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Language parameter

Could we remove the links to non-English languages? By the same logic that somebody is unlikely to be unfamiliar with the English language, WP:OVERLINK suggests not linking to common languages like French, German or Spanish. Maybe one to Setswana or Manx would be of interest, but short of that, I don't think these links add anything. What do others think? --John (talk) 04:51, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Any thoughts on this? I'd try to be bold and update it myself, but I don't really understand the code and I don't want to break it. --John (talk) 18:44, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

To which links do you refer? In any infobox I've seen English hasn't been wikilinked. If that is what you mean then I agree, they shouldn't be wikilinked. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 18:49, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

On articles about films in non-English languages, there is an automatic link to "<TYPE> language" and an added category "<TYPE>-language films". For example, at Pan's Labyrinth, in the infobox, it only says "Spanish", but there is code that automatically does linking and categorizing. I'm not sure whether or not we should remove the automatic-linking code or just add more exceptions that are "obvious", like French, Spanish, German, etc. I'm leaning toward removing the code (but not the code for categorizing). Erik (talk | contribs) 18:52, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, that would be my preference. Keep the categories but lose the linking. --John (talk) 19:23, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

• Agree with Erik and John, keep the categories but lose the linking.--TriiipleThreat (talk) 14:06, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

I agree as well. We should loose the linking. Which languages are we going to drop the linking? Start with List of languages by total number of speakers and List of languages by total number of speakers above 50 million? BOVINEBOY2008 14:30, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

I think the goal is to drop all linking. The reason that "English" is not linked is because the code has an exception not to link to it. Do you prefer to add exceptions for specific languages? I'm not sure if these lists help us choose... I imagine that most Anglophiles will "get" when a language is German, but they may not be familiar with Bengali (even if it is far more used in a global sense). Erik (talk | contribs) 14:41, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

So its a matter of a page-by-page decision to link languages? I know if you link the language in the infobox, the coding does not allow for the category. If we were to allow manual linking, then we would need to adjust the coding (which is most likely doable, just not by me). BOVINEBOY2008 15:12, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I think we can get rid of the automatic linking, if film is in an obscure language like The Passion of the Christ, the links can be added manually.--TriiipleThreat (talk) 15:32, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Bovine means that if we remove the linking code, and someone manually adds a link to the language, then the categorizing code would not kick in. It's a good point. We have that problem with films with more than one key language; the categories have to be added manually. Erik (talk | contribs) 15:36, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

• Remove: Remove linking and keep categories. —Mike Allen 14:58, 8 July 2011 (UTC)
• Questions...
  Is the field for the predominate language or for the major languages used in non-minor ways? If it is the latter additional parameters are needed.
  And, for a list of "common" languages, would we want an expandable list? I can see how the code can be changed to do this, but it would be goo to have a base list that can be expanded.
  - J Greb (talk) 15:33, 8 July 2011 (UTC)
• Keep both Leave the English-language delinked, as this is the English-language WP, but I don't think it's right to remove the other linking to other langugaes. WP:BIAS, or something like that. Lugnuts (talk) 19:58, 10 July 2011 (UTC)
  • With respect to the essay, the MOS for linking (WP:OVERLINK mentioned above) specifically includes "major geographic features and locations, religions, languages, and common professions" (emphasis added). It does have the caveat about including the links if it is particularly relevant to the topic. IMO the language of the film isn't that relevant to the films which only leaves the non-major languages appropriate to link to. - J Greb (talk) 20:30, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

I've changed the coding at "Language" to use a switch. This will allow for later revisits under WP:OVERLINK. In doing a spot check though I ran across a two issues:

1. Some of the articles have the language link entered as part of the parameter entry. This doesn't break the coding, but it is redundant with how the template works.
2. At least 1 instance of multiple languages. Again, this break the template, but it points to the possibility of needing additional language fields.

- J Greb (talk) 21:04, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Image border

I propose adding a |border= parameter to the infobox, that if filled in with yes would produce a 1px grey border around the image. This is useful for instances where the image and the background will blend together. {{Infobox album}} uses this to positive effect (see examples The Beatles and Everything Sucks), and it could be useful in film articles such as Doctor Dolittle and Multiplicity.

The code to be added to the |image= line would be {{#ifeq:{{{Border|}}}|yes|border}}, making the full line as follows:

| image        = {{#if:{{{image|}}}|[[File:{{{image}}}
 |{{px|{{{image_size|{{{image size|}}}}
 }}|frameless}}|alt={{{alt|}}}{{#ifeq:{{{Border|}}}|yes|border}}]]}}

Thoughts? If there are no objections within a few days I'll put up an edit request. --IllaZilla (talk) 21:41, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Any chance of adding it to the sandbox so we can see how it would look? Betty Logan (talk) 22:31, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, I didn't realise the first two were examples. I think that looks ok, it provides a contrast without being taht noticeable. Betty Logan (talk) 22:33, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Support I don't see a problem with this. —Mike Allen 22:35, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Support It looks good. Thanks for the suggestion. I think it'll help with the poster for that long film that shows at most drive-ins from October thru April entitled Closed for the Season :-) MarnetteD | Talk 23:08, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Keeping in mind my comment above I'd go with:

| image        = {{#if:{{{image|}}}|[[File:{{{image}}}
 |{{#if:{{{image_size|}}}|
   {{#iferror:{{#expr:{{{image_size|}}}}}|
     {{#iferror:{{#expr:{{str left|{{{image_size|}}}|3}}}}|
       220px|
       {{#ifexpr:250>={{#expr:{{str left|{{{image_size|}}}|3}}}}|
         {{#ifexpr:220<={{#expr:{{str left|{{{image_size|}}}|3}}}}|
           {{#expr:{{str left|{{{image_size|}}}|3}}}}px|
           220px
         }}|
         250px
       }}
     }}|
     {{#ifexpr:250>={{#expr:{{{image_size|}}}}}|
       {{#ifexpr:220<={{#expr:{{{image_size|}}}}}|
         {{{image_size|}}}px|
         220px
       }}|
       250px
     }}
   }}|
   220px
 }}|alt={{{alt|}}}{{#if:{{{border|}}}|{{!}}border}}]]
}}

Reasons being that:

• Currently "frameless" is being ignored. {{Px}} does not seem to acknowledge the 3rd parameter.
• The image_size parameter gets constrained to a maximum, currnetly not stated within the docs, and the minimum the docs specify.
• {{!}} is needed with the border paramater in either format and this allows for any indication to place the boarder.

I've got this set up in a sandbox for the code here and the output here. The code has both the #ifeq:{{{border|}}} and #if:{{{border|}}} options.

- J Greb (talk) 02:23, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

I know next to nothing about code (I just copied from {{Infobox album}} and plugged the part I though was necessary into this box's coding, but I didn't sandbox test it or anything...I'm really no good at the technical stuff) so I defer to you entirely on how to make it work. I just think it'd be a helpful feature. --IllaZilla (talk) 07:42, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Y Done. I did a random look through an it seems to be holding and so is the border field. Please LMK if it breaks on any of the pages. - J Greb (talk) 20:37, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

I tested the border on Dr. Doolittle & Multiplicity, seems to work fine. Thanks! --IllaZilla (talk) 20:39, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Starring field

I think the template guidelines for the starring field should say to list the starring roles as reflected in the credits on the poster (usually at the bottom). If no poster with credits can be found, find a source which says the film stars such and such. If no reliable source can be found, leave it blank. This is especially important when the film is in production and no poster has been released. Editors just guess who the starring roles are based on who has the "biggest name". —Mike Allen 03:13, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

I agree with this. We need some kind of limit to starring or else we end up with lists like this that just list every actor in the film. BOVINEBOY2008 03:19, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Yikes and with the cast list right next to it too. Limiting a cast list to a poster does have some drawbacks. Names on the poster often reflect Hollywood power games and agent negotiations that can be unrelated to a persons actual importance to a film. Some posters will have a long list of names on them (though I can't think of one at the moment) thus, using it won't cut down on a bloated cast section. Then there are posters like this one It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World that has no names on it at all. I just think that we might suggest starting with the poster but still allow for flexibility in names entered in the starring section. Now I am always in favor of reducing infobox bloat and I like the solution that we came up with for the film Love Actually. Sadly this probably isn't practical for all articles. MarnetteD | Talk 03:43, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Actually I could see that approach practical, given an article has a cast list. I like it. —Mike Allen 04:56, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Relevant discussion here. Erik (talk | contribs) 11:38, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

The main component to remember is it is the starring field, this is what people seem to forget. There's a reason there are stars and co-stars, best actor and best supporting actor and so forth. The starring field, if there is no billing especially, maybe a discussion should be started on it in each relevant article but it should be clear who is starring in many films. Even with Love Actually, there will be those who are prominent and have a major role in the film and those who provide support. Like Batman (1989 film), Keaton and Nicholson are billed and I could agree with Kim Basinger and the guy who played Alfred. But Jack Palance? He's in it for all of 10 minutes, he's supporting Nicholsons character. And if you want a bad list, go look at Transformers (film series).

