Template talk:Infobox Film

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Template:Infobox Film page.
Archives: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
Film Portal
This non-article page is within the scope of WikiProject Films. This project is a central gathering of editors working to build comprehensive and detailed articles for film topics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can edit the article attached to this page, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion.
Template
This article has been rated as Template-Class on the quality scale.
NA
This article has been rated as NA-importance on the priority scale.
Template:Infobox Film is permanently protected from editing, as it is a heavily used or visible template.

Substantial changes should be proposed here, and made by administrators if the proposal is uncontroversial, or has been discussed and is supported by consensus. Use {{editprotected}} to attract the attention of an administrator in such cases.
Any contributor may edit the template's documentation to add usage notes, categories or interwiki links.
Archive
Archives
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6


Contents

[edit] Discussion on professional reviews

There is discussion in WP Films talk about adding professional reviews in the infobox. Please comment there. Hoverfish Talk 08:28, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Guidelines on release

I see that someone has set the instructions for release date to read: "Insert the first public, non-festival release date of the film". I have followed all relevant discussion here and in WP Films talk and from what I see discussed, this should not be stated so. Please set it as: "Insert the earliest public release, including festivals" and if there are objections we can afterwards count voices. Hoverfish Talk 17:41, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Also there are two editors who brought up the issue of an IP user who is delinking the year in film from infoboxes and film articles. I tried to refer to the infobox instruction to link year-in-film but I see it's also gone. The last relevant discussion about it is here above, in section 8 (Year of release), and it doesn't look like we have agreed on removing the guideline. Hoverfish Talk 18:07, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Proposed additions

I previously suggested Costume Designer be added to the infobox. and Production Designer added to the infobox. Does anyone agree? Thank you.

I think we should add a sentence explaining that the year in film should be linked. I haven't seen a consensus either way, so we should talk about it now, and add it if people feel the same. - Peregrine Fisher 18:27, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
Things have been moved and I don't find the previous instructions, but a while ago it was there. Anyway, I support linking to years-in-film in the infobox, as oposed to linking there in other parts of the article where the link is not really significant. Hoverfish Talk 19:24, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
Hi, I didn't notice the same discussion was going on in there (It was at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Films at the same time). Please don't link full dates to 'year in film', it messes up the user-specific date formatting and therefore goes against WP:MOSDATE. In the cases where only a year is included, it doesn't really make a difference, but those should probably link to plain years for consistency, while the link to 'year in film' can be left for the article body. - Bobet 21:54, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

I have to apologize to all, as I had somehow thought it was proper to link to year-in-film, so I have filled lots of infoboxes this way, including some that had month-day (followed by this link). If I find any, I will repair them. Hoverfish Talk 09:05, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Protected edit request

At the moment, {{protected template}} is included in Template:Infobox Film/doc via <includeonly>, meaning that it shows up on the template when the documentation page is transcluded, but not the documentation page itself. However, that documentation page is also included (via Template talk:Infobox Film/Syntax) in a number of userpages, and as a result those userpages are being incorrectly categorized into Category:Protected templates. To fix this, {{protected template}} should be removed from Template:Infobox Film/doc and instead added directly to Template:Infobox film, in the <noinclude> section. Thanks – Qxz 01:51, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Y Done - Harryboyles 02:40, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Language instruction

I have reformulated the language instructions to address a problem common also to multiple language categorization (see*). I hope there are no objections to the new formulation. Hoverfish Talk 13:54, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Rating

For some reason this won't appear and some info gets cut off. I can't fix this. BuickCenturyDriver (Honk, contribs, odometer) 23:06, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Be sure you're adding the rating to {{{Infobox movie certificates}}} and not {{{Infobox_movie}}}. --70.142.42.81 01:32, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] IMDb

There's a discussion regarding linking infoboxes here. Matthew 08:54, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

And there was a discussion about what links to have in the infobox here. The short version is that people really like the imdb link and since there isn't a policy against that it will most likely stay. On the other hand, that part of the discussion was an unadvertised straw poll that lasted for 2 days, so take it for what it's worth. - Bobet 09:42, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

It would be helpful to note that the IMDB number will have the preceding "tt" automatically included. --otherlleft 03:22, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Gross profits" is incorrect

The instructions for the new "gross" parameter ask for editors to include the gross revenue, not the profits. What Box Office Mojo reports is revenue, because only the studio knows (or would report) the actual profits (the rough estimate of "revenue divided by two minus budget" isn't always accurate). This needs to be changed immediately to "gross revenue", "worldwide gross", or simply "gross". --FuriousFreddy 15:19, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

{{editprotected}} done. CMummert · talk 15:42, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Certificate number

It's a minor detail, but could we add a "certificate no." field to the template? It's a serial number of sorts for most films (at least all those released in the U.S.), similar to what the ISBN number is for books. For example, Lost Horizon (1937) is shown in the opening credits as certificate number 2006. Current U.S. films are numbered somewhere around 40000. I'm not sure if this applies to non-U.S. films, though. — Loadmaster 15:12, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Can you look up a movie using its certificate number? This also seems more of a trivial fact than an essential piece of information that needs to be easily accessible by means of an infobox. Cbrown1023 talk 02:23, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Country

Resolved.

Can country please be changed to production country or as i had to come to the infobox to find out what it was which kinds of defeats the purpose of having the box (Gnevin 04:31, 20 April 2007 (UTC))

What is your suggested choice of wording - it can't be too long or else if will disrupt the look of the overall template. I would have thought "Country" would be assumed by most readers to be where it was produced (vs say country of the production company or film studios) David Ruben Talk 00:14, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

All databases mean the same thing when they refer to Country, i.e. country (or countries) which produced (or co-produced) a film. Hoverfish Talk 17:19, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Also, adding a new variable name won't do any good unless we also change a few hundred (thousand?) transclusions of the template, too. Probably easier to leave it as it stands. – Luna Santin (talk) 18:56, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
Rejected: Consensus is against changing the template. Luigi30 (Taλk) 13:06, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Two AMG ids

Prophecies of Nostradamus has two AMG ids. One as Prophecies of Nostradamus, which in the U.S. was a subtitled, very limited, art house release, and one as The Last Days of Planet Earth, which was dubbed and heavily edited for television and the only version released to home video (neither version is on Region 1 DVD). Trying to include both has messed up the infobox. How do I do it? --Scottandrewhutchins 15:47, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

