A chronicle of pedantry, delusion, and bliss from the games first 100 grids.
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Its a milestone moment: we justpublished the 100th Cinematrix.
And to be clear, we love this.
The enthusiasm and competitiveness and overall level of politeness in the feedback you share with us has been heartening.
Its been a fun road to the century mark.
Thanks for coming along for the ride.
For one: No!
XXL isnt a valid numeral in theRoman system.
For another, the XXL ofMagic Mikerefers the size of the guys big ol dicks.
Correction:Youre right, an uncredited Gwyneth Paltrow does appear at the airport inDogma.
The Basics
RulesReview
A refresher on categories that continue to trip players up.
.Articles count
.
The answer: always.
In the [number] Words in Title categories, every word counts.An American Tailis a three-word title.
When it comes to Movie Title Starts with a Vowel, we count every letter.
That meansThe Accuseddoes not begin with a vowel, whileA Simple Plandoes.
.Lets define a book
This comes up a lot, so lets lay it all out.
.Know your tomatoes … Alas, we go by the critics score, a.k.a.
Because we are unrepentant elitists, thats why.
(Plusits all gamedanyway, right?)
It depends on how its being used.
(Dont worry,Y Tu Mama Tambienis on our radar.)
Clarification: Non-words are one word
WhatisF9?Is that … a word?
Two words smooshed together?
However, words separated by a slash are two distinct words, meaningVictor/Victoria and 50/50are considered two-word titles.
because steve carrell looks exactly the same in the posterspic.twitter.com/cV3cZISaov
contretemps
Don’t get us started on documentary eligibility.
3.Set in Space
3.
By far the most dorm-room conversation weve had in Cinematrix Slack.
2.City or State in Title
2.
What we underestimated was just how many of you would want to useBilly Madisonas your answer.
Of course, Madison in that title doesnt refer to the city of Madison; its his name.
(This argument has been moderately persuasive.)
(The King of Staten Islandwas another common wrong answer.)
But those were the easy examples.
Trying to parse California municipal designations alone nearly drove us to retire the category forever.
1.Character Name in Title
1.
Weve wrestled with the definition of Character Name in Title more than any other category.
We tried to be very cut-and-dried and insist that it had to be a proper name.
And then the moniker floodgates opened.
ShouldJokercount if the characters proper name is Arthur Fleck?
If Batman counts forBatman, shouldntThe Dark Knightalso?
(Ditto Superman andMan of Steel.)
How official does a moniker need to be?
Short of convincing IMDb to change the way they have always listed movies, theres nothing we can do.
That’s the whole gag!
The one problem: Ridley Scott has never won an Oscar.
It only feels like he did.
DidntGladiatorwin Best Picture, you ask?
This makes perfect logical sense sinceShrekwon the very first Oscar for Best Animated Feature in 2002.
Thing is, directors Andrew Adamson and Vicky Jensen werent the recipients.
That is, frankly, mean to both them and you.
Do uncredited cameos not count?
Yes, this uncredited cameo should have counted.
In other countries, including the films native Australia, its calledEvil Angels.
This has tripped up many a Cinematrix player (as well as Jimmy Kimmel).
But unless you were aware of that as an alternate title, you wouldnt know to pick it.
Now at least youll be better prepared for future Meryl Streep (and Sam Neill!)
It waswritten bya young upstart named JJ Abrams, but it wasdirected bythe legend and Oscar-winner Mike Nichols.
Not gonna live that one down any time soon.
Thats very kind of you.