A little off-topic, but it may be worth having guidelines on how to use the infobox for a film series or to even create a different kind of infobox. At Harry Potter (film series), I included only the overarching details, and it seems agreeable to others. Erik (talk | contribs) 13:58, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

The whole infobox needs more guidelines, this is the 3rd or 4th discussion about what is and isn't appropriate to put into infobox fields because not enough clarification is provided. We've got starring, based on, and executive producers going at the moment.EDIT: and budget. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 14:03, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

I know what you're saying, but this is a problem of success. If there were no guidelines, just the template, we'd have more or less the same infoboxes. That's Wikipedia. Personally, I'd like to see fewer fields that ask for judgement calls (those go in the article) and more factoids. We could accomplish that by making it our convention that we accept an identifiable authority for each field. For example, the screenwriter credit can go as listed in the screen credits, the starring roles go by the names listed on the official poster. The inaccuracies can be handled in the article. So the effort would not be metaphysical accuracy, but a quick guide that's useful because it's uncomplicated and you know what you're getting. That is Wikipedia, too. --Ring Cinema (talk) 15:33, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

This thread seems to have wandered a bit. Tonight I came across an example of why we might want flexibility in the "use the poster" guideline. The poster for Bedazzled (1967 film) has Raquel Welch's name on it. For anyone who has seen (and I hope enjoyed) this film you will know that she is onscreen for roughly 10 minutes and is not a star of the film. Her name is on the poster in the hopes of capitalizing on her skyrocket like popularity of that time period. The producers of the film hoped to get customers in the door who had no idea who Cook, Moore and Bron were. IMO having her name in the starring section is a mistake but, as Darkwarriorblake points out, we seem to start these discussions and never come to a conclusion. Thus, any input to settle on things would be appreciated. MarnetteD | Talk 00:22, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

I wonder how IMDb determines who is 'starring' (see below 'Writers'). I don't think there is any way for a user to edit it. —Mike Allen 00:48, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

The posters with production credits are fine. The posters with marketing credits are unreliable. Raquel Welch's cameo in Bedazzled was big and that's reflected in her billing. 'Starring' doesn't refer solely to the size of the role and this is a good example of that. Today, she might have done that appearance uncredited (cf. Tom Cruise in Tropic Thunder) but she didn't so there's not a problem listing her. --Ring Cinema (talk) 01:02, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure that I've ever seen a poster with "marketing credits" so I can't speak to the difference in the two. My point is that her listing on the poster and in the credits is only for marketing purposes. The bigness was only an attempt to get bums in seats not to reflect her importance to the films story. In terms of plot she is not anymore important than any of the other actors who play the seven sins. MikeAllen I popped my DVD in the old machine and IMDb's credits are in the closing credits order. On the other hand, in the opening credits it goes PC, DM, EB, Stanley Donen then the title Bedazzled and then RW. Next is everyone else though in a slightly different order than the closing credits. If everyone is happy with marketing being more important than who was actually starring in the film that is fine. We should add that statement to our MoS for filminfoboxes. MarnetteD | Talk 01:25, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

"Marketing credits" = the names of the "big stars" in big bold print across the top of the poster or above the title, usually in an order reflecting the amount of money their agent demanded to get top billing (which is often why the names don't correlate directly to the actors above/below them). "Production credits" = the smaller-type credits at the bottom of the poster that give a full listing of the film's "stars" as well as studio, director, and other crew-type credits. A good example of this is the poster for Cowboys & Aliens: The marketing credits are in big bold type above the title as "Daniel Craig, Harrison Ford, Olivia Wilde" (even though the actual image is, left to right, Wilde, Craig, then Ford...the names don't always line up with the image because the names appear in "top billing" order), while the "production credits" are in smaller type at the bottom of the poster and give the names of all the major actors in the film including Sam Rockwell, Adam Beach, Paul Dano, & Noah Ringer. --IllaZilla (talk) 01:51, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Marnette, you might have overlooked Welch's scene about midway where she serves breakfast to Dudley Moore's character. She had more to do than the other Sins, but it's not really relevant anyway. The production credits -- which match the screen credits by and large -- are reliable for our purposes. If the poster we saw is not a production credit, it should be ignored. Screen credits trump marketing credits and editors don't have to make judgments about whose role is bigger, which may or may not be relevant to its importance and which can be measured in many different ways. The production credits or the screen credits settle the issue. --Ring Cinema (talk) 04:15, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. If one were to go by marketing credits alone then one might thing that Sylvester Stallone was the only star of Judge Dredd, or that Arnold Schwarzenegger was the only star of The Terminator, when a look at the production credits (and of course common sense, if you've seen the films) tells us that there were other quite notable actors in leading roles in these films. --IllaZilla (talk) 05:30, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

English language

Please change |english = English language[[Category:English-language films]] to |english = English[[Category:English-language films]]

The extra "language" is not needed as it is the title of the parameter. BOVINEBOY2008 00:00, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Yeah I was wondering why this was changed? —Mike Allen 00:35, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Typo on my part, sorry. And now fixed. - J Greb (talk) 01:43, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

"Distributor" field

User:Typhoon966 has been blitzing through these fields again; I don't blame him really, because we give very little guidance on the usage of this field, and some films can have many different distributors, so I think we should offer a bit more guidance on which distributors to include. If the film only had one distributor then obviously that's a no-brainer. A big Hollywood studio might distribute domestically but sell its overseas distribution rights to another studio, meaning there are two distributors; in such cases, I think it's ok to include both distributors.

The real problem is when there are many distributors, and deciding which are the notable ones to include. I was thinking that when the number of distributors exceed two, we only list a distributor if they distributed the film in a majority of the territories. If there is no dominant distributor we shouldn't bother listing one. Anyone else with any suggestions, or agree that the guideline should be more specific? Betty Logan (talk) 12:05, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

It seems every field on this infobox needs guidelines. There are many ways we can go here. For instance, on a A Good Old Fashioned Orgy, the theatrical distributor and thus the first distributor is Samuel Goldwn Pictures. But Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions also has US distribution rights, but for all other media apart from the cinema. I also think there needs to be consideration if there is an international distributor or a single distributor who supplies the majority of the international market, considering how large the international market is becoming in many films including some of the biggest films of all time. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 12:13, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Generally we only include distributors for the most notable release i.e. first theatrical run, or home video distributor when the film is straight to video. I still more or less agree with that principle, since we have to draw the line somewhere. Betty Logan (talk) 12:22, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Agree with this. The convention should be exactly the same as for release dates, and that's how it seems to always have been done in the best developed articles. Smetanahue (talk) 12:37, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Yes! I sent him/her a message saying we only go by the home country (or countries) distributor. He kept adding "international" and I said that should go in the prose. I was going to say "Per the Template:infobox film guidelines", but .. there are no guidelines. —Mike Allen 22:16, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

We could drop the field. It's trivia. --Ring Cinema (talk) 05:34, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Yes the company that purchases a film and makes it possible for us to watch it, is trivia. Most sites that lists a film, like Variety, New York Times, ComingSoon.net, Allrovi, list the distributor. So no it's not "trivia" it's basic information. —Mike Allen 06:22, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

The distributor is about as important as the film processor (also essential to seeing the film) and we don't list them in the infobox. --Ring Cinema (talk) 15:42, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

I think there is a middle ground; I also think the unwritten rule of listing the "home country" is somewhat arbitrary. For instance, a non-notable company could distribute a film in its home country, whereas a major distributor could pick it up and distribute it internationally. If we use this field it should be to present notable distribution information. At the moment this home country rule (which seems to have evolved out of a need to set an arbitrary limit) can lead to excluding a prominent international distributor, so I don't think it's necessarily a good one to have. We need to have some criteria for addressing the importance of a distributor. I mean, does anyone actually agree that this guideline needs better specification? Betty Logan (talk) 13:53, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

The home-country convention comes out of the need to present an unbiased perspective. What do you mean a "prominent international distributor" should be? The US distributor? UK? German? Chinese? In the past we used to include all "major" English-speaking territories in addition to the production country, but even that bloated the infobox and created some strange situations, especially for English-language African films. But it makes sense that the distributor field is a continuation of the release date field, both are basic release info. Smetanahue (talk) 14:21, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Connecting it to the release date is good common sense. Perhaps it could be more explicit. --Ring Cinema (talk) 15:38, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

I find that criteria somewhat arbitrary. I mean, if you limit it to home countries and release dates then we technically shouldn't list Fox in the Titanic article, even though it distibuted it to more markets than Paramount and took more rentals than Paramount. If you want to explicitly tie the distributor to the release date, then maybe we could just combine the fields i.e. Released: {{{date}}} by {{{distributor}}}. Betty Logan (talk) 17:33, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it is arbitrary. I'm not clear on who wants the info on distributors and to what use it is put. --Ring Cinema (talk) 17:59, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Maybe we should overhaul the release parameters in tandem (release date and distributor). Sometimes I see two or three dates in the release date section, and I wonder what is the point? At most we only really need a year to identify the age of the film, and yet we can end up with several dates separated by mere days. Perhaps what we should do is just have the first general release date (regardless of where in the world the film premieres, since the important thing is that the film has gone on general release) and include the distributor that goes with that date. Festival dates and other release dates and distributors can all be covered in the prose if they're that important. Betty Logan (talk) 18:22, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Usually I go with the distributor that is listed on the poster. —Mike Allen 22:29, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Which poster would you look at for Titanic then? Paramount's poster or Fox's poster? Betty Logan (talk) 22:37, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

I would go by a case by case basics as not all movies are like Titanic with different posters from different companies being released. I wouldn't go by the poster at all for it. Actually I would put a [[#Release|see release]] in the distributor field. —Mike Allen 22:52, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Fox is not even mentioned distributing it internationally (that I can see). So I don't know what to suggest. I figure something like that should be in prose. —Mike Allen 22:54, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't know the details about Titanic's distribution, but if it was distributed by Fox internationally, I assume, although I might be wrong, that means a lot of national subsidiaries and close collaborators of Fox, rather than one company operating globally. It's also a special case of an international blockbuster, made explicitly for international markets, and, as I think I have said here before, while those movies might be prominent at the box office, there really aren't that many of them when all movies are counted, so it would be a bad idea to base any general conventions on such films. Smetanahue (talk) 15:55, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

What should I do about this undersized box art?

Hi! I'm mildly concern about the image used in Anti-Semitism in the 21st Century: The Resurgence. The original is 158px wide, but this template blows it up to (I believe) 200px, which makes it look horrible. Any way to fix this, I wonder? Bobnorwal (talk) 02:36, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

I added 150 to the image_size parameter, but not sure it did anything. —Mike Allen 03:11, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

Right now the 'box is set up to have a range from 220 to 250 as "valid" sizes. Anything below or missing is brought up to 220. Anything above is brought down to 250.

The limiter can be altered to allow keyed sizes between 220 and, say, 150 with an empty "image_size" still defaulting to 220.

- J Greb (talk) 04:14, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

Hmm... so what you're saying is I'll probably need to find a large version of this, right? Trouble is, I have no idea about the ins and outs of images here on Wikipedia... Bobnorwal (talk) 14:55, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

"Gross Revenue"

Please change the word "Gross Revenue" to "Worldwide Box Office" The difference is huge. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.31.159.101 (talk) 03:18, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

The IP has a point! We are detailing box office as opposed to Home Video/TV, so "revenue" is misleading for editors/readers who don't read up on the infobox guidelines. Box office gross would be more appropriate. Betty Logan (talk) 03:35, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Good point. What about just "Box office"? It seems understandable still. Erik (talk | contribs) 11:46, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

That would actually be better thinking about it, because theater rentals were often reported for older films so gross isn't available in every case. Betty Logan (talk) 12:06, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

• Should we put in a request to change this to Box Office then? It seems that the three editors who contributed to the discussion all agree the current wording isn't great. If no-one objects I will put up an edit request tomorrow. Betty Logan (talk) 11:53, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

I was sure I replied to this, must've been something similar. Either way I support a change to Box officeDarkwarriorblake (talk) 12:03, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

I agree with "Box office". —Mike Allen 12:06, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Please change
| label19 = Gross revenue
to
| label19 = Box office
Betty Logan (talk) 01:11, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Done Dabomb87 (talk) 02:30, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

Woah

Woah. I strongly disagree with this change, because:

• The IP is right. "Gross revenue" and "box office" have completely different meanings. So taking a parameter that's filled in for tens of thousands of articles, and changing its meaning, is... well, it's really just a dumb move; no offense intended.
• Betty said, "We are detailing box office as opposed to Home Video/TV..." We are? Why? Since when? Says who? The "Infobox Guidelines™"? Where are these guidelines, exactly? Because the "guidelines" on this infobox's own page say "worldwide gross revenue accrued by the film", not "box office revenue", and the manual of style says home media revenues should be covered, so I'm not entirely sure where the "box office only" idea comes from.
• "'revenue' is misleading" - How so?! It would help to explain exactly how it's misleading. We've been using the term for more than four years, I would think someone would have complained before now if it was so damaging.