Include the most popular version in the infobox and both in the external links section. Cbrown1023 talk 13:59, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] cover placeholder

I think it would be beneficial for to add this placeholder when the cover/poster is missing: Image:NoDVDcover copy.png.--Esprit15d (talk ¤ contribs) 22:19, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Why is it beneficial? I think it's really ugly and unnecessary. And besides, we normally try to use posters, not DVD covers. Cop 663 22:23, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
I don't like it. Some articles can't justify an image, at present. Matthew 22:24, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Tagline

Why not insert tagline in this infobox? Most movies have taglines. BlueAg09 (Talk) 06:51, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

They are also usually not interesting/encyclopedic. It's been discussed AdamSmithee 12:45, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
The discussion is pretty well scattered, though. Taglines are for promotional purposes, but their current position (in the lead paragraph of many film articles) is as unacceptable as they are unencyclopedic. This is more of a question for the Film Wikiproject overall, what to do with taglines in general. --Stratadrake 12:40, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
Tag lines might have their place in articles, but they do not fit well in the infobox and are not of much value there. Prolog 15:24, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Indian Films

How about adding lyricist and singers into the template. This is crucial, especially with Indian films, where good music makes or breaks the film. I'm not comfortable with this though, and a better suggestion that I can think of is to make a new template for Bollywood films. Sniperz11 14:12, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

New template is a good idea. Jay 08:05, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Increase the width

Can the width of the infobox be increased ? When names are long, they wrap and the infobox grows long. I was looking at Plan_9_from_Outer_Space. In IE, the name of Edward D. Wood, Jr. fits into the box, but in Opera, the "Jr" gets wrapped to the next line. As a result, the box has become very long. Jay 08:05, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] {{editprotected}}

{{editprotected}} Add a rotten_tomatoes_id. Wiikipedian

Not uncontroversial. In a poll on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Films most even wanted the amg_id out. External links are better suited in the appropriate sections in articles, and we should avoid turning infoboxes into link farms. Prolog 16:43, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
Kthx for reply.

Wiikipedian

[edit] Voices field

Hey can someone add a voices field for animated films. Using "Starring" for animated film does not seem right and a "voices" field would fit better.--NeilEvans 17:25, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

This sounds like a good idea. Maybe it could be added right below the "staring" field in the template. Perhaps something like
{{#if:{{{voice_actor|<noinclude>-</noinclude>}}} |
! Voices by
{{!}} {{{voice_actor}}}
{{!}}-
}}
Jecowa (talk) 01:33, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
I'm uncertain as to what the real problem here is. What I am certain of is that if this is adopted, it will require an immense amount of retagging, so why exactly is this a pressing issue? Is there actually a misconception that animated characters are not voiced by humans? That not being shot on camera means you can't star in something? Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 03:27, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Preceded by/followed by - should they go by release or story?

Are the preceded_by and followed_by parameters supposed to go by when the films were released or where in the story they take place? In other words, if a movie was released later but took place earlier, should it be considered preceded_by or followed_by? I see the Star Wars movies use the story order but the Indiana Jones movies use release order. I personally think it should be by release, but I wanted to see if there was a consensus about it. -Joltman 16:46, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Canonical order can be ambiguous, especially when you have retellings, prequels, midquels, and reboots. E.g., would Bambi 2 be both preceded and followed by the original Bambi since it technically takes place in the middle?
Chronological order is non-ambiguous, however if there is a significant delay between two movies (e.g. original Star Wars vs. Prequel Star Wars) which would cause confusion, then it can probably be disregarded. (An alternate proposal would be to rename both params simmply to "See also", but that would be a bit unorthodox). --Stratadrake 12:21, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Taglines

{{editprotected}}

I think we should add a section that displays the tagline for a flim. Karrmann 14:20, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

I disagree, the template is already bulky enough. No need to add long tag lines. Matthew 14:34, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

N Not done; due to a reasonable objection, making this change boldly would be inadvisable. Please replace the editprotected if a consensus forms for this change. --ais523 15:57, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Executive Producers

{{editprotected}}

Can you add a line to the Infobox saying "Executive Producer"

Thanks,

Tovojolo 11:19, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

Please write and test the code, and get consensus for it here, and then reactiviate the tag. If you would like help writing the code, you may ask at Wikipedia:Requested templates. — Carl (CBM · talk) 23:46, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't understand this. There's a big notice saying the the Infobox is protected and we have to ask someone else to change it. Now you're saying we have to do it ourselves ? - so why protect the Infobox  ?

Tovojolo 21:16, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree completely. Executive Producers should be listed. Moreover, in order to get Executive Producers in the articles, inaccurate representations (even sanctioned by the Style Guide) are being made that list the EP's with the Producers. This is found in many films, such as Schindler's List, but also in the same of the Wikipedia:WikiProject Films/Style guidelines itself. 2 of the "Producers" listed were, in fact, Executive Producers. There is no justification for leaving out either EP's or...for that matter...AP's most of whom typically have been integrally involved in the development of a film from the earliest. There are exceptions, but credits aren't passed out at the water fountains.

Dawgknot 13:13, 21 August 2007 (UTC) Dawgknot 13:13, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

I propose that the infobox be edited to provide for Executive Producers and CoProducers. Associate Producers are an option but I don't have strong feelings about it. This is a glaring deficiency as it currently stands because either important people are left out or their credit is misrepresented by being called "Producer". Example: X2, Terminator, Schindler's List and many others.

There is no good reason to leave out the names of people who have these credits. Dawgknot 15:20, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Edit-protected request: add hCalendar mark up

{{editprotected}}

As described debated and implemented for Infobox Album. Thank you. Andy Mabbett | Talk to Andy Mabbett 14:16, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Done. Cheers. --MZMcBride 15:13, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
Thank you. Could I trouble you to move class="description" to the tr, so that the words "directed by " are also included? Andy Mabbett | Talk to Andy Mabbett 15:42, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
Done. Cheers. --MZMcBride 18:33, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
Could you also add class="dtstart" to the release date? An event without a date seems a bit useless to me... Also, I think the class="description" now only spans "directed by. Thanks, Bernhard Bauer 14:00, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
The former is unnecessary and potentially harmful. The date is included in the microformat by use of {{Start date}} (per this template's documentation!) which includes the necessary ISO8601 formatting and class-name. Marking up unformatted dates would cause problems. ("description" does indeed need fixing, though.) Andy Mabbett | Talk to Andy Mabbett 14:51, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
I've disabled the editprotected request while discussion continues. --MZMcBride 15:55, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
Thank you, but we're agreed that "description" is broken, and needs fixing promptly. Andy Mabbett | Talk to Andy Mabbett 16:40, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
The way this page's code is written, it doesn't appear to be an easy problem to fix. It will certainly need testing in a sandbox before this highly-used template is updated (again). The alternative option is to have the class in the <td> tag as it was before and not in the <tr> tag. Getting the class into the <tr> tag looks difficult. Cheers. --MZMcBride 16:46, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

