UHF’s and Anchorman’s MF# may be, UHF can never be ranked lower. (You may be saying “WHAT?! UHF Beat Anchorman and there is nothing I can do about it?” Well, no, there is something you can do. Drop a comment in any comedy related post or send me a message that says that you would like to see a rematch between UHF and Anchorman, and your wish will likely be granted).

So, that being said, I hope I’ve explained the rankings well enough. I bet I haven’t, but my hopes are this will spark plenty of debate. If you don’t care for it, let me know. I’ll take your advice and consider the consequences. In the meantime, enjoy the polls and I look forward to hearing from you.

The 100th Post! Our Next Big Project! A Decade Old….

The Movie Fight’s Wonderful 100th Post! Yay!

Ok, so I have to do something special for this and I believe I shall start our next big project! The Best Picture Tournament is coming to a close soon and we need something to preoccupy our minds, don’t we? So, I am proposing a new tournament; Tournament Like It’s 1999! That’s right we are going to decide the rankings for the 100 most popular movies of 1999, a decade ago this year.

100 movies, you say!? Yes, I do say that! We have significantly more time to work on this, so I have a giant idea on how to conduct this fight… So as to keep us from having the best movies from have byes all the way to some third or fourth round, I think I will create a round robin style for the early rounds. A “Group Stage” if you will. First, later today, I will throw the current rankings up for the 1999 movies. Then, hopefully soon there after, I will be able to show you the group tables and the brackets. Then, hopefully soon after that, I hope to give you the first fights of the tournament.

This is a large undertaking, but I think it will be fun and I think everyone will enjoy it. At worst, it’s worth a shot! I hope everyone enjoys and I can’t wait for your votes to be heard!

The Movie Fight Mission Statement; Part 2

http://themoviefight.wordpress.com/2008/12/09/mission-statementmission-statement/

 Alright.  It’s been a few days that I’ve allowed the above post to digest in your stomachs and I thought now would be a great time to check back in and discuss my next topic: Participation. 

The Movie Fight is intended to work on many levels for many different people.  It’s the perfect movie discussion site for those who want to be involved to those casual viewers who just want to stop by from time to time. 

Let’s start with the “casual visitor.”  Imagine you’re wandering around the internet, having a grand old time and you stumble upon a site where you can vote on some polls.  Happens to me all the time.  But what you don’t do on other sites that you would be doing here on The Movie Fight is making a difference!  Every vote cast counts.  At the end of 5 days, the fight becomes inactive, the poll is taken away and the results are posted.  When those results are posted, the movie changes positions on the rankings listing, just like in Boxing or in College Football.  Just like in those leagues, margin of victory is taken into account, so every vote actually does matter.  Even if you only show up every once in a while, make a few votes then leave, you are still a valued member of The Movie Fight community. 

Then there’s the “participant.”  The loyal and true.  You are the people that make The Movie Fight exciting for me.  For me, a participant is someone who makes it a point to visit the site often, make votes, checks the rankings and hates when they miss a fight.  These are the people who rely on these fights to determine if a movie they haven’t seen is worth watching.  This site is for you and I’m glad you are around.  I’m sure some of you are considering participating even more… maybe dropping a few comments around the board? 

That brings me to the last group; “contributors.”  This group, as of this writing is essentially empty.  At our old site, I had a few readers who always made a point of writing a comment about the movies they felt most passionately about and that is a culture that I would like to foster.  Swaying other people’s votes is what this site should be all about.  Don’t be bashful about attempting to get your movie to win.  There’s no shame there.  Get in there, drop a comment when you see something you don’t like.  Let your voice be heard. 

Furthermore, those rankings are just asking to be disputed.  I’m sure there are blatent errors and glaring omissions all over the place, but no one is pointing them out so they stay in like sore thumbs.  It’s your job as much as mine to make sure that the movies you want in the list are in the list in the right place. 

Here’s the key: the more you participate, the more you make The Movie Fight your own.  Start easy.  I understand if you don’t want to vote because you have only seen one of the movies.  I understand if you don’t want to be the first person to post, but just remember, every time you participate, you are creating a site that is catered to your preferences. 

So, point is, thanks everyone for your participation, but I am always looking for more… 

Thanks

T

The Movie Fight’s Mission Statement

Hey Everybody,

As an update to what I wrote in “About” and “Rules,” I’d like to discuss the philosophy of The Movie Fight. I am attempting to create a scientific, mathematically sound method for generating lists and rankings that we can trust and abide by. For too long, the answer has simply come from the mind of whomever is in charge of the rankings and no one gets to participate. That’s all been established, but I wanted to discuss two of the finer points of what we, together, are trying to do and then I’ll listen to your feedback.

1. Face to face competition: I have always found that it difficult to compare and contrast a whole list of movies without breaking it down to a 1 on 1 basis. If we have 30 Diane Keaton movies we want to rank, arbitrarily picking movies and putting them in order isn’t good enough. For each movie you add to the list, I feel that you must compare it to each of the others to define where it fits best. That’s why we aren’t asking questions like “among these four, which is the best action movie?”

Furthermore the issue with that concept is how to rank everything below first with a question like that. For example… If you had a list of three movies and asked which was the best, movie A could get 40%, movie B- 35%, movie C- 25%. Logic might convince you to say that Movie A is #1, Movie B is #2, and C is #3. That just doesn’t seem right to me for two reasons. One, what if all 25% who voted for movie C like B more than A; then in a AvB fight, A would get 40% still, but B would receive 60%. Worse still, what if all 40% who voted for A consider C to be the second best movie. Then in a BvC fight, C would win 65%-35%. I see no way to get out of this situation and I like it that way. You get to compare 1 movie vs another and thats how it stands.

more to come….

The Rules of the Game

Hey everybody. It’s my pleasure to introduce you to or welcome you back to the movie fight. Here’s how the game works. On this site, you can find the various lists of movies that we have ranked for you. The point of the site though is that these rankings are likely not correct. It’s your job to participate and decide which fights you would like to see and which movie you would like to win each fight. There are two key ways to participate:

1. VOTE: Every day there will be new fights for you to check out, vote on, and argue with others about. Come back and do so often. It’s your job to make sure that the movie you love the most reach the top of the list. We ask that you only vote once per fight. Nothing is stopping you from trying to influence others though. Get on there, comment and influence away. Each fight will stay live for 3-5 days, at the end of which, the results will be made and the changes to the rankings will be made. Point is, check back often so that you don’t miss a thing!

2. CHALLENGE: Take a close look at the rankings. See anything that you don’t like? Is there something that is missing or out of place? Get in touch with us and we will put your fight’s challenge to the top of the list. Let us know all of the fights you want to see and we’ll try to get them live as soon as possible and even drop you a little credit. Furthermore, if you see a list that you would like that we haven’t created yet, let us know that too. We’ll create a pre-ranking version of the list and throw up a fight at the first availability. Have fun with it! We love all of your suggestions!

And that’s it. Soon we will have decided what our best and worst movies are and it will all be decided by you!

Happy Fighting!

Hello world!

Hello everyone and welcome to The Movie Fight.  If you want a refresher on the past of The Movie Fight, check out The Old Movie Fight.  If you are an old favorite judge, get ready for the fun to commence again.  If you are new, I’ll be posting the rules once again soon.

For now, enjoy and lets get excited about doing some Fighting.