I personally see no basis for this radical change of a longstanding, widely-accepted and highly visible infobox parameter, especially since so little thought seemingly went into it (everyone in the "discussion" just piled onto Betty's comments with no consideration of the downside). I seriously think we need to reconsider and revert this change, and maybe think a little more before taking and running with a somewhat thoughtless comment from an IP. Swarm ^{u | t} 19:50, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm coming in quite late so my apologies if I'm getting this wrong, but my understanding was that box office could be counted more accurately than gross revenue, therefore it was a better metric. --Ring Cinema (talk) 20:12, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

I assume your comment refers to a past discussion; might you be able to point me in its direction? Swarm ^{u | t} 22:31, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

I advocated the IP's suggestion because I thought that is what we use the field for. All the articles I have seen use it to detail the box office only. I've never come across DVD rentals/sales etc in there. However if there are articles that do document these figures using this field then I agree the amendment should be reversed. Betty Logan (talk) 00:54, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

"Gross revenue" has typically meant "box office" because we don't usually see the actual figures for home video release. They are not as easily available as box office figures. Additionally, because we don't typically use anything other than box office figures in the infobox, if there is an instance where we are including home video sales then it would need to be noted in the infobox so as not to confuse readers who may be used to seeing just box office figures. Thus, I'm ok with changing the term to simply "Box office" (I don't think we need "Worldwide" because that should at least be implied that we're not going to limit the figures to just one country).  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 01:00, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

DVD sale info is partially available from The Numbers and it can occasionally be found in news articles. Straight up box office info is going to be the most cited obviously, but I seriously doubt that there aren't articles that do include home media sales as part of "gross revenue". Swarm ^{u | t} 03:36, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

It's partially available, and not available for movies after a certain decade (namely this current one). Thus, that leaves a crap ton of movies with no easily attainable home video sales records. I never said there were NO articles that use home video sales, I said that they would be few and far between. I also said that if they were using it, then they needed to be noted in the infobox as to that fact that it is not a typical inclusion in articles. Thus, changing it to "box office" is better because easily the vast majority (I would wager all but a handful when compared to how many articles we have) don't use any home video sales in the infobox. Thus, it would be better suited to have that information in the body of the article as opposed to the infobox which generally includes theatrical information over anything else (e.g., we use the theatrical run time, not director's cuts or unrated versions that you see on DVDs).  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 03:41, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

(←) Your argument implies that "gross revenue" is incorrect if nothing but box office earnings are posted. That's a false assumption. "Gross revenue" is a broad term that allows us to be flexible, while "box office" is a restrictive term that doesn't allow us to include home media revenues when they are available. Second, we do commonly include both theatrical and extended running times, and I would disagree that this infobox is, in practice, "theater focused". Swarm ^{u | t} 07:39, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

I said it was inaccurate, not incorrect. If the average reader is assuming that what they are looking at is box office information, because the information isn't identified as including home video sales, then it's an inaccurate term. Yes, "gross revenue" means we can include such things, but since we typically don't, it's inaccurate to use that term when readers don't assume that they are looking at figures that include such details. As for the "extended release" times. No, we don't. The only times we are actually including those figures are in the special cases where the "extended release" was released in the theaters (e.g., Star Wars, Alien, etc.). Any other time, it's usually removed. Plot sections are also written from the perspective of the theatrical release, and any releases that contain extension or director's cuts are usually covered from a different perspective in another section of the article. I'm not sure what film pages you're working on where this is different, but I can assure you it is not the normal practice. Additionally, "Distributor" is typically those that distribute theatrical--whether domestic or foreign theaters--and not those that have the rights to distribute home video releases. So, yes, I would say that the infobox has typically been gears toward theatrical information.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 12:03, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

You say it's inaccurate, BigNole, but I'm also reading 'misleading'. If I understand you, you believe readers think that 'Gross Revenue' means 'Box Office Revenue'. In addition, you are saying that sometimes it says one but the number is the other, which is truly misleading. You may have a point but I also think readers realize what the words say. (2) There might be a compromise to the two positions here which would involve a two step. Step one, we include both Gross Revenue and Box Office instead of choosing. That will allow the BO number to propagate without losing the editing that's already been done. Then, step two, after a decent interval (six months?), we revisit the issue and remove the one that we don't want to keep. --Ring Cinema (talk) 15:45, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

I think Bignole is more or less right. The field is primarily used for the box office figure, and I've never seen them used for anything else. Gross revenue does imply all incomes, but that really isn't the case on most of the articles. If the field is used only to document the box office on say 90% of articles, then I think it's best to keep it simple and call it "box office". If we go with gross revenue then for most articles we are going to have to clarify that the figure is only box office, because we are implying something which isn't technically correct. It would be easier to clarify the cases where the figures are sales/broadcast income if there are any. If we actively decide to add DVD sales data to the infobox it may be best just to have a separate parameter, since "gross revenue" implies the total income from many avenue streams which may be difficult to track down: box office/home video/downloads/pay-per-view/broadcast rights. There are grey areas too, like should income from the soundtrack and other merchandise be included? "Gross revenue" is too imprecise, I think we should label the revenue accurately, and as yet only the box office is widespread on the articles. However, the change did go forward without much consideration being give to the outcome, so I am happy for it to be reverted so this can be discussed more thoroughly. Betty Logan (talk) 18:39, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Merging infoboxes

So a while ago, there was some consensus that we should be merging several Infobox templates with this template, including {{Infobox television film}}, {{Infobox Chinese film}}, {{Infobox Japanese film}}, {{Infobox Korean film}} and {{Infobox Hollywood cartoon}}. My goal is to work on this in the next couple days, but I have some concerns.

1. {{Infobox television film}} is currently used for both television films and miniseries. My question is, do we split this use, having the television films use this template while converting the miniseries to {{Infobox television}}? If so, what constitutes a television film? What is the difference between a two- or three-part film and a two or three episode miniseries?
2. The main differences between the various language infoboxes seem to be the main language component. Would we like to add this as a parameter to the main infobox, namely a |original name= that would allow the original language title to be displayed in the infobox? If this were the case, we should have some guidelines on what exactly should be included.
3. There are two other parameters that are used in the various language infoboxes. The Japanese infobox uses |artdirector= and the Korean infobox uses |admissions=. Should those parameters be merged?
4. It seems that there is a major difference between this and {{Infobox Hollywood cartoon}}. Should this be merged here? And a slightly related question, should these be classified as short films, in terms of categories and language used in the articles?

Responses would be extremely helpful! Thanks! BOVINEBOY2008 22:57, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Observations:

• |original name= or |original language name= would be a good thing to have, merge or no merge. |original language= or assuming |Laguage= would be this would also helps a bit.
• It maybe best to leave telefilm alone until a consensus on breaking apart the films and minis is reached. That would still leave at least one parameter to port over though.

Questions...

• Would we be putting the original language title under the English title or below the poster?
• Would we be accounting for no English title?
• It looks like |admissions= is a "bodies in seats" metric notable within Korean cinema. Would the be an issue with linking it to only show with |original language=Korean being present?
• Is there a definition as to what an |artdirector= is in Japanese cinema?
• Is there a similar job/credit in the cinema of other countries that would be reasonable to include?

- J Greb (talk) 23:30, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Art director and admissions can both be removed IMO. Lugnuts (talk) 07:11, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Admissions and revenues are just about different conventions. It's the same in several European countries, you seldomly find numbers for how much the movie has earned in domestic mainstream media, only admissions. But revenues work better for Wikipedia: the info is still on Box Office Mojo and worldwide admissions are often difficult to find. So yeah, drop the admissions field. Drop them all by the way, original title has been discussed before and there was no consensus for it (though it is often included via the original poster). Smetanahue (talk) 10:07, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

I think we should leave the TV and Cartoon boxes for the time being, and just focus on the foreign language boxes for now, since discussions have a habit of becoming diffuse on this page; it's better to stay focused on one thing at a time. I'm wondering if it wouldn't be better to replace all these foreign language boxes with a single "foreign language" box which can focus on the needs of foreign language films without undertaking huge changes to main box. Once we get that right then we only have one box to integrate into the main infobox. Betty Logan (talk) 10:31, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

My instinct for original titles is to pull them into the lede sentence. Wikipedia:WikiProject Video games suggest using {{Nihongo}} when titles are original in Japanese (see Super Mario 64), and we have similar templates for {{Korean}} and {{zh}} for Korean and Chinese titles, respectively. Most other languages use this formatting as well, using something like {{lang-fr}}. The admission parameter seems highly unnecessary when used in conjunction to |gross=, so I could easily see dropping that. BOVINEBOY2008 12:05, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

FWIW, I've cobbled something together here with examples here keeping the current formatings. Thoughts?

- J Greb (talk) 00:28, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

These look like exactly what I was imagining, but I am beginning to be wary of these parameters. I'm afraid that every film that editors will begin to fill in every single language variation of the title, which is not what we want. I think it would be better if we dropped the original title parameter and pull it into the lede sentence and section, which is where alternative titles are traditionally held. This also allows us to explain the meaning of the title if it differs and the exact circumstances of the change in title (theatrical title, festival title, literal translation, etc.) BOVINEBOY2008 20:49, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

The easy way would be to "bury" them and use the existing templates as a pass through. For example, only indicate |context= (which seems very, very silly to me) and the core Korean language fields on the Korean film 'box, the template then parse them an passes it along to the main 'box for display. Users of the main 'box though won't see those fields listed.