(outdent) I would suggest changing:

{{!}}-
{{#if:{{{director|<noinclude>-</noinclude>}}} |
! class="description" {{!}} Directed by
{{!}} {{{director}}}

to:

{{!}}- class="description"
{{#if:{{{director|<noinclude>-</noinclude>}}} |
! {{!}} Directed by
{{!}} {{{director}}}

Then, if there's no director, the producer, and if not them, then the writer, would (AIUI) be used. Andy Mabbett | Talk to Andy Mabbett 17:11, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

All right, that will work. I will leave this request open for a little bit for any additional suggested changes (if any). --MZMcBride 19:54, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
Done. Cheers. --MZMcBride 22:01, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
Thank you again! Andy Mabbett | Talk to Andy Mabbett 23:14, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Stating language

There is an ongoing discussion in Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Films/Categorization#Categorization of films by language which also concerns the language stated in the Film Infobox. DieWeisseRose has brought up the issue of minority languages and endangered languages. I copy here her suggested draft. Doctor Sunshine and myself are in agreement. If there is no objection, please, adjust the instructions in Template:Infobox Film/doc. Hoverfish Talk 07:06, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

(copied suggestion - added nowiki code)
Insert the language primarily used in the film. It is usually unhelpful to list every language used in a film. However, when a film is clearly bi- or multilingual or if it contains significant portions of minority language or endangered language usage then you may enter the secondary languages separated with a line break (<br />). In addition, the language should link to its appropriate article. Ex: For a film primarily in the English language, insert [[English language|English]].
--DieWeisseRose 03:35, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] adding visual effects companies to infobox

Would it be possible to add a list of visual effects companies that worked on the film to the infobox? It seems that a large portion of the promotion for major event movies (i.e. Pirates of the Carribean: Dead Man's Chest, etc) is dedicated to mentioning the contracting visual effects houses, so I think that these companies warrant a mention.

BGyss 00:34, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

This would often make the infoboxes very long. Since visual effects are relevant to only a few films, it is simpler to note the companies in the "Production" section of the article's main body. Cop 663 00:44, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Suggested change for display of language

I've noever really had much to do with the editing of this template, so I sha'n't add {{editprotected}} and I'll leave it to the regular editors to discuss the issue and edit it, if necessary, but it's occurred to me a few times that it might be useful to change the code to read

{{#ifexist: {{{language}}} language | [[{{{language}}} language|{{{language}}}]] | {{{language}}} }}

rather than just {{{language}}}, so entering English should end up with English, but without messing up if the right code (or multiple languages) were entered.

Feel free to ignore me, of course, but I just thought I'd make the suggestion  :o) — OwenBlacker (Talk) 20:07, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Done. Quick test/demo:

"{{Infobox Film|name=abc|language = English}}" gives "

Infobox Film

" [1]Template:Xpd/

"{{Infobox Film|name=abc|language = Englis}}" gives "

Infobox Film

" [2]Template:Xpd/

"{{Infobox Film|name=abc|language = English}}" gives "

Infobox Film

" [3]Template:Xpd/

"{{Infobox Film|name=abc|language = ghi}}" gives "

Infobox Film

" [4]Template:Xpd/

Patrick 11:36, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Other Infoboxes include Genre information so why not this one?

The Infoboxes for video games, novels and TV series include Genre: so why is Genre: not part of the film Infobox. I get that the genre that a film belongs to may not always be a solid fact but it's still a very important piece of information to leave out, especially when it's included elsewhere. This seems like a very big oversight so I'm hoping that Genre: will be added to the Film Infobox Template soon. What do you guys think? 218.215.142.116 13:29, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Hi, Please see this previous discussion. Genre is a field which is open to POV and can start edit wars. Much better to discuss the various classifications in the article than try to come up with a hard and fast genre for each film. RWardy 08:42, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

But there already are "hard and fast genres" for TV series and books and games. I haven't noticed any edit wars come about because of it. If putting Genre: into Infoboxes is so bad then shouldn't it be removed from the other Infobox templates? The fact that Genre: exists in other infoboxes wasn't mentioned in the previous discussion, which is why I thought this issue should be reconsidered. 218.215.145.49 11:40, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

If the possibility of edit wars is so unnerving, we could just agree to use IMDB's genre information instead of arguing among ourselves. 218.215.148.201 13:04, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

IMDb is user-submitted, which creates many problems with using it for any sort of reference. See the discussions on WT:CIMDB. Girolamo Savonarola 13:27, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

I understand the problems with adding genre to your infobox but the same problems already exist with the following categories: Horror film, Western films, Drama films, Thriller, Thriller films, Slasher films. There are others, but I have just listed these few examples. Perhaps we should eliminate these categories. - BuffaloBob (talk) 02:12, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Image display help?

Please see Semi-Tough. How to I decrease the size of the image that is displayed in the infobox? Thank you. Curt Wilhelm VonSavage 20:45, 25 October 2007 (UTC).

Hi, I took a look and you had the parameter as imagesize rather than image_size. I have fixed this now and it has shrunk the image. Please edit the value to set the image to the size you require. RWardy 21:20, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Thank you. I noticed the old "Awards" parameter is missing? Curt Wilhelm VonSavage 21:35, 25 October 2007 (UTC).
The awards parameter was removed ages ago. Awards should be mentioned in thier own section in the article usually. RWardy 11:25, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
Just curious, I usually put them in their own section anyway. Thanks for the help! Curt Wilhelm VonSavage 11:26, 26 October 2007 (UTC).

[edit] Edit request

{{editprotected}} Please replace {{/doc}} by {{template doc}}. Thank you. 16@r 12:48, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

I used {{documentation}}.--Patrick 13:56, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] What have I done wrong?

