The promise and peril of movie ratings

Writing movie reviews is simple. Translating their nuances and subtleties into a one-dimensional star rating is where things get tricky

By Ty Burr

Globe Staff / January 4, 2004

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"The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars but in ourselves." -- "Julius Caesar" (Act 1, Scene 2) Pace Cassius, sometimes the fault seems very much in the stars. I speak of the movie critics' bane: the star rating that sits atop each film review in this newspaper and that functions as a neon-green directional signal diverting the reader ... (Full Article: 1331 Words)