- J Greb (talk) 21:41, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Can you sandbox an example? I am not sure I'm following what you describe. BOVINEBOY2008 00:36, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Production Designer

I was quite surprised to see that the title of Production Designer is not there in the template. Is there any particular reason for this? I'm no expert on filmmaking but I guess the production designer plays a very vital role in film production. In most films when they roll out opening or closing credits, they mention the production designer either soon after or before the editor (see this). Hoping for good suggestions. — Finemann (talk) 22:23, 19 August 2011 (UTC)

I've had the same thought. It must be the very next field that would have to be added. --Ring Cinema (talk) 01:13, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

Personally I'd put it on par with editor and cinematographer, so logically if we include those two we should include this; that said I'm not convinced editor/cinematographer should be in there, since I think the vast majority of readers probably wouldn't care about those things. They would most likely be interested in who stars, who directed and wrote it, possibly who produced it and composed the score. It's so tough these days getting things added or removed from the infobox, that is probably the real reason we have this inconsistency. Betty Logan (talk) 01:34, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

Yeah and the fact that any decisions made, someone comes in months later and strongly disagrees with it and that it should be reversed. Anyway, I bet half of production designers does not even have a Wikipedia article. —Mike Allen 02:57, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

My own impression is that we've as a whole been wary about adding yet another credit to the infobox, lest it gets longer. When a new field gets added, some editors get devoted to filling them out. (Some days I wish we didn't have the "studio" field that can result in every production company being mentioned.) As for credits, there's also the costume designer, the art director, not to mention sound and visual effects people. I like the approach that W.E (film) took with its "Production credits" section. I would not mind seeing some kind of crew-member table going in a reasonably sized "Production" section; the editor and the cinematographer could be in that table instead of the infobox. Otherwise, we're just going to mention such crew members in comprehensive Featured Articles or relatively meaty ones about films where the members win awards. My one concern with that kind of table is that there won't be many blue links. I added mention of a costume designer at one film article, and even though she was involved in blockbuster films and got recognized for her work, she has no Wikipedia article. Kind of wish it was a standard approach to do filmography articles for crew members, bypassing stubby or nonexistent biographical articles. Erik (talk | contribs) 03:22, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

I concur with Erik's assessment that we want to avoid (A) making the template any longer, and (B) trying to list every credit in there. When I worked on Alien (film) (the film article I've put the most work into) I mentioned all of the relevant production staff within sections on the production. --IllaZilla (talk) 18:57, 21 August 2011 (UTC)

Do you think there could be a list approach for articles that are not comprehensive and will not detail each crew member's contributions? Only a percent of film articles will ever be comprehensive, but it could be useful in terms of navigation to at least identify the key crew members. It seems like we have a periodic discussion about including so-and-so crew member in the infobox, and a table in the article body could go a long way toward naming names. We can determine by consensus what the criteria should be (such as crew members who get nominated or if we should consistently list sound effects people). Erik (talk | contribs) 20:44, 21 August 2011 (UTC)

Tried out the W.E (film) approach at Contagion (film). Any takers? Erik (talk | contribs) 23:45, 21 August 2011 (UTC)

I think it looks OK as a temporary thing, but the goal should be to incorporate these names into prose as the article becomes more comprehensive. The goal should always be eyeballing towards FA, although some accommodation for less-developed articles is alright. --IllaZilla (talk) 01:08, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

Production Designer is very important, but not on a par with Cinematographer. If one has to choose between Editor and PD, I think we have decided correctly, although it's worth considering. It is said that a film is created three times: when it's written, when it's shot, and when it's edited. Now, is PD less important than Distributor? I think there is a case to be made that PD is more significant because of their impact on the film's artistic value. For an index on that, consider that Hitchcock went straight from PD to Director, so it was understood at least in that English studio that a PD was an important leader. --Ring Cinema (talk) 05:20, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

Studios and distributors

I think we should clarify the guidelines for filling the "studio" and "distributor" field. I keep seeing a lot of edits in which the "studio" field explodes with every single production company involved, and I think that this poor approach gets away from the goal of making the infobox a concise overview of the film. I've also seen instances where a major studio is plopped into only the "distributor" field even if it is the primary one producing the film. (Of course, the "studio" field will only list all six of the production companies that helped that major studio.) There will also be instances where there are minor production companies that produce a film and a major studio steps in as a distributor to release the film in theaters. Any thoughts on how to explain this kind of clarification? Like does a major studio that produces and distributes a film need to be repeated twice in each field? Erik (talk | contribs) 12:16, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, I think a company should be repeated if they both produced and distributed a film. An alternative could be a special parameter only to be used in such cases. The best way to determine what studios to include is imo to look at the producers, who are credited either as producer or co-producer. The studio(s) which are represented by those credited as producers should go into the infobox, the others not. Smetanahue (talk) 15:10, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

I brought this up because of edits at Contagion (film) such as this. Warner Bros. is the primary studio and will distribute the film as well (at least in the United States). I'm not sure about having the redundancy nor a new parameter. Is it not realistic to see Warner Bros. as the studio and come to the conclusion that it was responsible for the film's production and distribution? It seems to me that the "Distributor" field was intended for cases where a distributor picks up a film with preexisting production backing for release in theaters. For example, a film can be produced independently by a small production company, and a company like Fox Searchlight acquires it for distribution. Erik (talk | contribs) 15:37, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

After a quick look at Contagion's website it seems like Warner only are the distributor. They might have put in some of the budget as well, but the most active roles were held by other companies. But generally speaking you have a point. I think the term "studio", in the meaning production company, comes from the concept of a dominating "studio system", which is sort of irrelevant in contemporary cinema? Smetanahue (talk) 16:38, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

I reviewed the case of Contagion, and Warner Bros. picked up the project as seen here. So I suppose it is financing and distribution? Assuming that's the case, is it still helpful to identify in the infobox the various production companies involved? They tend to be red links, and to me as a reader, it is not valuable information as part of the infobox's overview of the film. Contagion has a major studio label attached, which is more relevant to me. Beyond that seems to be indiscriminate entities, not "I'm glad I learned that" kind of information for the infobox. Erik (talk | contribs) 18:22, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

I definitely find it useful. It's true that the usefulness varies depending on familiarity with the company, but that could be said about the other parameters as well, including director and starring actors. I mean, if a film has a second-unit director who is more famous than the main director, it's still the main director who should be listed. Smetanahue (talk) 18:45, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

There are different arguments for each parameter. I'm saying that the "studio" and "distributor" fields ought to be used wisely because the production companies are more indiscriminate than discriminate. Listing one production company and one distributor makes sense in its brevity, but the trend is to plug in all the production companies without regard for that brevity. There is a similar struggle with the "starring" field, where some editors push to list a dozen names. There's a point where listing so many elements leads to the infobox no longer having information-at-a-glance but becoming a tediously long table. Keeping it brief does not preclude mentioning such companies in the article body. I think that the companies' commonly red links go a long way toward reflecting a general disinterest in them and in highlighting them in the infobox. Erik (talk | contribs) 18:58, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

I agree about the need for brevity, but not that the selection should be based on how famous a company is. Whether they have a Wikipedia article or not is arbitrary; in certain film industries practically zero companies have articles, while elsewhere some really obscure companies have. It's more consistent to use the same method as for deciding which producers, directors, cinematographers, etc to include, ie going by the credits. Smetanahue (talk) 19:14, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Maybe a good start would be dropping financiers. Films these days often have many financiers but usually only one company still actually makes the film. Take the recent Bond films for example, they were "produced" by Danjaq, MGM and Eon Productions, but it was Eon that actually made the film. Similar situation with Titanic, produced by Fox, Paramount and Lightstorm but physically made by Lightstorm. Clearly the company that makes the film is integral to the production, a financier or copyright-holder not so much. It's a common scenario. I think a financier can be limited to the prose, but the most prominent production company is the company that physically makes the film. Film credits usually distinguish between financiers and "makers" as "[Financier] presents a [production company] production". If we are looking to streamline that field then the logical way to go about it would be to limit it to the company that actually makes the film. Betty Logan (talk) 19:16, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure if it is easy to identify the one company that makes the film. The so-called "presents" line often identifies multiple companies. For example, in this poster, we see "Warner Bros. Pictures presents in association with Participant Media and Imagenation Abu Dhabi a Double Feature Films/Gregory Jacobs production." Would we identify Double Feature Films as the studio? What about Gregory Jacobs (who is an executive producer)? That's what I mean about being indiscriminately inclusive leading to the infobox no longer having information-at-a-glance. There's a distinct difference between compelled recognition in promotional materials (and the film's opening) and useful recognition in Wikipedia articles. I feel like the attempt to include all the companies leans toward compelled recognition, as in the promotional materials are compelled to identify the companies involved, and thus Wikipedia's articles must too. I'm looking for a way to keep the infobox uncongested. I don't think that most people can really make a distinction between which company does what, and so they go the compelled-recognition route and list all the companies, leading to congestion, especially with some blockbusters having a half dozen companies involved in today's world of cinema. If we figure out a way to keep it simple, then the infobox can be kept straightforward. Erik (talk | contribs) 19:31, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Gregory Jacobs is not an executive producer. You can find all info here from page 29. The producers are Michael Shambers and Stacey Sher from Double Feature Films, and Gregory Jacobs who seems to have been brought in as a freelancer, thereby the / between the company and his name. Participant Media are, as financiers, only represented by executive producers. Warner and Imagenation Abu Dhabi lack production credits entirely. I would include only Double Feature Films in the studio field. Smetanahue (talk) 22:40, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

My mistake; he is a producer. I glanced at the poster image too quickly. :) Even so, who the heck is Double Feature Films? A Google News Search, as the film is due to be released soon, does not show any coverage discussing its role in producing it. In contrast, Contagion is frequently referred to as a Warner Bros. film. I just don't see the point in giving such a behind-the-scenes entity a highlight in the infobox. We should not share the same compulsion as the promotional materials, which identify such entities for contractual reasons. We should identify them for encyclopedic reasons. Erik (talk | contribs) 22:53, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

It is a Warner Bros film since they're releasing it, and they'll still be included in the distributor field. I had never heard of Double Feature Films, but I had never heard of the writer Scott Z. Burns either. So I can't see why that would matter. If anything it means that they really need the credit. Smetanahue (talk) 23:02, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