I have added the film infobox to numerous articles, yet on Late Fragment I seem to have done something incorrectly. It won't display properly. Can anyone tell me what's wrong? Thanks, Shawn in Montreal 14:13, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

I think you fixed it already, but if you miss one square bracket from a wikilink, the whole template goes pear-shaped. Cop 663 18:16, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
It was not me. A Bot appears to have fixed it. Thanks all the same.Shawn in Montreal 22:09, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Budget

Is the budget for field production budget only? Or does it include advertising? I ask because I found an article on how Akeelah and the Bee cost $8 million produce (the number that Box Office Mojo has for the budget), but an extra $20 million to market.--SeizureDog 19:28, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

I would say that it's the production budget, but I'd suggest explaining the $20 million marketing approach in a Release section for the article, which seems needed. Just mention how the studio tried to market the film, when the film was released, its box office performance (use Box Office Mojo), and the critical reaction (use Rotten Tomatoes). —Erik (talk • contrib) - 17:03, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Add category

{{editprotect}} Would an admin please add Category:WikiProject Films templates to this, attempting to propagate category correctly. SkierRMH 00:04, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

It's already there. Rigadoun (talk) 20:18, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Choreography

Would it be a good idea to have the option of adding the choreographer's name to the infobox for films with many large-scale dance numbers (i.e. musicals)? Dan (talk) 18:06, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

I second that suggestion. MovieMadness (talk) 21:29, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
I would support that as long as the template instructions made it clear that it's for films with notable usage (or something to that effect) - in other words, people listed as "Choreographer" for films with minor choreography notability (in reference to the film itself) would not be in the infobox. Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 22:08, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
Because I work a lot with articles about musical films, I think this would be useful as well -- has anyone undertaken to do it? Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) (talk / cont) 20:23, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Additions

I would like to see two categories added to the infobox: Based on, so the writer(s) of the source material are listed separately from the screenwriter(s) listed under Written by, and Costume design. Thank you. MovieMadness (talk) 21:29, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

Let's discuss this first before formally requesting a protected edit. Is there some reason why the current writing situation isn't working? After all, most films deal with it using parentheticals. Changing the parameters will require a massive number of article edits to bring it up to date, and will not add any information that isn't already made clear. As for costume design, it seems relatively reasonable. Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 22:12, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
I didn't know I was "formally requesting a protected edit," I just followed the instructions at the top of this page! I thought this was the discussion. Why should an addition require "changing the parameters [of] a massive number of article edits to bring it up to date"? Why not just let what's been written remain as is and new articles follow the enhanced format? (Following your train of thought, do you expect every infobox to be updated if "Costume design," which you agree "seems relatively reasonable," is added?) Just because most films deal with the writing credits using parentheticals doesn't make it an accurate way to list them. Screen credits traditionally read "Written by ABC" followed by "Based on the novel, play, etc. by XYZ." I just thought the infobox should be similar, that's all. MovieMadness (talk) 22:32, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
Adding Costume Design is simply adding new information that has not existed before. It will not effect the tables as they currently exist. Changing the already existing field for "written by" will alter already existing information and will require that every film infobox that has this info (and we are talking tens of thousands at the minimum) will need to be individually altered. Not altering old ones simply leaves a mishmash of editing styles and, as unlikely as it is that we will ever fully achieve it, we are striving for uniformity in the look of our film pages. MarnetteD | Talk 23:10, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
Just because most films deal with the writing credits using parentheticals doesn't make it an accurate way to list them. How would it not be accurate? The parenthetical contains the information. This, so far, has been standard practice. Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 03:43, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] IMDb interwiki link

{{editprotected}} Seems there is an interwiki link for the IMDb.

'''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt{{{imdb_id|}}}/ IMDb profile]'''

should become

'''[[IMDbTitle:{{{imdb_id|}}}|IMDb profile]]'''

-- Ned Scott 19:20, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Not done. This seems like a bad idea to me and definitely needs to be discussed before implementing. We don't generally use interwiki links this way in articles or templates used in the mainspace. Think about the problems this would create for mirrors and forks, for example. Prolog (talk) 20:28, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
The interwiki link was made for use on the article namespace. I can see your point about the mirrors. I'll bring it up on meta:Talk:Interwiki map. -- Ned Scott 01:40, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Optional "name" attribute

{{editprotected}}

I've been going through infoboxes for a while adding the ability to make the "name" or "title" attribute optional. This way, it can be left off entirely if the article title matches the name of the film.

Change to be made:

{{{name}}}

becomes

{{{name|{{PAGENAME}}}}}

(As an aside, is it really necessary to have full protection on this? Wouldn't semiprot do?) Chris Cunningham (talk) 09:47, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

To answer your question, 28,092 current transclusions would be why the template is fully protected. I'll leave the request up for a bit longer. mattbr 10:48, 16 December 2007 (UTC)
high number of transclusions shouldn't automatically mean preventing the community from editing. If the template had a history of edit warring between registered members I'd understand, but most of the past problems were by anons from what I can see. {{Infobox Person}} isn't fully protected, and it doesn't seem to cause major havoc to the project. Chris Cunningham (talk) 11:35, 16 December 2007 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but high number of transclusions= protected from editing. Any vandalism would be seen on 30,000 different pages, and the server load would be enormous. See Wikipedia:High-risk templates for more info. Woody (talk) 19:37, 16 December 2007 (UTC)
Okay, okay, I get it. So how's about someone actually does the requested janitorial action? It's pretty standard across quite a few infoboxen now. Chris Cunningham (talk) 19:48, 16 December 2007 (UTC)
Done, since I don't anticipate any objection to the change. Let me know if I'm wrong. ;) Will update documentation in a bit, but feel free to tinker with that. – Luna Santin (talk) 07:52, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Rating

Why isn't there a section for the MPAA rating of the film? Particularly considering all of the other details that are included. 67.128.143.196 (talk) 02:03, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

The number of different ratings can get pretty large, so this task is done in another box at Template:Infobox movie certificates. -- Ned Scott 02:09, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
Independence Day (film)#Reception is also a good example of how the ratings box fits nicely into sections like "Reception", rather than at the top. -- Ned Scott 02:10, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
I was about to ask the same question (as 67.128.143.196) myself. What about merely including a link to that section? E.g., add an anchor tag to Template:Infobox movie certificates and then a parameter for this template such as ratingsbox=name to produce a link in the infobox such as "Ratings    (Details)". --Stratadrake (talk) 20:12, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Writers

Why is "Writer" the only option for screenwriters? It seems like this is inadequate for most movies. Most articles have dealt with this by using parentheticals, but this seems a rather sloppy way of handling it. At minimum it seems like we should have the following options:

  • writer (resolves to Written by, as it does now)
  • screenplay (=Screenplay by)
  • story (=Story by)

And there should probably be something along the lines of:

  • source (=Based on)

This would be for films based on novels, plays, television series, etc. Although I wonder if there should be a separate line for the source's original author. (Otherwise it would presumably be broken into two lines.)

