Talk:The Sweet Hereafter (film)/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Popcornduff (talk · contribs) 12:07, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

This is one of my favourite films. Looking forward to reviewing this article. Popcornduff (talk) 12:07, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

Comments

First impressions: this looks like a nice, concise, well-cited article.

The prose is generally good, but I have some suggestions for clarifying and simplifying some parts:

Lead

• "As with the novel" - unnecessary
  •  Done
• "large class action lawsuit" - "large" isn't necessary, class-action is a compound adjective in this case so needs a hyphen
  •  Done
• lead sections don't need citations - citing in the body is sufficient.
  • Removed Oscar ref. Not sure where Alton mention belongs in body at this time.
    • The Alton info does need to be in the body, not the lead. I suggest adding a sentence to the start of the Production section, something like: "The Sweet Hereafter is adapted from the novel of the same name by Russell Banks, inspired by actual events in Alton, Texas in 1989." Popcornduff (talk) 02:14, 14 August 2016 (UTC)
      • Moved the footnote, but disagree a mention can't be in the lead. Ribbet32 (talk) 05:33, 14 August 2016 (UTC)
        • I meant it couldn't only be mentioned in the lead. Keeping the mention in the lead is fine. The new sentence is good and actually gives more relevant information, nice job. Popcornduff (talk) 06:44, 14 August 2016 (UTC)
• "The film was highly acclaimed upon its release" - this sounds like puffery and it's unnecessary when you have the concrete facts of the awards instead. delete.
  • Removed "highly," but awards and reviews aren't exactly the same thing. Ribbet32 (talk) 00:14, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Plot

This looks a little short to me. (I have a funny feeling I wrote it - or a version of it - a long time ago, whoops.) Having said that, I err on the side of brevity, and it's a deliberately concise movie, so if you don't think there's anything worth expanding on, that's totally cool. Clearly I didn't seem to think so at the time. Just double-check.

You don't need cast names in plot summaries when you have a cast section - unnecessary duplication.

• •  Done

Comment disagree running through the barrier isn't important, since the lawsuit (may) have been against the town for the rail. Ribbet32 (talk) 06:49, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

• Good point. The terms (rail/barrier) were not consistent before, so I missed this. I've reinserted it and made them consistent. Popcornduff (talk) 06:53, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

Production

• "Egoyan found it was initially challenging to acquire the rights to the novel, saying "it wasn’t available."" What does this mean? Sounds vague/euphemistic. Concrete details please.
  •  Done
• " Novelist Margaret Atwood suggested Egoyan meet with Banks personally after his success with the film Exotica (1994)." Who does "his" refer to? And who did she suggest it to, Egoyan or Banks? She's a writer so maybe she knows Egoyan?
  •  Done
• "Banks was willing to grant Egoyan the rights, and Egoyan later stated he was drawn to the novel because he felt film was for "Confronting the most extreme things." These two pieces of information seem unconnected.
  •  Done
• "in order to make funding from Canada more accessible." - simplify: "to help secure Canadian funding"
  •  Done
• "Another major change is Egoyan's addition " - > "Egoyan also added"
  •  Done
• "Egoyan wrote his own stanza " - "his own" sounds like he wrote it to keep for himself, so -> "Eogyan wrote a new stanza"
  •  Done
• "Egoyan explained" -> "He explained"
  •  Done
• "Holm accepted the role," - We know this, delete
  • Tweaked.
• "Holm called his part a "Difficult role,"" - > no need for a quote, Holm found the role difficult
  •  Done
• Egoyan and the Canadian actors to be great to work with. -> pretty bland, essentially "he liked the job". delete, not interesting.
  • Made difficult role easier.
• "The Pied Piper theme influenced Mychael Danna's music," what is the Pied Piper theme? Who is Mychael Danna?
  •  Done
• "the use of Medieval-style music was adopted" -> medieval-style music was used
  •  Done
• "Polley's character, Nicole, was an aspiring singer before the accident," - > should be "is", not "was"
  •  Done
• "The two songs were chosen because of their largely domestic popularity, " -> what does "largely domestic popularity" mean?
  • Seems like "largely" was causing the confusion, removed.
• "sexual content," "rather than the early film's artistic merit." - > "sexual content ... rather than the early film's artistic merit."
  •  Done
• "The film received overwhelming critical acclaim upon its release. " - delete - let the facts (ie the RT score and critics' quotes) do the talking.
  •  Done
• "The A.V. Club named The Sweet Hereafter as the 22nd best film" - > delete "as"
  •  Done Ribbet32 (talk) 00:14, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Great, thanks. I tweaked a few more small things, mainly grammar issues; I hope that's OK - seemed simpler than just listing them all in a niggly way.