I agree about including Warner Bros. as the distributor. Regarding Double Feature, I'm talking about identifying companies, not people, so the strawman screenwriter does not matter here. There's still not an answer for why a company like Double Feature Films is so important to mention in the infobox. Its resume is here. The films are very mainstream, yet the company has no real coverage. Arguing that "they really need the credit" is the opposite of how Wikipedia functions; we follow, we don't lead. It is something that can be mentioned in the article body, I have no problem with that, but I'm not seeing a reason to elevate it into the infobox also. Anyway, I'm going to cram it and let other editors weigh in with how these two fields should be completed. Erik (talk | contribs) 23:31, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

The main production companies and distributor are almost always listed on the theatrical poster -- even if they are hard to distinguish which one is the 'studio' or 'distributor'. But I've always gone by the poster. —Mike Allen 00:23, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

I mean that if they really need the credit, it's extra unfair to rob them of it when it is legitimately theirs. Smetanahue (talk) 21:34, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Preceded By / Followed By

The preceded by and followed by sections of many (if not all) film infoboxes are not showing up in the articles, even if they have been filled out. This problem needs to be fixed. Alphius (talk) 02:01, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

They're not showing up because the parameter was removed after a discussion about both the problems associated with those two parameters when dealing with a film franchise consisting of different "series" within an overall series, as well as the bigger issue of the infobox becoming too large. It was decided (several months ago) that the parameters, though helpful for quick navigation, are unnecessary for the infobox and easier to remove than any other parameter. So, if you're seeing those parameters, please remove them. I don't believe we ever went through, whether us or a BOT, to remove them from articles. We probably should have though.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 02:45, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

I've been trying to remember to remove them when I see them doing other stuff but I've left several in place (as a sort of mental placeholder for myself) if the sequels/prequels weren't covered in the article text, yet. Since I poke at articles for so many movies I'm actually not familiar with, it seemed better to leave a potential (if invisible) reminder for the moment. Millahnna (talk) 03:21, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

Added Category:Film articles using infobox succession as a maintenance cat to the infobox. It should generate the require list for clean up. - J Greb (talk) 17:02, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

Well aren't you handy. :D Millahnna (talk) 19:23, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

Sometimes... but now we need a way of dealing with the ~5200 articles that are in the category at the moment... - J Greb (talk) 19:26, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

First things, first - these 600,000 articles need their hidden category cleaned up... Lugnuts (talk) 19:33, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

I don't think we should clean them up. --Ring Cinema (talk) 21:18, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

I know you think the parameters are going to come back here soon, but the reality is that leaving them is actually creating more confusion. People don't know why they aren't showing up and new editors are seeing them and assuming they're supposed to be there. They need to be removed from those articles.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 22:07, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

No, I don't think the parameters are likely to reappear, and I am sympathetic to what you're saying. However, that material is a great deal of editorial work that shouldn't simply be trashed. I think we can show a little more respect for it and find a way to reincorporate it. There's probably a smart way to do that too. It's not incorrect or illegal or anything. --Ring Cinema (talk) 22:58, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

It should only require scanning the article for mention of the next film (or previous film) in the series and placing one there if not already. That is, if it's appropriate to have one there in the first place. I came across a Three Stooges film that was in no way connected to the film before or after it, because those films were all stand alone films and the infobox was merely linking to the next stand alone film. In that case, a link in the articles themselves wouldn't be prudent because they aren't connected.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 23:02, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm not saying the work can't be repeated but that's kind of obvious so maybe I don't understand you. What is it that only requires scanning the article? If you're saying that readers can figure out which film is next or previous if they only do some digging, you're making a powerful argument in favor of the parameter's inclusion. The only way the Anti group's argument made sense was by holding that a navbox would be just as good. Are you backing away from that now? --Ring Cinema (talk) 20:32, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Scanning so that we can fix. Millahnna (talk) 20:35, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're even talking about Ring. When I said "it", is that "editorial work" that you were referring to. First, there is no "editorial work" when it comes to adding a name to the infobox. So, there isn't any "trashing" involved to begin with. Secondly, when I said "scan the article" I was saying that editors who go through the list to remove those parameters by hand from each infobox would need to scan the article to make sure that those films are listed somewhere (whether in a navbox or in the lead preferably) so that they are mentioned and people have a way of connecting the films. My statement was actually me providing a compromise to the people that want the links in the infobox to stay, because in reality no such mentioning of the before and after films is necessary for the understanding of the film you're reading about. Thus, I could simply just go through and remove the parameters by hand from each article and not bother to make sure the films are mentioned somewhere else on the page.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 22:24, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Preceded By / Followed By cont'd after break

I don't understand why this was removed. I found the Preceded By/Followed By tags to be extremely helpful. If I wanted to go through the Halloween movie series, all I had to do was start with the first one, read through that, go back to the top, and click on the followed by link and so on. I can't believe that people actually thought its removal was a good idea. Granted, I missed the discussion but then again, it wasn't advertised anywhere else like a deletion tag. I make a motion for the Preceded By/Followed By links to be put back on. In the long run, it will make it easier for the reader, not just because an editor didn't want to let two movies be connected. Jeremyeyork (talk) 14:05, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

First, it was not removed because editors did not want two movies to be connected. FYI one of the many reason it was removed is that the fields were being used for films that weren't connected at all. Next, you can go to the Halloween navbox {{Halloween series}} and find all the info for all of the films in one place rather than having to go through page after page, or back to the top of the page. This is actually easier for the reader. If you need something at the top of the page most lede's have the before and after in and those that don't can certainly have the info added. While I haven't gone through all of the articles for Halloween the first one has this supsection Halloween (1978 film)#Sequels and remake and I think that all of the film articles have this link Halloween (franchise) in them somewhere. In other words there are numerous places in these articles where exactly the same info, and more, than was provided in the infobox exist. Having said all that you are certainly free to ask for the conversation to be reopened. In that case I say that we should Keep those fields out of the infoboxes for the reasons I have already stated as well as keeping infobox bloat to a minimum. MarnetteD | Talk 14:24, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

MarnetteD is right, Jeremyeyork: The use that you describe (navigating from the article you're on to the next film in the series) is perfectly serviced by {{Halloween series}}, which is found at the bottom of every Halloween article. Navboxes serve the purpose of inter-article navigation for a film series much better than the preceded/followed by fields in the infobox ever did. --IllaZilla (talk) 14:45, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Additionally, the original discussion (which you can find here) was actually broadcast in several locations that were pertinent to the discussion. We did not put a notice on every film talk page because that would have been unreasonable and largely unmanagable. Another one of the reasons we took out those categories was because the infobox has become increasingly lengthy. Those two categories tell you the least about a particular film compared to the other categories. Given that there are so many other locations in the article linking to the next film in the series (or films), they were the best option to be removed.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 14:50, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

It seems that Marnette's advice points out the relative lack of utility that we have imposed on the readers. To start with, he is incorrect in asserting that the field was removed because editors linked unrelated films. That has always bee a correctable error and I don't recall that mentioned in the discussion on the subject. Then he offers alternatives for navigation. They are 1. check the navbox for links 2. check the lede for links 3. search the article for links. All three are good examples of the sad reality that removing the field has made the articles less useful and navigation between related articles more difficult. Again, to be clear on this, I supported the change at the time because of the argument that navboxes would be just as useful as the field. Now we see that this was apparently in error. If we don't correct our mistakes, we don't improve the encyclopedia. --Ring Cinema (talk) 01:10, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

I too am strongly in favor of restoring the preceded by and followed by parameters to the infobox, for reasons that I explained in the original discussion linked to in Bignole's post above, and here's a similar link, but to the beginning of the discussion instead of to the straw poll: Template talk:Infobox film/Archive 19#Preceded By/Followed By. It seems that quite a few editors feel this way. — Mudwater ^(Talk) 01:39, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

You are correct in that quite a few editors feel this way. It seems this discussion gets attention by an editor once a month or so. —Mike Allen 01:54, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Ring, I'm confused. How is the article less useful without the infobox links? If the article is about 1 specific film that removing a link to another film doesn't make the article itself "less useful". It might make navigation "more difficult" (that's kind of a stretch, as at worst it makes navigation 2 seconds longer to accomplish), but the article itself isn't less useful. Unless you're trying to say that an article's usefulness hinges on where a particular link is placed within said article. That's the only way it would effect that actual article. The nav boxes are just as useful as the link. If you notice the only people have have voiced dissention are people that have been editing Wikipedia for awhile and remember having the links. I have yet to come across any random reader posting on the talk page: "Hey, you know what would be useful would be if we had links to the next film in the series in the infobox." I mean, when your argument begins with "I read the page and then scroll back up to click the infobox link", you're not really able to argue that its absence is costing you precious time in navigation considering the link to the next film (really the links to all the films) is actually at the bottom of the page where you just were.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 01:51, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

I agree that navigation isn't a legitimate reason for restoring the links, that is what the navigation boxes are for. What goes in the infobox should be there to further understanding of the article, or the film. That said, there was a consensus at the time to remove these parameters, but consensus can change over time, or not embrace a wide enough opinion when it is first formed, so decisions that affect many articles probably should be reviewed at some point. Sufficient time has passed now, maybe it's worth having a formal review period, contact everyone who has been involved in the discussion at some point, broadcast it on the Film project page, and if there is a consensus to restore the links then so be it. This is going to keep bubbling away until editors see that their opinions are being taken into account. Betty Logan (talk) 02:02, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)x 4 or 5 - Please do not misrepresent what I wrote. My advice actually describes quite the opposite of a lack of utility since all three of the items I mentioned are easy to find for someone with even average reading skills and, once again, the navbox has a great deal more info than what was in the infobox. Next, I said incorrect usage was "one of the reasons" (not the only one) for removal. Next, I would have to say it was not an easily solvable problem, in fact the opposite occurred as it encouraged edit wars over different interpretations of what was and was not a sequel. Even if one discussion could get resolved a new editor would come along and start it up all over again. I respect Mudwater's request but it should be noted that the two most recent times that it was brought up (I was digging through the edit history Bignole that is where the edit conflicts came in) before Mudwater's post were by an editor recently joined [1] with no edits to film articles (and who, it should be noted, joined after the fields were deativated) and a SPA IP [2] with no other edits whatsoever. Don't get me wrong their comments are certainly welcome - I just don't think they understand how infobox bloat and incessant edit warring are not improvements to the encyclopedia. I feel that "we" did not make a mistake and as I said above if we need another full discussion I have already state my position to keep those fields out of the infobox. MarnetteD | Talk 02:04, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