This could apply to hundreds of films easily and would not break existing infoboxes using the old format. (In fact, the "writer" field should be preserved either way as a simple option for films that do not have separate story/screenplay credits.) An example of the suggested format is given below using the Star Trek: First Contact credits:

Currently:

| writer = '''TV series "[[Star Trek: The Original Series|Star Trek]]"'''<br>[[Gene Roddenberry]]<br>'''Story'''<br>[[Rick Berman]]<br>[[Brannon Braga]]<br>[[Ronald D. Moore]]<br>'''Screenplay'''<br>[[Brannon Braga]]<br>[[Ronald D. Moore]]

Would become:

| screenplay = [[Brannon Braga]]<br>[[Ronald D. Moore]]
| story = [[Rick Berman]]<br>[[Brannon Braga]]<br>[[Ronald D. Moore]]
| source = ''[[Star Trek: The Original Series|Star Trek]]''<br>Created by [[Gene Roddenberry]]

Seems a whole lot cleaner to me. Thoughts? --Roger McCoy/រ៉ាចើ (talk) 02:15, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree that this setup would look cleaner, as most films whose articles I edit have some kind of source material. However, I'm less sure about the "story" attribute -- that's something I see less often as a stand-alone credit. It's usually the screenwriter and the source material. Perhaps we can keep the general "writer" attribute to cover those who have conceived of the story and those who actually penned it, then refer to the "source" attribute for where it all came from. —Erik (talk • contrib) - 04:54, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Just to give a few examples of films that have (or should have, based on the film's credits) separate story/screenplay credits:
Batman, Batman Begins, Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker, Batman Forever, Batman: Mystery of the Batwoman, Batman Returns, *batteries not included, Benny & Joon, A Bug's Life, Cars, Chicken Run, Clue, Cool Runnings, The Dark Knight, Edward Scissorhands, Encino Man, Finding Nemo, Flushed Away, Forbidden Planet, The Fugitive, Galaxy Quest, The Goonies, The Greatest Show on Earth, Groundhog Day, Hook, Hulk, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Innerspace, Labyrinth, Mad City, Men in Black II, Mission: Impossible, Monsters, Inc., Mr. Deeds, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, A Prairie Home Companion, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Ratatouille, Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, Star Trek Generations, Star Trek: First Contact, Star Trek: Insurrection, Star Trek Nemesis, The Sugarland Express, Superman, Superman II, Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, The Terminal, Titan A.E., Toy Story, Toy Story 2, Twilight Zone: The Movie, A Very Brady Sequel, X-Men, X2, Yellow Submarine, and Ziegfeld Girl.
I'm sure there are many, many more. The inconsistent listings on these show the need for a separate story credit. (I guess the "Screenplay" credit could be left alone as the primary writing credit, although I personally would prefer less ambiguity.) Several of these movies are listed with the screenplay/story credits combined with no clear distinction between the two. The others are inconsistently listed.--Roger McCoy/រ៉ាចើ (talk) 07:45, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Randomly choosing some of the films, I notice that there is a lot of redundancy with names under the story and screenplay credits. This is my concern, since the infobox is supposed to provide a succinct overview of the film. I understand your argument for the specific assignment of credits to the appropriate persons, but I think that this is too much of a breakdown that adds extraneous text to the infobox. I'm not totally sure about a "source=" attribute either since the infobox is rather narrow, where the source material's long title would fit better in the lead section. Wikipedia tries to be more than just a list of cast and crew information, so I think that writing credits should be elaborated in the body of the article. I'm trying to think of a different way to re-format the infobox to differentiate a little better without redundantly repeating names. —Erik (talk • contrib) - 15:52, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
I'm not really convinced this is redundant, though. If the writer is listed as both, they are serving different roles in the film's production. If the screenplay/story credits are exactly the same, then it would be redundant to list both, but in many of these cases there isn't even a single shared name between the two. Even if there is a shared name, I think that this makes the difference between the roles all the more important to point out, since the current method seems very ambiguous. In any case, many of these pages currently list the full story and screenplay credits separately already, meaning that this wouldn't create any additional "redundancy"; it would simply smooth out the formatting. --Roger McCoy/រ៉ាចើ (talk) 18:59, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
I agree (In fact thats what I just came here to suggest) that optional Story by and Screenplay by fields should be added. Written by should be kept since that is how credit is usually given when it is the same person. But as noted above when multiple writers are involved it is not uncommon for the credit to be divided, and we should have a consistent way to handle those films.
As for Based on (called source above) I think that is a good idea as well. None of the three fields will cause any problems with existing articles either, as they are new additions. —MJBurrage(T•C) 22:20, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Distributors

The Painted Hills is one of eight MGM films that are now in the public domain because MGM neglected to file the copyright renewal forms. As such, no less than 8 companies have distributed the film on VHS or DVD, so I'm confused as to what to put under distributor? Do I just list MGM which did the theatrical release, or should all of the VHS and DVD releasers also be listed? Collectonian (talk) 22:41, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

MGM would be best, since it was the primary distributor for the film. The others are secondary. —Erik (talk • contrib) - 22:49, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] hCalendar syntax

{{editprotect}} The template is set up to include hCalendar info ("vevent" class), but some particular fields could be defined to take advantage of this format:

{{!}} {{{released}}}

could become

{{!}} <span class="dtstart ">{{{released}}}</span>

{{!}} {{{distributor}}}

could become

{{!}} <span class="organiser">{{{distributor}}}</span>

{{!}} {{{runtime}}}

Could become

{{!}} <span class="duration">{{{runtime}}}</span>

Currently, only the movie title ({{{name}}}) is used as "summary". See hcalendar-cheatsheet for more parameters. --Qyd (talk) 00:15, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

