Wikipedia:Notability (films)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This Wikipedia page is currently inactive and is kept primarily for historical interest. If you want to revive discussion regarding the subject, you should ask for broader input, for instance at the village pump.

Notability and inclusion guidelines
Notability guidelines Companies 'Cool' ideas Fiction Internet content Music Numbers People Pornographic actors Other Places of local interest Gender/race/sexuality categories Neologisms Active proposals Academics (talk) Books (talk) Candidates and Elections (talk) Churches etc (talk) Computer and Video Games (talk) Fandom (talk) Organizations (talk) Royalty (talk) Science: 1, 2 (talk) Software (talk) Songs (talk) Schools (talk) Trivia (talk) More... subject-specific See also: Precedents, Notability verification

This proposal deals with the notability of films themselves. For the notability of actors and other filmmakers see generally Wikipedia:Notability (people) or Wikipedia:Notability (pornographic actors) as appropriate.

1 Released films
2 Unreleased films
3 Notes
4 Epilogue
5 Relevant debates

[edit] Released films

In general a film is notable if it meets one or more of the following criteria:

The film has been the subject of multiple non-trivial published works whose source is independent of the film and its creators/producers.
- This criterion includes published works in all forms, such as newspaper articles, books, television documentaries, and full-length magazine reviews except for the following:
  - Media reprints of press releases, trailers, and advertising for the film. ¹
  - Trivial coverage, such as newspaper articles that simply report the film name and where it is being shown.
The film has been theatrically released nationwide in a country, or into 200 or more commercial theaters. ²
The film has received a major award for excellence in some aspect of filmmaking. ²
The film is a full length film released by a major studio. ²

[edit] Unreleased films

Because Wikipedia is not a crystal ball, articles on films that have not yet been publicly released (either theatrically or direct-to-video) are generally not appropriate unless the production of the film is itself notable in some way.

Factors to consider are:

Has the film actually entered production or is it just rumored or expected to be made?
Has the production of the film generated multiple, non-trivial news stories? In other words: Does the film already satisfy the primary criterion?
Will the film be notable upon release?

[edit] Notes

Note 1: Self-promotion and product placement are not the routes to having an encyclopaedia article. The published works must be someone else writing about the film. (See Wikipedia:Autobiography for the verifiability and neutrality problems that affect material where the subject of the article itself is the source of the material.) The barometer of notability is whether people independent of the subject itself (or of its creator or producer) have actually considered the film notable enough that they have written and published non-trivial works that focus upon it.
Note 2: These criteria are secondary. Most films that satisfy these criteria will almost always already satisfy the first criterion. However, this criterion ensures that our coverage of such content will be complete regardless.

[edit] Epilogue

This proposed guideline is meant to reflect, as far as possible, community consensus on the issue of film articles. If you disagree with it or feel that it fails to reflect consensus please improve it directly or state your concerns on the talk page.