I agree and disagree. I don't believe I misrepresented you, because I didn't say it was impossible to follow your advice; I said that we reduced the relative utility by making it more difficult to move between related articles. However, you are correct to point out that the original motive to remove the field resulted from edit wars over defining which films belonged in which series in which order. That is not insignificant. Still, there is apparently something to the point that navboxes are not as good as the field was, at least for some. I'm a little baffled that these editors, hopefully more attuned to the nuances of our readers' interests and needs, stake out almost exclusively defensive positions. That is not a sign of open-mindedness. Thanks for your thoughts. --Ring Cinema (talk) 05:56, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Looking at this from a practical standpoint...if one is interested in reading a film article, then jumping to the previous or following film, the navbox should serve that purpose as they'll already be at the bottom of the article; minimal scrolling required (there's also the wonders of Ctrl-End). If one is uninterested in reading the article, then there's no reason the lead can't be expanded to accommodate a one-sentence linked prequel/sequel statement; problem solved. Alternately if there's a section discussing sequels, the problem is solved that way. I just don't see what having those fields in the infobox adds other than the potential to revisit some lovely edit wars and philosophical differences. If anything the navbox should be more favorable to people as it allows all films in a franchise to be listed rather than only immediately adjacent ones. As I've said before, I'd like to hear an argument as to how having these fields substantially improves the quality of an article, or how not having them substantially detracts from the article. Thus far I have not heard such an argument. Doniago (talk) 19:11, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

It is not friendly to the reader to ask them to search for links. That is the practical reality. I don't see the advantage of leaving the knowledge disorganized when our entire purpose and mission is to organize it. --Ring Cinema (talk) 21:08, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

No one is having to search for anything. By the way most infoboxes are long enough that one had to scroll down to get to the spot where those fields were anyway so the mention in the lead required no onerous finger work in comparison. Until scientific research is done upon a wide variety of readers can we please stop the "what about the children" stuff and keep to our own opinions pro or can. MarnetteD | Talk 21:25, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

What you say is plain and simply false. Someone has to search for something as a matter of fact. Your rationale involves asking the reader to decide which of three possible searches would be most efficient. Should it be the lede, the article, or the navbox if there is one. There are innumerable navigation aids included in Wikipedia for the simple reason that the technology allows it. We could, I suppose, do away with disambiguation pages or alphabetical listing. We could just let the readers search for the article they want, and, by your logic, no one would be searching for anything. No, if that's your best argument, I think we can honestly admit that the infobox field was useful. --Ring Cinema (talk) 21:54, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Then all reading is searching which is probably correct. Your "best argument" is that somehow - and this has yet to be explained or proven by empirical evidence - readers didn't have to "search" for the items in the infobox. My experience show that not to be the case but that is just my experience. I would ask, one more time, that you please quit using "we" when you are speaking only for yourself. Speaking for myself it was no more useful than any of the other places that the info exists and "in my opinion" it was far less useful than a navbox. By the way no one has said anything about removing disambig pages or anything else - except you. MarnetteD | Talk 22:09, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Mine is an argument by reductio ad absurdum. The point is that your argument is just as logical as asking for the elimination of alphabetizing the articles, since, following your logic, alphabetizing is just to spoon feed the readers when they can clearly just look around, do some searching instead as you advocate, and eventually find what they're looking for. So to complete the thought: since it is absurd to think that organizing the articles alphabetically is bad, it is equally absurd to think that other useful methods of organization are bad. The argument is the same and it fails in either case. As we know, alphabetizing is good, and so other useful methods of organization are also good. Our purpose is to make it easy by organizing the information, not make it difficult for them as you seem to argue. I am in favor of organizing the knowledge and that is the mission of Wikipedia. Perhaps you can explain how your disorganizing preference advances the mission of Wikipedia. --Ring Cinema (talk) 22:31, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

You have now descended into sophistry. If you are going to continually claim that I am saying something that I am not then there is no reason to respond further. No evidence has been provided that the having the items in the infobox was inherently more useful then having it anywhere else on the page so, in my opinion, the correct choice was made in removing the fields. MarnetteD | Talk 22:40, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Somehow overlooked in this is the fact that navboxes are usually hidden on the bottom of film pages. So the casual reader probably won't even realize the links can be found there. Even if he does he then has to click to open it before finding the link he wants. How is needing to hit two links more efficient or preferable to simply hitting one at the bottom of the infobox? Gothicfilm (talk) 22:51, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Navboxes are only hidden if they have activated the hide command in their preferences and does not apply to all readers. It also only takes one click when the info is in the lead (which also does not require scrolling) or in a sequels section. One other example - a few years ago the IMDb link was removed from the bottom of the infobox - I completely understand why and agree with why it happened - but I missed the convenience of its being there. It took less then a day to realize that the end page command got me to where I could get to the same link. MarnetteD | Talk 22:57, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

I never set such a preference. The default seems to be to have navboxes collapsed if there's more than one, as there usually is on the bottom of film pages. I just tried unchecking "Enable collapsing of items in the navigation menu in Vector skin" and they're still collapsed. If I didn't know about and can't find how to set this preference, I'm sure the average reader can't either, and is seeing collapsed, hidden navboxes just like I am. Gothicfilm (talk) 23:16, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Fortunately, I am not engaged in any sophistry. Marnette's argument is that organization is unnecessary because the readers can just search for what they're looking for. Again, an encyclopedia's method and purpose is to organize knowledge. Therefore, his argument in this case is in opposition to the mission of Wikipedia. There have been some valid arguments on the Anti side, but his are not in that category. --Ring Cinema (talk) 23:36, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Oh, boy, another deletion for the convenience of editors, against the convenience of the readers. Why am I not surprised? I wish I had been involved when the discussion to remove them took place, I would have !voted and discussed vigorously to keep. Thousands(?) of film articles stripped of them, without resolving the alleged "problem" some other way, seems quite wasteful and uncreative. It is a brutal reduction of Wikipedia's navigability among film series articles, and quite bluntly opposed one of Wikipedia's design tenets: use links for the convenience of navigation of the reader (not editors!). This tenet serves Wikipedia very, very well. The deletion of these parameters serves nobody, not even editors. What an uncreative way to solve what is essentially a minor bookkeeping problem, which could have easily been solved by introducing differently named parameters. This one punishes readers, benefits no one. --Lexein (talk) 06:19, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

But the utilities you just described (reader convenience, navigability among film series articles) are already (better) served by navboxes. In what way are these needs better met by the infobox? Isn't it redundant to link the preceding and following films in the infobox when we already link every film in the series via navbox at the bottom of each article? Honestly, I argued to keep these fields, but ever since they were taken out I haven't missed them even slightly. It occurred to me that even before they were removed, I (as both a reader and editor) had already transitioned to using navboxes as my primary mode of navigation between series articles. When it comes to convenience and navigability, navboxes are pretty much one-stop-shopping. --IllaZilla (talk) 06:36, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Indeed, I don't see how the infobox fields add anything that the navboxes don't already have covered beyond "they're at the top of the page and the navbox is all the way at the bottom". 1) It's easy enough to jump to the bottom of a page, and 2) there's already been discussion as to how concerned editors can work around the "bottom of the page" issue by updating the lead. Doniago (talk) 08:22, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Behold: Men in Black (1934 film). What nav box? What nav box? Taking tools away from readers. No regrets. No retreat. --Lexein (talk) 13:54, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

What you're illustrating is a point that a nav box should be created, not that the "preceded by/followed by" categories should be reinstated. The description on that page says there are 190 short films. Since none of those films has anything to do with the other, a nav box is much better because I may just want to jump from short film 23 to short film 123. An infobox category is going to force me to click through each film individually until I get to the film I want.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 14:12, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Behold: The Three Stooges filmography, from which one can navigate to any film the trio ever made. And if one wanted such navigation to be avaiable within every article, it would be a simple matter to create {{Three Stooges films}} as a supplement to the already-extant {{ThreeStooges}}. Giving better tools to readers. No regrets. No snarkiness. --IllaZilla (talk) 14:32, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Nope. We are volunteers here, with no inherent right to force extra work on other editors, after the work has already been done, and done well, once. Ridiculous. What you're suggesting is a slim rationale at best for breaking down what was already working. You break it, you rebuild it. Cheers, and thanks ever so much. --Lexein (talk) 15:45, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

It should be noted, although this has been mentioned before, the fields were designed for films in a series like Star Wars or Star Trek. They were not meant for films in a row by an actor, director, comedy team etc. Even in those areas they weren't working as edit wars over things like the James Bond films (like Never Say Never Again) broke out all the time. MarnetteD | Talk 16:10, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Once again please present evedence that readers have been punished or refrain from hyperbole of that type. MarnetteD | Talk 16:12, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

For that matter, I'd still like evidence that the navboxes are not at least as useful, if not moreso, as the infobox fields were. Citing an article where no navbox exists is irrelevant, as a navbox could be created, and I'm sure that when the infobox fields existed there were articles not utilizing them. As Mark Twain said, "Everyone complains about the weather, but nobody does anything about it." If one is willing to complain about the lack of infobox fields but their best reason for not helping with a workaround (or improvement) is essentially, "I'm a volunteer, I don't have to help," then IMO they're invalidating their own complaint. Doniago (talk) 16:45, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Did you read the paragraphs above? It's absurd to argue that a HIDDEN navbox is as good as a link readily visible in the infobox. The default seems to be to have navboxes collapsed if there's more than one, as there usually is on the bottom of film pages. So the average reader probably won't even realize the links can be found there. Even if he does he then has to click to open it before finding the link he wants. How is needing to hit two links more efficient or preferable to simply hitting one at the bottom of the infobox? And no one is arguing to remove the navboxes. They should both be there, and a reader can choose what's most convenient to use. And as Lexein said, it was already working. We shouldn't need to rebuild something because you took it out. Gothicfilm (talk) 22:13, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Except that they weren't working per several items which have been written about time and again above. Navboxes aren't "hidden". They are quite apparent below the "External links" section of every article and when I go to an article with them on it they are open. Maybe we can use a command to force them to the top of the article if you feel that is necessary although I wouldn't recommend it. Why are readers continually discussed as though they have never looked at a wikipedia article before. Anyone who has been here for any amount of time has had ample opportunity to learn how things work and those that have only started using Wikipedia in the last 8 months never saw those links at all. You and others miss them. I can understand that. There are items that I miss too like the previously mentioned IMDb link and I vastly preferred the "Actor infobox" over the person one. They are gone and there is plenty of other editing to continue on with. MarnetteD | Talk 22:59, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Another example of their limitations. Lets say that I am on the article for Star Wars: A New Hope and I want to go to Attack of the Clones using the old infobox links I have to click through four articles, whereas, I only have to make one click in the navbox - two of it is closed. Star Wars is another example of the neverending edit warring as one editor would want them in release order and the next would want storyline order. Even if a temporary resolution occurred the next new (or even long time) editor that preferred the other order would some along and start the whole thing up again. MarnetteD | Talk 23:09, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