Forgive me for being a bit slow, but what would the practical reason for doing so be? Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 07:25, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
N Not done Come up with a precise set of the changes you want to make, test them in the sandbox, and add the editprotected tag once you can be certain that these changes will work where you want them to, and not break the template in unexpected circumstances. Happy‑melon 16:52, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
GS, vevent is a microformat that can be used by web-spiders to gather this kind of info and sort/organize it; Similarly, firefox "operator" plug-in can read the data and export it to third party programs (such as MS outlook or Apple iCalendar), see hCalendar.
Happy, here's a sandbox with the changes, and here is a testcase. The changes do not modify the aspect or rendering of any transclusion, but an extractable dataset is additionally available. In this testcase, it would be
BEGIN:VCALENDAR
PRODID:
X-ORIGINAL-URL:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Qyd/Temp
X-WR-CALNAME:
VERSION:2.0
METHOD:PUBLISH
BEGIN:VEVENT
DESCRIPTION;CHARSET=UTF-8:Directed by Joel Coen Ethan Coen
LOCATION;CHARSET=UTF-8:United States
SUMMARY;CHARSET=UTF-8:No Country for Old Men
UID:
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20071109
DTSTAMP:19701209T000000Z
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR
No problem if this changes will not be implemented, it's just that the existing code ("vevent" class, with the two fields "summary" (name) and "description" (director)) is not complete without the mandatory "dstart" field, per the hcalendar specifications. In the linked sandbox, I added dstart, location and organizer. url (for official website) and uid (for IMDB ID) could also be added (with some effort). --Qyd (talk) 04:32, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] TCM database

I've been editing quite a few movie articles lately, and I've found the TCM database to be very helpful and a very solid source of information, especially production information, much of which is not available on IMDB. Overall, it's at least as valuable as IMDB, and certainly better than All Movie Guide, which frequently doesn't have much information at all.

I'd like to suggest that a link for the TCM database number be added to the template. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) (talk / cont) 20:22, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

As a replacement for the AMG link, perhaps, but I would be opposed to simply adding it to the template. The infobox shouldn't become a repository of external links. That's not what it's for. PC78 (talk) 20:41, 29 February 2008 (UTC)
Either way, as an add or a replacement. I don't find the AMG all that helpful, usually. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) (talk / cont) 21:18, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Academy Awards and other awards

I have recently reviewed certian arctiles about Academy Award winning films, including Best Picture, and I found it difficult to distinguish the films as Academy Award winners, even Best Picture. I made an icon or image of an Oscar and have placed it next to some infoboxes from articles about Academy Award winning films, as a way of making easier for a reader to recognize the image and identify the film as being an Academy Award winner almost instantly. I believe that should bee used more often with Academy Award winning films. I also noticed that there was no section in the Infobox about film that listed the awards the film has won. Even though there is a seperate infobox for awards, I think that including a section listing the awards in the Infobox about film, would be more recognizable. Please take this proposal under consideration, Thanks. Jughead.z(1) (talk) 22:40, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

I do not support this. This is English Wikipedia, not American Wikipedia. Placing the AMPAS image in the Infobox without including reference to other awards shifts the focus to American-centrism. Also, although considered by many to be important, Oscars are not the end-all-be-all indicator of a film's significance. Even if awards are included in the Infobox, which awards and for which categories?
Jim Dunning | talk 23:20, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
It's also inappropriate use of a copyrighted image. An awards parameter was removed from this infobox some time ago (see discussion here). PC78 (talk) 23:25, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
WP:FUC rule #8 states that "Non-free content is used only if its presence would significantly increase readers' understanding of the topic, and its omission would be detrimental to that understanding." The current interpretation of that rule is that fair use images cannot be used merely as decorative icons on infoboxes. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 23:37, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
I concur with Jim about the characteristic shifting the focus to American-centrism. In addition, awards can be too varied for a brief summary in the infobox. If you've come across articles in which you thought it was difficult to discern what awards it won, including Oscars, perhaps the lead section or the Awards sections could be revised to reflect this better. —Erik (talk • contrib) - 23:38, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
Although I'm in the odd position of having just asked for an addition to the infobox myself (see #TCM database above), I also agree that adding either an awards section to the infobox or the Academy Award icon is unwarranted. For the latter, it won't pass muster for fair use, and for the former, it will just get much too complicated. The infobox is fairly stuffed at this point - let's leave something to include in the article! Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) (talk / cont) 00:25, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
Category:Academy Award winners does group those movies, and it does it better than an infobox could. --Qyd (talk) 02:10, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Home Video releases

I really think that the infobox should comment on home video releases for movies. This is pretty relevant information for anybody interested in a film and who may want to watch it.--SkiDragon (talk) 02:37, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't think that's necessary... we already cover such details in Home video sections. We try to keep the infobox limited to primary information about the film, such as when it first came out. In the Home video section, we can specify things like DVD/Blu-Ray and the kinds of features it may have. —Erik (talk • contrib) - 04:14, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] ISBN

what are the thoughts of adding an ISBN link to this infobox. a lot of movies have them see ISBN 1419828371 and the WorldCat link? βcommand 01:05, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't think it would be very useful. ISBN is an international standard book number, and I'm not sure how widespread their use on films is or will become. In any case, the articles are about the film itself, not about any one particular instancing of the film, in a DVD or tape - not to mention that different versions would probably have different ISBN's, just as in book publishing, which actually makes them somewhat problematic for referencing there.

I'd say no. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) (talk / cont) 01:11, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

(xpost) Hmm...how would that be able to deal with multiple editions not only in this country, but many other ones? It would need to cover VHS and/or DVD, all the different DVD region releases, and several editions in each region or country for certain films? Is there a unified code per film, or is it on an edition-basis? Because the latter would be a considerable logistical challenge. Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 01:13, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
I would welcome something like an ISBN for films, but I'm not really sure if there is such thing. I'm not aware of any kind of sorting system available beyond identifying the title, studio, and director. —Erik (talk • contrib) - 01:16, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
I suggested (see above) using the MPAA certificate number (at least for U.S.-made films), but the idea was shot down. — Loadmaster (talk) 01:56, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Edit request

{{editprotected}} Can someone please change

! style="font-size: 100%;" align="center" colspan="2" {{!}} '''[http://allmovie.com/cg/avg.dll?p=avg&sql={{{amg_id|}}} All Movie Guide profile]'''

to

! style="font-size: 100%;" align="center" colspan="2" {{!}} '''[http://allmovie.com/cg/avg.dll?p=avg&sql={{{amg_id|}}} Allmovie profile]'''

following a page move to the correct website name? Thanks! PC78 (talk) 17:22, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