Apart from the detail about it being "challenging" to get the rights, which is still unclear IMO, I only have one more major issue with the prose. The box office section basically restates the same information (it was a box office flop but critical success) several times, quoting multiple sources. I'm sure you can condense this into a one or two-sentence summary. It's only useful to quote a source if they have something original or insightful to say about the situation; for example, the quote about why Exotica performed better is good because it tells us something new, rather than just restate the same thing. But the others are just repetitive. Does that make sense? Popcornduff (talk) 08:31, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Oh, one more thing. Looks like some text got garbled: "Holm explained hes acceptance". Huh? Popcornduff (talk) 08:34, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Tweaked prose; respectfully disagree about box office analysis, Writers Guild adds some context about other Canadian films and the international box office specifically; Stuart adds the film aimed for a mass audience; Spokesman-Review comments specifically on box office. Ribbet32 (talk) 15:38, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Fair enough. I'm not persuaded all the quotes are necessary but it's not a major problem and it's still readable and clear. Popcornduff (talk) 04:09, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

• " Egoyan found it was initially challenging to acquire the rights to the novel, saying "it wasn’t available," due to rights being optioned to studios that weren't actually producing it." Thanks for clarifying this. But it's so wordy, you have a contraction which isn't MOS-approved, it isn't quite technically correct (source says studio, not studios) and I don't see why the quote is necessary. Most importantly, I also think it still fails to explain the story very clearly; if it was already optioned, how did Egoyan get the rights at all? Reading the source, it looks like you can express it more simply as something like: "Egoyan was initially unable to get the rights to the book, as had been optioned by another studio. Two years later, at the suggestion of novelist Margaret Atwood, he spoke to Banks personally. As the studio option was about to expire, Banks, tired of studio procrastination, gave the rights to Egoyan on the condition that he make the film." You should also wikilink to option (filmmaking). Popcornduff (talk) 04:03, 12 August 2016 (UTC)
  • Thanks for finding that wikilink. Revised. Ribbet32 (talk) 12:56, 12 August 2016 (UTC)
• "Egoyan later stated he was drawn to the novel because he felt film is for "confronting the most extreme things."" I don't understand this. Why would his opinion on film attract him to a novel? Do you mean he was drawn to adapt the novel? Popcornduff (talk) 04:06, 12 August 2016 (UTC)
  •  Done

Drive-by notes from Moisejp

A very nice article! A couple of comments:

• Please see Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Punctuation_inside_or_outside. In a nutshell, periods and commas should go outside of the quotation marks if it is not a complete sentence being quoted. I would argue that this applies not only to the main text but also the References section.
• In the External links section, it would be helpful if the link "Film reviews" had more information about the source or specifics of the content. Cheers, Moisejp (talk) 05:30, 14 August 2016 (UTC)
  • Removed that link- never heard of FilmVault, and it doesn't appear to have a Wikipedia article. Ribbet32 (talk) 05:36, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

Criteria checklist

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

1. Is it reasonably well written?

   A. Prose is "clear and concise", without copyvios, or spelling and grammar errors:

   B. MoS compliance for lead, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list:

2. Is it factually accurate and verifiable?

   A. Has an appropriate reference section:

   B. Citation to reliable sources where necessary:

   C. No original research:

3. Is it broad in its coverage?

   A. Major aspects:

   B. Focused:

4. Is it neutral?

   Fair representation without bias:

5. Is it stable?

   No edit wars, etc:

6. Does it contain images to illustrate the topic?

   A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid fair use rationales are provided for non-free content:

   B. Images are provided if possible and are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions:

7. Overall:

   Pass or Fail:

OK, this looks like a Good Article to me. Congratulations and thanks for your hard work! Popcornduff (talk) 04:40, 15 August 2016 (UTC)