Wikipedia:Featured article review/Latter Days/archive1


 * The following is an archived discussion of a featured article review. Please do not modify it. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page or at Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was kept by Dana boomer 19:45, 4 April 2011.

Latter Days

 * Notified: Dev920, SandyGeorgia, WikiProject Film, WikiProject LGBT studies, WikiProject Latter Day Saint movement

I am nominating this featured article for review because it does not meet the current Featured Article criteria 1(b): comprehensive. The 'Development and production' section is very short, like not even of GA length. To bring the section up to FA standard would require an enormous amount of research and work. - Kollision (talk) 03:40, 26 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Comment: I believe the de-list proposer should make a substantive actual review. Like Sasata going over "Painted turtle". Starting this whole process of with a paragraph does not make sense.  Delister should show that he's read the article in detail front to bakc and composed a thoughtful hit list to really review the thing up and down.  If we are going to spool up other reviewers and authors, then the delist proposal should be a first class review to start things off.TCO (talk) 14:38, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Hi TCO, and thanks for your comments. When there are major issues with a FA, such as the comprehensiveness issues brought up by Kollision above, it often does little good for the FAR initiator to spend a lot of time writing up a review, although they can if they wish. A line-by-line prose review, like you often see at FAC, normally does little good, because if there is someone around who wants to bring the article back up to meeting the FA criteria, they often re-write the whole article, or large parts of it, making the reviewer's line-by-line review moot and rather pointless. So, it is often best to start out by pointing out one or more large areas, and then, if someone appears to work on the article, get more and more detailed once the major issues have been nailed down. Although some FAR initators write longer reviews than the one above, others are even shorter. It just depends on how much is wrong with the article - you often see shorter reviews with more problems, because it's easier to point out where the issues are. Dana boomer (talk) 16:30, 26 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Thoughtful review does not equate to detailed prose go over. TCO (talk) 16:58, 26 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Comment: This is not the kind of film that will have a long article, much less a long section about production. I am not sure if it is necessary to do a Featured Article review for this reason. Possible improvements would include shortening the plot summary (and excising the unhelpful Idaho image) and converting the "Cast" section into a list of actors and roles followed by prose, but I do not think we will be finding extensive production information or critical analysis for this film. Erik (talk &#124; contribs) 20:13, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

More detailed review by Kollision — Kollision (talk) 04:07, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Infobox
 * Needs American theatrical release date
 * Lead section
 * Needs box office details
 * Plot
 * A smidge long. WP:MOSFILM recommends a word count under 700 words for films like this.
 * Could also use a reduction in the number of paragraphs, if possible.
 * Cast
 * "Cox said that Erik's" → "Cox said that Palladino's"
 * Too much plot information in Sister Gladys Davis' description. Remove everything after "cannot accept the fact that her son is gay."
 * "upon learning that he's gay" → "upon learning that he is gay"
 * Development and production
 * Surely there's got to be more out there that could be added to this article.
 * Alot of emotional "reviews" can be found, but very little substantial facts beyond those already present. GermanJoe (talk) 18:53, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
 * For example, in this article Cox talks about how the sexuality of the actors was unimportant in the casting process, why the film was released unrated, how he showed the film to his family, his research into Mormon excommunication tribunals, and how Bisset offered suggestions to the script. All of this should be in a Featured Article.
 * Done - details added to production (grammar up to improvement ...), however i believe the family detail doesn't really belong in the article. I don't think it's notable enough for the film itself (it would be different, if suggestions from the family were taken into consideration for the production - but there is no evidence for it). GermanJoe (talk) 18:53, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Filming location?
 * Principal photography start and end dates?
 * No exact dates available (atleast i can't find some). GermanJoe (talk) 20:13, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Release
 * A lot of the information in the Critical section is not about the film's critical response at all. All non-critical response information should be split into a Release section.
 * "One person who attended Outfest"
 * Who?
 * Move to Critical response section
 * "aired at Seattle and Washington film" - "aired" → "screened"
 * "The film was released in few other countries, mostly at gay film festivals, as the ones in Barcelona and Madrid (where it was also a popular pick) and Mexico City."
 * I don't understand this sentence.
 * Clarified this (and similar lead phrase) a bit. The problem is mixing of "country releases" and "festivals" in one structure, i think. GermanJoe (talk) 20:10, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
 * "In 2005 it had already received nine best film awards."
 * Does that mean it received nine best film awards in 2005 or does it mean that by 2005 it had received nine best film awards.
 * Which nine best film awards?
 * Done, clarified and award list updated GermanJoe (talk) 21:30, 2 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Move to Awards section?
 * I'd like to keep it there, if it's not critical. A single sentence looks odd together with the awards table and the promotion at dozens of festivals apparently was an essential part of the release strategy. GermanJoe (talk) 20:26, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
 * "made $834,685 from a maximum of 19 theaters." - Not in citation given. Replace with Box Office Mojo citation.
 * "As of October 2009, the film is the top grossing film from its studio TLA Releasing." - Source?
 * Critical response
 * "Critical reviews have also been mixed" - remove "also"
 * "one wrote, "Cox's screenplay, while" - Who?
 * "with one critic saying Latter Days was" - Who?
 * A total of only five reviews. More should be added.
 * Another critical review added, most reviews have similar details and arguments and don't really tell anything new. GermanJoe (talk) 20:59, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Rotten Tomatoes
 * Move sentence to after "Critical reviews have also been mixed"
 * "movie review website" → "film review website"
 * Remove italics from website name
 * Soundtrack
 * "written by C. Jay Cox for Julie" → "written by C. Jay Cox for Rebekah Johnson"
 * "impressed with C. Jay Cox's musical" → "impressed with Cox's musical"
 * References
 * iblist.com citation needs accessdate
 * The title for one of the Rotten Tomatoes citations is "Hancock Movie Reviews"
 * Several dead links. Fix if possible.
 * Images
 * Alt text should be added for all images
 * Procedural note: Alt text is no longer required for featured articles. Editors can add it if they want, but it is not necessary. Dana boomer (talk) 13:27, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment: very solid stuff, Kollisen. Shake your manly hand.  If there is a "lover" of the film, he has the workplan for what is needed to fix it. Sounds like there is a general issue of several flaws as well as a key content gap in the film production background.TCO (talk) 14:25, 27 January 2011 (UTC)