Y Done. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 06:37, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Proposed additions (2)

I previously requested Costume Designer be added to the infobox. Girolamo Savonarola thought this was "relatively reasonable," but nobody else responded and nothing came of it. I think Production Designer is a worthy addition as well. Does anyone else agree with these two suggestions? How does one go about adding them if there's a consensus to do so? Thank you. MovieMadness (talk) 19:46, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

I think that adding these roles would unnecessarily weigh down the infobox. The problem is that there are a lot of different roles for any given film, so a case could be argued for any one of them. (Why not the casting person? Why not the visual effects supervisor?) My opinion is that what already exists is suitable because they are pretty general roles for any film. Not all films will necessarily utilize a costume designer or a production designer to the greatest extent. In addition, I think that biographical information about such crew members would be very minimal. In opposition, there are editors, producers, and cinematographers that have pretty extensive backgrounds. I don't have a problem with identifying people like the costume designer and the production designer in the article body itself if they contributed something particularly important to the film. However, having fields for them would suggest biographical articles, and I don't think there's much that can be said in them. We used to have executive producer and associate producer attributes, but they were not really substantial. That's my take on it, anyway. By the way, you may want to post a link to this at WT:FILM -- I'm not sure if many people in WP:FILM have this template on their watchlist. —Erik (talk • contrib) - 20:02, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
Also, a follow-up thought. The crew information is available at IMDb, so the credentials of any one of them can be explored without biographical concerns. —Erik (talk • contrib) - 20:04, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
Actually, if you look at Academy Award for Costume Design, Costume design, Academy Award for Best Art Direction, and Production designer, you'll find a lot more blue links than you might have thought existed. MovieMadness (talk) 13:28, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
The blue links aren't the issue so much as the template-creep. At a certain point, the infobox no longer serves its purpose - to show only the most salient data on the film. Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 07:30, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
In that regard, I know I asked for TCM to be added to the template, but I wouldn't be adverse to removing both AMG and IMDB from it if it would free up space for designers and other personnel directly connected to the movie, such as, for instance, choreographer. Since the database links are set off from the main body of the template anyway, removing both of them would provide space for three or four names. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) (talk / cont) 07:55, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Ed. Since AMG and IMDB can be and usually are listed under "External links," they easily can be removed from the infobox to make space for what I feel are credits more pertinent to the project. MovieMadness (talk) 13:35, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

I think the most prudent approach would be to keep our "default" the same but add some more parameters which are only used in special circumstances. Some films warrant greater prominence for these positions while others do not. gren グレン 12:01, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Image_size issue

It looks like something "funny" is going on with image_size. This parameter can be used to reduce the image size, but that's sometimes not working now. See for example Montana Sky. That has image_size = 200 px, which was reducing the size to 200 pixels until recently. To make things more confusing, I'm also seeing pages where it's still working, e.g. Black Scorpion (film) — Mudwater (Talk) 11:52, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Remove the "px" from the imagesize parameter, that solves the problem -- I've doen it for Black Scorpion. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) (talk / cont) 12:00, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
That worked, thanks! Do you know if there was a recent change somewhere that made things work differently? I'm wondering if a lot of other film infoboxes will be affected. — Mudwater (Talk) 12:04, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
There was apparently a bug in a new version of the MediaWiki software. There was a notice about it for a couple of days at the top of my watchlist. Some infoboxes have been effected, but some haven't -- I have no idea why. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) (talk / cont) 12:06, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
Okay, thanks for your help. — Mudwater (Talk) 12:14, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
See Wikipedia:ClickFix for the technical reasons why it's happening. The bug does affect this template, but it's not very visible since the image_size parameter is used rarely. It's only supposed to be used when the actual image is smaller than 200px, and in those cases, the bug wouldn't affect anything (since the image would just be shown in full size, which is less than the 200px). If you see the bug happening a lot, please leave a note of it somewhere though. - Bobet 13:07, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the additional info. — Mudwater (Talk) 13:21, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
I've noticed it on many pages too. Wikipedia:ClickFix#Fixes explains how the template can be fixed so that it accepts both "200px" and "200" for the image size. Can someone who is able to edit this template do it? That way we don't have to go around to every film article just to remove the "px" from the ones that have it. For An Angel (talk) 14:41, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
The line
[[Image:{{{image}}}|{{#if:{{{image_size|}}}|<!--then:-->{{{image_size}}}px|<!--else:-->200px}}|]] {{#if:{{{caption|}}}|<br />{{{caption}}}}}
should be replaced with:
[[Image:{{{image}}}|{{#if:{{{image_size|}}}|<!--then:-->{{px|{{{image_size}}} }}|<!--else:-->200px}}|]] {{#if:{{{caption|}}}|<br />{{{caption}}}}}
--Qyd (talk) 15:11, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
Can someone who is allowed to edit this template do this? For An Angel (talk) 21:51, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
{{editprotected}} Requested, as per above. Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 23:45, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
Should be fixed now. - Bobet 23:59, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, everybody. — Mudwater (Talk) 00:16, 3 April 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Genre

I'm not sure if anybody has requested it before, but I think that adding a line for genre might be a good addition. ONEder Boy (talk) 21:46, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

It's been discussed before: Template talk:Infobox Film/Archive 6#Genre. My opinion is the attribute may be too subjective or too varied to be part of a straightforward infobox. If there is a lack of clarity regarding the genre of a film, it can be outlined in the lead section. The infobox has pretty basic information, and while there are a chunk of films whose genre could be identified without a problem, I think that there's plenty that cannot be easily described in a "genre" attribute. —Erik (talk • contrib) - 22:08, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
Many films cross genre lines, or can be considered to be in different genres depending on how you look at them. Bottom line is that genre is pretty subjective, and the stuff in the infobox is really objective data.

