How the Celluloid Score Works: Our Five-Source Rating System, Explained
The Celluloid Score blends five independent rating sources — critic reviews, audience ratings, Metascore, Letterboxd, and IMDb — into one 0–100 number. Here's exactly how it's calculated.
The Celluloid Score is a single 0–100 rating that averages five independent sources, so no one outlet — and no one bad take — can distort the picture. Here’s exactly what goes into it and why we built it this way.
What is the Celluloid Score?
The Celluloid Score is our composite critic-and-audience rating, calculated by averaging five normalized sources into one number from 0 to 100. A higher number means broader agreement that a film is worth your time — across both professional critics and everyday viewers.
What five sources go into it?
Each source is converted to the same 0–100 scale before averaging:
- Critic Score — the aggregated percentage of positive professional reviews.
- Audience Score — the aggregated percentage of positive viewer ratings.
- Metascore — a weighted critic average, already on a 0–100 scale.
- Letterboxd rating — the community’s average out of five stars, multiplied by 20.
- IMDb rating — the user average out of ten, multiplied by 10.
How is it calculated? A worked example
Take a film with a 90% Critic Score, 85% Audience Score, an 88 Metascore, 4.2 on Letterboxd, and 8.1 on IMDb. Normalize the last two — 4.2 × 20 = 84, and 8.1 × 10 = 81 — then average all five: (90 + 85 + 88 + 84 + 81) ÷ 5 = 85.6, which rounds to an 86% Celluloid Score.
Why average five sources instead of one?
Because any single score can mislead. Critics and audiences frequently disagree; a review-bombed film can crater one metric while the others hold steady. Averaging five independent measurements smooths out those outliers and rewards films that genuinely win over multiple constituencies. When the sources diverge sharply, we flag that gap on the movie’s page — often the most revealing signal of all.
What counts as a good Celluloid Score?
- 90 and above — a Celluloid Pick, our highest tier.
- 60–89 — Recommended by most critics and audiences.
- Below 60 — reception was largely negative.
One important rule: unreleased films never carry a Celluloid Score. A movie has to actually screen for critics and audiences before it earns a rating — so anything you see marked “Coming Soon” has no score until it opens.
Read more on our How We Compare page, or start exploring with our Editor’s Picks.