 * I think deeper discussion of the commercial aspects of the film is needed. There's the infobox and then a slim paragraph.  But if we are going to do FAs on niche films that didn't make money, let's tell the story of how they bombed (release plans, week one, blabla).  Also discussion of any DVD versions and the take is warranted.  Other than that, will add a note on the drama and gay project boards, see if they want to do the work to build up the article.  Added a See also to Orgazmo (although a spoof, pretty similar content (sex and Mormon missionaries).) [edit, signed late and cut note below, just for clarity, no intention to mess with others talk!]TCO (talk) 16:56, 28 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Awards - "Which nine best film awards?" The German language site http://latterdays.profun.de/preise.html shows 7 awards (all audience awards apparently), but seems to be incomplete as atleast Madrid is missing. So 9 seems reasonable. If any more details from this site are interesting, i can probably translate them. Most of the information is already incorporated in the article. GermanJoe (talk) 12:04, 28 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Source for TLA top grossing film - Here is a list of numbers for TLA: http://www.the-numbers.com/market/Distributors/TLA.php. Can someone check reliability of source though? Looks like RS but not 100% sure. GermanJoe (talk) 19:33, 28 January 2011 (UTC)


 * I researched it in the Project talk . TN is fine.  There are two sources they use, BOM (owned by IMDB) and TN (owned by this Nash research firm).  Each uses a method for estimating takes as they don't have the P&L actually (inside the companies).  They're the estimates used by industry and our project.  they can differ from each other, so for a particular problem, you might have an idea which is better.  Also have to be careful when combining numbers from the two sources (like a breakout versus total).  But basically yeah, that source is good.TCO (talk) 22:30, 28 January 2011 (UTC)
 * The link you provided above is a search page. Could you please provide a link to a specific project discussion that decided it was a reliable source? Also, just because the project decided it was reliable doesn't necessarily mean that it is a high-quality reliable source as required by the featured article critiera. For this, you need to prove that the information is compiled by subject experts, or that the site is quoted by other high-quality reliable sources. Dana boomer (talk) 22:34, 28 January 2011 (UTC)
 * If you want to maker a reasoned argugment to disagree with the project practice that is fine with me. I read the About us section on TN website and it passed my sniff test for an RS (an independant busines, not a hobby site, been around for a while and does consulting).  That and I checked several discussions (I won't copy all the urls, but just go the ones that have a "section" that calls out the "the Numbers" or "the Numbers or BOM", you will see them readily.  Check the first three and it will back up my story).TCO (talk) 22:41, 28 January 2011 (UTC)
 * It is the main editor's burden to prove reliability of sources, and the reviewer's burden to question sources that might not meet the HQRS criteria. I have given the method by which this can be proven. Also, please re-read my comment about project vs. FA sources. Dana boomer (talk) 22:48, 28 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I have investigated the issue and discussed it in a higher level of detail. It is my considered opinion that this is a reasonable source for movie takes. TCO (talk) 22:53, 28 January 2011 (UTC)
 * OK. I looked at all the FA movies in Portal Film that started with A or B.  None of them used TN.  All used BOM (Box Office Mojo).  I don't know why one is favored over the other (they are both estimates), and I'm even open to learning why one is better (did not hear clear reasons in the talk page discussions).  But if you can get BOM numbers might as well use those.  If you can't, I think we should throw down on this why is BOM better than TN issue.  (I still think it would be interesting to hear a rationale for why one is more FA worthy than the other, not just that's how we do it, but why.)  BTW, there was at least one FA (Blade Runner) that did not have its gate sourced.  Also a lot of variance as to whether the infobox had a citation or the article, but I tried to dig in article for the ones that lacked it in box.TCO (talk) 23:30, 28 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure what you mean by "discussed it in a higher level of detail"? You have yet to show evidence that the source is of a high quality - all editors are obviously allowed to have opinions, but they are expected to provide evidence to back up those opinions. Pointing to other FAs is not always reasonable, as many times older FAs did not have the source checking done at FAC that is done today. As I said above, showing that the source is by a subject expert or that other high quality sources reference this one is what is needed to prove HQRS. Dana boomer (talk) 23:33, 28 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Dana, I've now bolded the earlier comment which was exactly on the topic of industry expertise. It was my summary of the About Us field which describes the firm and its output.  Just click on it and read it.  Then give an up or a down.  I already gave like four points about it.  I'm not going to do more translation between the website and here.  On the earlier FAs, yes, I completely agree that "error carried forward" is an issue and my comments reflected the same caveat you have.TCO (talk) 23:44, 28 January 2011 (UTC)
