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Rotten Tomatoes Scores Don't Correlate To Box Office Success or Woes, Research Shows (polygon.com)

Posted by msmash on from the what's-really-happening dept.

Depending on who you ask, Rotten Tomatoes is the reason some movies don't perform at the box office. From a report: Countless movie executives, including producers, have told Deadline and the New York Times that the number atop a movie's page on Rotten Tomatoes signifying whether the majority of critics enjoyed or disliked a movie rules the box office. Director Brett Ratner was quoted as saying "I think it's the destruction of our business" while others have called for its demise. According to research conducted by Yves Bergquist, director of the Data & Analytics Project at USC's Entertainment Technology Center, that's not correct. Bergquist collected data from 150 movies this year that made more than $1 million at the box office. Using those Box Office Mojo numbers and comparing them to the critic and audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, Bergquist then "looked at [the] correlation between scores and financial performance" to determine if there was a linear line that could be drawn between low scores and bad box office performance. Or, more simply, did a lower "rotten" rating on Rotten Tomatoes equate to box office woes? The short answer is no, it didn't. Bergquist's findings confirmed that of the 150 movies surveyed, there was only a 12 percent correlation between a movie receiving a bad score and not performing well at the box office. Summer films saw even less of a correlation, with seven percent of lower-scored movies not performing at the box office.

5 of 106 comments (clear)

  1. Of course it doesn't. by king+neckbeard · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Critical success doesn't equal commercial success, but if your movie fails commercially, blaming rotten tomatoes makes for a convenient scapegoat.

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    1. Re:Of course it doesn't. by AmiMoJo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Also, user scores don't correlate to success either. At best only people who could be bothered will actually give an opinion, and then their motivation for rating the movie is often unrelated to its quality (e.g. they dislike the cast or the director).

      The standard advice applies. Find a critic who seems to like the same stuff as you, and follow them.

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      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  2. Are they measauring the same way? by TimothyHollins · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Perhaps the difference is found in what Ratner considers a success and what Bergquist considers a success?
    If you need a $2 billion revenue to consider a movie successful, then it probably correlates quite well to the Rotten Tomatoes score.

  3. Correlation does not equal causation. by Kenja · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Perhaps the Rotten Tomatoes score is low, because the movie is bad, and that's why your box office sales are poor.

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    "Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
  4. The public's ratings are cool by ToasterTester · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The professional reviews are usually way off base loving or hating a film. I go by the public's reviews for a better idea if movie is worth my money. Even then you have to factor in the fanboy effect that will sway the numbers for the first day or even first weekend. Fanboy's are worse than the critics they like anything by . For fanboys its a competition more than if it's good or not like whole Marvel vs DC crowd the Star War fans versus the masses.

    I say ignore the professional critics check the reviews of the masses, but factor in if they have a fanboy following.