House rules
This is Pip. He works here.
Everyone’s a critic. Not everyone has manners.
Movie Manners is a film diary for people who love movies enough to argue about them. The name is a promise about how we do that. Seven rules, none of them hard.
Spoilers go behind bars.
Like this. It doesn’t matter that the film is fifty years old — someone here is seeing it tonight for the first time.
Go after the film, not the person.
Say a movie is terrible; that’s what we’re here for. The member who loved it isn’t the enemy.
Respect the craft.
A few hundred people spent years on the thing you’re rating in four seconds. Hate it if you want — but say why.
A 1★ takes as much thought as a 5★.
Drive-by ratings are popcorn on the floor.
Loving things is allowed.
You don’t score points here for being hard to impress. Nobody is too cool for a musical.
Changing your mind is allowed too.
That’s what a diary is for.
First take sets the tone.
An empty lobby becomes whatever the first person writes in it.
Manners cost nothing. Popcorn’s extra.