 * TCO, I read that part of your comment. What the business says about itself is really a minor part of the equation. I can set up a website that says I am an established business that does consulting - that doesn't make it true. Does the New York Times reference their information? Does the author of the website write articles on the subject for other reliable sources? I'm not saying that you have to provide this information - I'm simply saying that you should be prepared to provide this information before declaring that it is a reliable source. Dana boomer (talk) 00:04, 29 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Whether or not The-Numbers.com is a reliable source has been brought numerous times (including recently) at WikiProject Film and the Reliable Sources Noticeboard (eg. here and here). The current consensus is that it is a reliable source. Box Office Mojo is considered more accurate most of the time but The-Numbers is still reliable. The website has been mentioned in The Wall Street Journal, The Times and MovieMaker. - Kollision (talk) 06:25, 29 January 2011 (UTC)
 * [Unindent] While i agree with the others, that TN looks like RS, i have added the similar BOM-statistics as ref for the moment. BOM is already used, so we avoid mixing sources and a longer discussing within FAR. I wasn't aware, there was a can of worms here to step in, sorry :). If other sources are deemed more reliable, it can simply be replaced. GermanJoe (talk) 11:33, 29 January 2011 (UTC)


 * External links - all broken external links can be fixed with archived sites from wayback, except ref 13 for Mexico, the archived links are accessible, but page format looks broken. I can add the other ones, just need a bit time as i have to get used to the tool. GermanJoe (talk) 22:19, 28 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Done - all ELs up to date or linked to web archives, 1 meaningless DAB removed, ALT text for info box added. All References points of nominator addressed. GermanJoe (talk) 12:42, 29 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Done - Info box theatrical release and lead box office info added. GermanJoe (talk) 17:05, 29 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Plot - Shortened a bit, removed a few side details, rearranged paragraphs. Feel free to change wording, where necessary. My English is sub-optimal at times. GermanJoe (talk) 13:24, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Names of critics clarified, (hopefully) award count for 9 awards clarified.

Kollision, your points have been very thorough and helpful. Would you mind double-checking and striking finished points? Thank you. As i haven't edited many articles, this comes as a nice exercise (i realize someone else will probably need to do a final copy-edit and MOS check). GermanJoe (talk) 15:44, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Most of the time, with these to-do lists in reviews you are free to strike-out anything you've done yourself. I've struck off the done items anyway. Good job.- Kollision (talk) 02:36, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Update - all points of the original nominator are adressed, either with edits or with additional information, where the edit wouldn't be beneficial in my opinion. If i missed any major point, please update the list accordingly. GermanJoe (talk) 13:19, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Comment - Could the nominator and other interested editors/reviewers comment on whether they think that this article can be kept without a FARC? If not, more comments on what needs to be fixed would probably be helpful for the main editors to the article. Thanks! Dana boomer (talk) 14:52, 14 March 2011 (UTC)


 * Save. Many small issues were identified and improved.  The one key issue of production details was improved as reasonably possible (this was not Gone with the Wind (movie), we are never going to have super detail on the production).  There have been no negative commens for a month and does not seem to be even a debate of a key issue.  I say Kudos to Kollison, the initial reviewer and to GermanJoe, the one who jumped and did work.  The process worked as it should and I think you can reasonably move this to keep without discussion (that the crits petered out a month ago, should be enough, IMO).TCO (talk) 19:20, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep The quality of the article has been improved greatly over the review period and I support this article being kept as an FA. - Kollision (talk) 04:32, 19 March 2011 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.