That's true of every element in WP. That doesn't mean you take it out. An edit war can be dealt with, just as it is in every other category. If you want to go from film 1 to film 4 in a series, then by all means use the navbox. But if I want to compare films in succession easily using links in the infobox, I should be able to do so. And I just tested WP film pages in three top browsers, two of which I wasn't signed in on. The navboxes are hidden on all of them, unless there's only one on the bottom of the page. So there's little doubt that's the default. Most film pages have at least two navboxes, so they're hidden. Gothicfilm (talk) 23:32, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

So, just to make sure we understand each other...for you, it's a matter of an additional couple of clicks and a few extra seconds that you feel are unnecessary and consequently annoying, and the possible confusion for a new user who doesn't realize they have to click the "Show" (or what-not) button on a navbox to see the navigation links? Doniago (talk) 23:57, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

You said "I'd still like evidence that the navboxes are not at least as useful, if not moreso, as the infobox fields were." This clearly demonstrates they're not. Don't ask how something is not as useful if you don't care if it's not as useful. Gothicfilm (talk) 00:55, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't see why you're taking my request for a clarification of your concerns as an indication that I don't care about them. That being said, I'll admit I was hoping for something a bit more substantial than, "The current system takes a little bit longer and may be slightly less user-friendly." Doniago (talk) 02:31, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

They are hidden in plain site as they title can always be seen. Again before and after can be, and usually are, mentioned in the lede, which is seen by all readers before they scroll down to the bottom of an infobox. An edit war that flames up again and again takes up energy and time that can be better spent doing other things. Since you have only started editing here after the fields were deactivated you wont have dealt with what a hassle they were. Three other places where the same information can be accessed is sufficient. MarnetteD | Talk 23:51, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Preceded By / Followed By cont'd

Going through the forest so far raised, a few questions present themselves to me:

1. What precisely would the intent of having these fields be? Is it to provide contextual information - "X follows Y but proceeds Z", provide a navigation tool based on some relation of articles, or a combination of both?
2. If it is contextual only, what is the context(s) that should be covered? Films of one continuity in an in-story order? Films in a franchise by release date? Featuring particular characters? Staring particular actors? By director? Producer? Production company? Each of these is relevant to the one degree or another and would potentially be of interest to a reader. Also, would the context be limited to just films? Would it include television shows? Novels? Comics? And in what order would the contexts be listed?
3. If it is in part or primarily for navigation, would it be limited as navigation boxes normally are and only list existing articles?
4. Would these things need to be listed in the lead as with some of the other fields used by this infobox?

I can see some value in these fields, and it is not just as links. But I can also see the disruption they have caused and could, or likely would, cause if re-instates without serious though as to what they are for and precision in the terms used to lay that out. As they were, the disruption and acrimony they created out weighed their usefulness. That seems to be where the consensus stood.

And an observation on usefulness... The premise that in order to get to film D from A when the fields were present required going through B and C seems shaky. Most film sets of 3 or more have a navbox and have had them even when these two fields were in the infobox. Jumping down to them then was just as easy as it is now.

- J Greb (talk) 03:19, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

If reinstated it should be made clear they are to be in the order a series of films were released. Not the story order, which is less useful and more subjective. That would stop most of the edit warring. Anyone who wanted more info on a series could use the navboxes on the bottom, which yes, would still be there. Gothicfilm (talk) 03:51, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

How would you suggest this be made clear to editors who are unaware of or unwilling to review the infobox documentation? Clearly measures taken earlier to discourage edit wars were not effective. Doniago (talk) 04:23, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)

There's a problem with that. While most sets of films have the story progression move forward as new films are made, those that don't generally have a specific order based on in-story dating or clearly marked titling. Both the production/release order and the story order are relevant and important context for the films. The Indiana Jones films have date captions for the main portions of the stories. Star Wars has chapter numbers in the text scrolls. And so on. And in some cases the "franchise" eschews continuity but some of the works in it have their own internal continuity and progression. The Batman films are an example of this where there are 8, 10 counting the serials, films which have a story continuity only cover 2 groups, 1 of 4 and 1 of 3, that are themselves mutually exclusive.

If these are context related fields, then providing both contexts is an appropriate job for the 'box.

@Doniago - The simplest way if both, or more, contexts are present? "Prv/Nxt_by_release" and "Prv/Nxt_by_story". If just the one? We make sure the clear statement of what it is is in the docs here and the Film MoS. And we point to it when the conflicts come up and hold the line with it. Worst case, we still use "Prv/Nxt_by_release" so that the field itself underlines what it includes.

- J Greb (talk) 04:29, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Speaking from experience I can tell you that "making things clear" does not stop edit warring. Just put the main MoS talk page on your watchlist and you will see. They went round a round for more than two months about comma usage. Item two of J Greb's post is to the point. There will never be a final decision on the parameters because as soon as one set of instructions is agreed upon other editors new and old come in and want them changed. The infoboxes are bloated with enough info as it is. It is a mistake to sell readers short. They can read an entire article and find what they need. BTW previous and next by story (and I hope that you are not proposing that we put four fields into already bloated infoboxes) was one of the main causes of edit warring as listing films made after others but came earlier in the story led to unending changes and confusion. MarnetteD | Talk 04:43, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

The parameter guideline could be written right into the edit text, e.g. <!- Please keep this listing in release order only, not story order -->, as I've seen on some film pages with conflict histories. It would need to be kept simple, so it should be release order only. In the few cases where the story order is different, people will need to read the article. Sometimes the story order is supposed to be a surprise, like with the (Spoilers ahead) latter Saw and Final Destination films. Edit wars are a problem you deal with. This would stop most, you deal with the rest. Or you don't - let other people deal with them. WP should be designed around what's best for the readers - not editors.Gothicfilm (talk) 05:14, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)

@MarnetteD

The main thing I'm trying to under line is the distinction between putting the fields back as purely a navigation tool and a link based on context. If it is purely there for navigation then:

• It is excessive in the infobox, a place that is already crammed with information with context importance to the article.
• It does not serve as a quick and immediate navigation tool since the previous and following films will be in the lead as links. And will almost always appear higher up on the initial view of the article.

If the inclusion is to be based on a context, then there are multiple contexts that may be relevant and should be looked at. Release dates/order is one of the strongest contexts for a group of films but it is not the only one. Story order is also a strong context and should not be dismissed out of hand. Having 2, or more, sets of Previous/Next fields is one way of dealing with it if inclusion of the field type is found desirable. And as you point out, inclusion of any number of Prev/Next sets is going to take up space on the right hand side of the article and affect how the body of the article is going to be presented. Remember the article should be the most important thing we look at. Not the navigation tools at the bottom. Not the categories. Not the nutshell minimal distillation of the content in the infobox. When those are added they are based on the article and should be present to support and not overwhelm the article.

@Gothicfilm

2 things off the hop:

1. This is an encyclopedia, spoilers are going to be present. The "Spoiler" tag was depreciated years ago on those grounds. Not doing some thing because it's a "spoiler" is a bit of a non-starter.
2. On of the things that is generally deemed "best" for a user of an encyclopedia if for the content to be as stable as possible. Part of that is minimizing edit wars as much as possible. If an ancillary item routinely results in edit wars which disrupt the articles, either an alternate way of including that ancillary item is needed or it needs to be eliminated. In this case alternate methods include: links in the lead (already done), navigation specific templates (already done), and multiple Prev/Next fields in the infobox. If those are unworkable, that only leaves not including the fields in the infobox. Navigation is still served, but some editors lose something they like to allow the articles to have reduced or eliminated disruption for the users of the encyclopedia.

- J Greb (talk) 05:37, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

I believe films should be seen and studied in the order they were made. The story order should be noted in the article, (not in the lead if it's a spoiler), but it's not the main focus of any film scholarship or encyclopedia. And even for the casual viewer - is there anyone who should see the last three Star Wars prequel films first, before the original trilogy? Because that's the story order?

Edit wars should be minimized, or certainly reduced, by the parameter I described above making it clear the listing is to be in release order.

And most pages for older films still don't list the preceding or following films in their lead. Even prominent ones like Goldfinger. You can say that they should, but the reality is they don't. They used to have those links in their infobox though.

By the way, putting the "Preceded By / Followed By" info in the lead for something like Goldfinger doesn't look right to me. While it should be in the article, it just clutters the lead. Saying it's the third James Bond film is enough. It should also be in the infobox though, for both context and navigation. Gothicfilm (talk) 18:49, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Given that you previously showed resistance to adding preceding/following information to the leads for film articles yourself, I don't think you have the right to complain about other editors not doing it as well, unless you've reconsidered your stance. As you noted, we're all volunteers. Why complain about this when it would take all of about five minutes or less to correct the problem?

As for your observation about Goldfinger, it would seem that the navbox would cover this just as well, and more clearly, and with better functionality, than the infobox fields. As previously noted, the only real issue seems to be that the navbox is at the bottom of the page. Doniago (talk) 22:48, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Runtime

Am I wrong or should this only be for the original release of the film? A user has added a runtime for the dvd version of Horrible Bosses and the situation is similar on all of the Lord of the Rings films. But it seems to me that if you're adding the runtime of the dvd then why not the release date and distributor? Again, the template doesn't offer any useful guideline so does anyone else think it is allowed or not? Darkwarriorblake (talk) 09:33, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

You have it right, I believe. Other run times can be included in the article. --Ring Cinema (talk) 14:26, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

I think sometimes the runtime of the director's cut is included, and I'm fine with that. A film being a few minutes longer because of scenes included on DVD is not worth noting in the infobox. Erik (talk | contribs) 14:56, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

Unless the new "runtime" was part of a special release in the theaters, like Star Wars or Alien, then I generally keep them out of the infobox. Most films today are coming out on DVD as "Unedited" versions. There's nothing truly special about them. Even the "Director's Cuts" are so popular now that most films (especially horror films) are getting that treatment as well. Before, that was such a rarity. To me, the infobox is about the theatrical release and the body of the article can mention the different cuts of the film. Otherwise, we're back at the slippery slope of adding too much fluff to the infobox and making it longer.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 15:05, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

OK, thanks guys. I agree Bignole, if you're including alternate runtimes you need to ask why other stuff is not being included and then you have a super bloated infobox. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 15:21, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