Besides, genre is almost always mentioned in the lede, and it seems silly to lard up the infobox with material that's going to be repeated just to its left (any more than in the case already). Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) (talk / cont) 00:41, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

More or less what the others have said but the infobox is to present a clear and concise listing of facts about the film. Genre is useful but it sometimes needs to be explained somewhat since many films cross genres. gren グレン 12:07, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
Points well taken. ONEder Boy (talk) 13:39, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] infobox

Regarding this conversion to use Template:infobox.. I don't see the point. Doesn't this make it harder to edit the infobox, with out any real benefit? It would be far easier to just use normal wikitable syntax and follow some kind of guideline for helping to standardize the template. -- Ned Scott 05:46, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Also, did it cause the change I'm seeing in film infoboxes, that the names in the box are smaller and stand out less from the page than the labels (Director, Starring, Producer, etc.) do? If so, it's not a change for the better, I don't think, since the actual information in the infobox has been downgraded. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) (talk / cont) 05:55, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing, but it's certainly a fairly major change to be making to a protected template without any prior discussion. PC78 (talk) 11:59, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
Well, my intention was to make it easier to edit - by using the infobox template one doesn't have to take care to hand-craft table or parser function code to add new rows, it's less cluttered, and the styling is handled all in one place by style parameters. I'll add style parameters to make the template look more like it did before, hopefully that will help with whatever problems the change may have caused. I don't think changing to infobox had an effect on the relative sizes of the names in the box and the labels beside them, they're still just plain vanila "header" and "data" table cells in both versions. I'm not sure what's meant by the "information" being downgraded in this case. Bryan Derksen (talk) 23:14, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
Looks better! :) Hopefully that will alleviate people's concerns. There does appear to be a greater amount of spacing between lines, but I don't see that being a major problem.PC78 (talk) 23:25, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
Thanks! For comparison I've rigged up my template sandbox to display both the pre-{{infobox}} and the current (as of this moment) {{infobox}} versions of this template. You can find them here displayed side by side: User:Bryan Derksen/Template sandbox/test. The font sizes look exactly the same to me (I'm using Firefox 2), the only difference I can see is a slight change in the spacing between the rows of the table. Bryan Derksen (talk) 23:28, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, the only real differences seem to be the spacing between rows, which is stretching the infobox a bit, and also around the edges, which is causing a few lines of text to wrap (I'm using Internet Explorer). Not a big deal as far as I'm concerned, but if it's something that can be fixed then it might be as well. PC78 (talk) 00:03, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
I think I'd have to add a cellspacing parameter to {{infobox}}, or change it globally, which would be rather drastic. I'll wait until there's feedback on the tweaking I did with style parameters before diving into that. :) Bryan Derksen (talk) 00:48, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

{{editprotected}}

I still think it makes things needlessly complicated in the big picture. Infobox film doesn't have to be "easy to edit" for every single editor, and it's protected from editing anyways. There's tons of editors who easily understand how to edit the template, if an edit is needed. This used to be one of the very few templates that one could even copy onto another installation of MediaWiki without making any modifications, because it was a well crafted template.

We're supposed to be dealing with parser functions, and we're supposed to be making hand-crafted changes (when necessary). Everything else can be covered in the infobox CSS class. This does more to limit future options and possible custom considerations, because we wouldn't be able to have any unique code. This is fixing a non-existent problem. I insist on reverting back to the previous code until we can discuss this some more. -- Ned Scott 05:51, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, since you insist. But I don't really see why this is such a big deal. Navboxes have been converted over to the {{navbox}} template virtually site-wide and it's done wonders for standardization and ease of use, and {{infobox}} supports everything that this template needs. Bryan Derksen (talk) 07:28, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Fix infobox

Could somebody fix this infobox, please?. It really doesn't look that good, and all the information is much smaller than it needs to be. The old version was the best, in my opinion, and I think we should stick with that one because it's easier to read and understand. --EclipseSSD (talk) 13:41, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

I've added the old font-size style parameters to the infobox template, they should now be the same size as they were before. Bryan Derksen (talk) 23:22, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Language parameter

I'm no syntax boffin, but I'm guessing there's a way to stop blank language parameters from automatically adding Category:-language films. —97198 talk 13:47, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Granted, it's something that should be fixed, but I would think that in most cases language can and should be specified. PC78 (talk) 23:03, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Language linking

Could the wikilinking of the language be suppressed when it's the same as the language of the Wikipedia it's on? What we now have in the English wikipedia is an enormous number of film articles with links to English language which are never going to be clicked on, as the readers of the English wikipedia presumably already know what the English language is. Colonies Chris (talk) 14:50, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

You make a good suggestion. Perhaps you can bring up this topic at WT:FILM? You'll have more attention to it. —Erik (talk • contrib) - 15:18, 6 May 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the suggestion - I've just done that now. Colonies Chris (talk) 23:04, 6 May 2008 (UTC)
I raised it there and the only comment was a request for clarification. The requester has not followed up on my reply, so there seem to be no objections, and my reading of WP:OVERLINK suggests that it should not be linked. Could this change be made to the template? Colonies Chris (talk) 08:07, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Copyright

Is this template copyrighted? If it is, I will take it down from conservapedia. Thank you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.24.122.248 (talk) 17:54, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

It is copyrighted but also released under the free content license GFDL. Garion96 (talk) 17:59, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Add an optional parameter called "broadcast_premiere"

{{edit protected}} request pending

Made-for-television films such as HBO's Recount don't have release dates, they have broadcast premieres. So I propose adding a parameter called "broadcast_premiere" to be used in such cases. I'll turn this into an explicit edit request after waiting a few days to see if its controversial in some way that I haven't anticipated. 67.101.6.13 (talk) 06:12, 27 May 2008 (UTC).

There is another infobox for made for television films, {{Infobox Television Film}}, that has that, though it also uses Release date for the wording. Its basically the same thing. The lead notes that its a made for television movie, indicating that release date = first aired. I dont't think another field is necessary.-- Collectonian (talk · contribs) 06:48, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
I have to agree with Collectonian here - it's a superfluous parameter which also borders on stepping on the toes of WikiProject Television. Plus, the existence of the parameter may be confusing enough that users start adding a TV broadcast premiere date to theatrically-released films' infoboxes. Let's keep things simple instead of going in the direction of instruction creep. Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 07:20, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Location

Maybe there should be a location setting for the film. Mcanmoocanu

[edit] Image size coding

Current coding is:

{{#if:{{{image_size|}}}|<!--then:-->{{px|{{{image_size}}} }}|<!--else:-->200px}}

But {{px}} allows for empty as well as blank parameters, and allows for default values. Hence above can be simplified to:

{{px|{{{image_size|}}}|200}}

If no objections, I can insert the revised code. David Ruben Talk 14:56, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm not as familiar with the code on this one, but I can always support more simplicity. Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 18:30, 12 June 2008 (UTC)