I've always been in support of the idea that the infobox should refer only to the original (theatrical) release. not later revisions/editions. Otherwise you end up with situations like Blade Runner, which used to list 4 or 5 different runtimes in its infobox. Information on different editions is best left to the article body. --IllaZilla (talk) 18:32, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

template was changed and need help

there was a template changed and wondering why and if its goin back to the way it was. on all the movies with sequels and prequels there use to be a section in the info box that showed them and you could click on them and it would show you them but its gone now — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.69.176.41 (talk) 17:49, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

It's been gone a little while now. I think it was removed back in February.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 18:09, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

yeah i just found out feb 16 the preceded and followed by. are they gonna put that back because that was a big help. for example i watched a movie analyze that and when watching it thought there may be a prequel to it because of the way it started so went on the site and saw that there was but wouldve never knew if that section wasnt there — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.69.176.41 (talk) 18:28, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

No, they're gone for good. See the section #Preceded By / Followed By above and the original discussion at Template talk:Infobox film/Archive 19#Preceded By/Followed By. You can usually find sequels/prequels mentioned in the lead paragraph or listed in a navigation template at the bottom of the article. For example Analyze That says right in the first sentence that it's "a sequel to the 1999 film Analyze This". --IllaZilla (talk) 18:42, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

oh ok thanks but that really sucks i loved that part of it im gonna miss it — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.69.176.41 (talk) 18:45, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

Actually we can put that field back in any time there is enough interest in it. We removed it with a majority vote. If this project is going to act responsibly, we have to pay attention to the consequences of our work. Every institution makes mistakes and if this was one, it would be foolish to ignore it. I don't think any other changes have received repeated objections here, which is strong evidence that many readers found that field useful. And I say that as someone who never looked at that field. --Ring Cinema (talk) 13:16, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

We had more when we removed IMDb from the infobox, because everyone thought it was "useful" to be able to skip to that website at ease.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 15:18, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

Ring, I know you keep insisting that we might bring it back, but IMO that's highly unlikely. It's been almost 7 months & there have been very few complaints, considering that there are 91,760 film articles (at present) probably receiving hundreds of thousands of views a day. I don't miss it at all, and I was one of the people who argued to keep it. --IllaZilla (talk) 16:27, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

I voted to eliminate it. I'm just keeping an open mind and trying to be very accurate. --Ring Cinema (talk) 16:58, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Film certificate

Hello All! Every film is certified by one or the other board & this information is important one. The infobox should include the certificate received by the film & by which board it is granted. I see very few films have this information included on their article page. If included in the infobox, it would maintain uniformity. This would also reflect on which movies were given undue certifications (if given). Has this already been discussed here before? -Animeshkulkarni (talk) 15:07, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, we include film certificates where secondary sources note it directly. See MOS:FILM#Ratings, which explains the consensus on using certificates. In the past, it was a problem to have only MPAA ratings everywhere for both American and non-American films. Erik (talk | contribs) 15:18, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

I fail to see how it is important information, it's a rating given to a film by any number of bodies to advise people watching it that it might contain the f'word more than twice in 90 minutes. It gives no understanding to the film at all unless it is unrated altogether and thus effectively censored. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 15:36, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Not only that, but ratings can change over time, different media (e.g. DVD) and versions (e.g. director's cut) can have different ratings from the main theatrical release (although that is admittedly relatively rare), and there are not only the multiplicity of different territories to consider but in some countries, at least, sub-national levels of government can also rate a film - local authorities in Britain, for example. All this would add up to something horrendously complex, time-consuming to assemble and verify, and almost certainly doomed to be incomplete, which as Darkwarriorblake says wouldn't really tell you much about the film anyway.

Of course, there will be cases where the rating is of special interest, e.g. perhaps because it is a landmark in censorship history as the first film permitted to use a certain obscenity, or because the rating had a significant effect on its commercial success/failure. And in those cases we can certainly mention it in the text of the article. Barnabypage (talk) 16:47, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Parameters

Should the explanation for the language parameter be changed in order to mention {{Plainlist}} instead of the line break? Sanfazer (talk) 19:38, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Field for the original title?

In my opinion, a field for the 'Original Title' would be very helpful, especially for articles about films from non-english filmmakers, as those are listed with their international titles. The original title (if there is one, or even more) should be mentioned in any article about a film anyway. (E-Kartoffel (talk) 12:25, 19 November 2011 (UTC))

This doesn't necessitate an infobox field. Very few articles would need it, and the title in the |name= field should probably be the original title anyway. Alternate titles should be mentioned in the lead, most likely right in the opening sentence (for example The Boat That Rocked). --IllaZilla (talk) 18:36, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Actually, I think the infobox title and the article title should match. Of course, in theory, they don't have to, but it seems to raise a lot of questions about our naming conventions if they don't. The most familiar title is used in the article and that's frequently not the original. --Ring Cinema (talk) 21:35, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Still, this isn't a frequent occurrence so I don't think it necessitates and infobox field. A difference between original and most familiar title should be right there in the first sentence. --IllaZilla (talk) 23:51, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Preceded / followed by Redux

Now that it was agreed some time ago to remove these parameters from this template, shouldn't the same be done with Template:Infobox television film??--WickerGuy (talk) 04:34, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

I suppose the same logic follows. Why is there a separate infobox for TV films? Most of the parameters are the same. Seems that it could be deprecated and switched over to this infobox, if a couple of its fields were added to this infobox as optionals (network, air dates, number of episodes). --IllaZilla (talk) 04:39, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Not quite... unless WP:TV is giving up the same in the television series 'boxes.

There are a few fields that are television specific: "Original channel", "Original run", and "No. of episodes". And it could (should?) be argued that "Release date" should be "Original air date". Also note that the template is also used for, by the docs, miniseries.

Lastly, some, but by no means all, television movies act as either a pilot or ending for a television series. This is where the series boxes come in - the TV film would point to the the series it spawned or which it is finishing up.

- J Greb (talk) 05:37, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

It just seems to me that there's a lot of overlap between the two:

{{Infobox film}}	{{Infobox television film}}
name	name
image	image
image size	image size
border
alt
caption	caption
	genre
	creator
director	director
producer	producer
writer	writer
screenplay	screenplay
story	story
based on	based on
narrator	narrator
starring	starring
music	music
cinematography	cinematography
editing	editing
studio	studio
distributor	distributor
released	released
runtime	runtime
country	country
language	language
budget	budget
gross
	network
	first aired
	last aired
	num episodes
	preceded by
	followed by
	website

TV film ought to have border & alt added to it anyway. preceded by & followed by could be ditched, & I'd also suggest doing away with genre (often contentious) & website (belongs in an EL section, if applicable). That'd leave just 5 fields to be added to the film infobox (creator, network, first aired, last aired, & num episodes) to have a single infobox for both theatrical & TV films. The infobox documentation could explain that these fields should only be used for TV films, while gross is only for theatricals. It'd be much the same way that {{Infobox musical artist}} covers both individual artists and groups/bands, or {{Infobox album}} covers all varieties of albums. --IllaZilla (talk) 06:45, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

To be honest, at this late stage I'm unwilling to support using a discussion on a template used/maintained by a single Project to annex/assimilate a template used/maintained by another, even if there is overlap. The templates you point out are fine examples, but they are each looked after by a single taskforce (Musicians for musical artist) or Project (Albums for album).

If the way forward is going to include working on folding the TV film 'box into here, letting WP:TV know would be a needed step since both that Project and Film have interest in looking after that template and the articles it's on.

- J Greb (talk) 07:13, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Infobox television film really needs to be merged into the film one. Lugnuts (talk) 10:41, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Isn't followed/preceded by more important in tv shows where otherwise you would have a ridiculously oversized, complex, difficult to navigate template at the bottom of each page?Darkwarriorblake (talk) 13:09, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

I think we're talking about television films here, not television shows in general. Doniago (talk) 14:33, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Ah OK, that makes more sense then.Darkwarriorblake (talk) 14:36, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

I'll repeat from above: a sub-set of the TV films act as either a pilot (whic are followed by a series) or an epilogur (preceded by a series) - J Greb (talk) 16:56, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

I can see the logic of combining the boxes, but if the box serves another purpose on another project then maybe we should just focus on our box, and integrate the parameters that it needs to cover TV films. If we then move all the films over to the film box then the TV project can do what they want with the TV film box, it won't be our concern. Betty Logan (talk) 17:26, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Field for black and white/color

Should there be a new field for whether the film is in black & white or color? Though many films are either due to the era in which they were released, others, more modern, were conscious decisions of the directors, ie Raging Bull, or The Wizard of Oz which was partially filmed in black & white and partially in color. Valley2city^‽ 09:46, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't see why that bit of info needs to go in the infobox. It should certainly be explained in the lead, and maybe elsewhere in the prose, but it's not infobox content. --IllaZilla (talk) 09:56, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Gross

I would like to propose that the summary for the Gross section of the infobox be modified to include the guideline that the figure is rounded instead of long-form ($209.6 vs $209,623,941). At Horrible Bosses there has been some edit conflicts about a user wishing to use the long form, but it is my view that the long form is an estimate only, as not every country is tracked and those that are, it seems impossible that they are tracked to the dollar or takes into account offers used to view the film. The rounded figure is easily read, and representative of the figure without claiming to be the figure accurate to the single dollar. It also is uniform with the above budget figures which are always given as a rounded number. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 21:19, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

This is at millions+ btw, I don't advocate for writing 60 thousand, should a gross come in that low. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 21:22, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Well budgets only tend to be estimated because they aren't usually released by the studios; box office grosses are audited by the distributor, so it is possible to report them to the dollar, it's just a case of whether the distributor chooses to release the accounts or not, and they usually do. If there is an argument for rounding the numbers I think it is more the case that the level of precision in reporting Avatar's gross to the dollar is not required. Generally, I would like to see more rounding to sensible figures because we are not box office trackers, but I think trying to enforce a guideline like that would be like putting your finger in the dyke. Sometimes you just have to submit to the will of the masses. Betty Logan (talk) 23:36, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Well the majority were in favour of the rounded figure, Sjones and Wikilubber both restored the rounded figure but Dman kept changing it to the long form figure. I feel it works like the lead, where it would seem appropriate to use a rounded figure and say "Alien made over $500 million during its run" instead of "Alien made $502,456,323 during its run", and so it works well with the infobox. The expanded figure can be used in the article where it can be explained. I mean obviously a lot of the figures are estimates where information isn't available, like a lot of the Friday hte Thirteenth films which either present a perfect figure like 40,000,000 or omit details from certain regions altogether were information isn't available. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 00:38, 23 January 2012 (UTC)