Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/V for Vendetta (film)

V for Vendetta (film)

Well-written article, in particular its bevity and excellent prose. It has undergone two peer reviews, and I believe that it deserves featured status. Those who have contributed to the article should give themselves a pat for the effort put into it. - Mailer Diablo 16:02, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

• Comment: Surely the film itself should be cited as a reference? Or was the plot synopsis cobble together from the reviews? — BrianSmithson 17:11, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Request for Clarification: Based on the current FA film articles November (film), Casablanca (film), Halloween (film), Ran (film), Tenebrae (film), the plot is usually not referenced, as it is implied that the plot is based on the film. (The film's reference is typically seen as the IMDB, and possibly a script if one happens to be available.) The IMDB reference itself is typically listed under external links or in the infobox of the film, and not as a footnote. WikiProject Films supports this policy as well. Have your concerns been addressed? Feel free to ask additional questions if your concerns have not been adddressed. --P-Chan 18:26, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Based on those articles and how my own article below is being received. I would say that the plot synopsis does not need to be sourced, since the information is widely available. A good example would be if the sentence "George Bush's middle inital is W." appeared in an article, this would not have to be sourced since it is known by everyone. Now the plot of a film is not that well known but it is still relatively easy to access. And don't call him, Shirley. The Filmaker 22:01, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Points for the Airplane reference. I don't see what it would hurt to add the film itself to the sources, though. If it is being used as a source, it's strikes me as academically dishonest not to list it. — BrianSmithson 00:17, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

I kind of disagree with this. It just seems odd to add such a reference. Where would it be added anyway? It would be a shame to start a general references section just for the film reference, as citations would definantly not be appropriate. No other film uses it, the closest I have seen such references, is like, DVD commentry. A reference to film, in the article about the film just seems redundant to me. There are a wealth of references and external links on the page. Referncing the film wold just be akward and not offer much in my opinon. Cvene64 17:05, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

No, the purpose of adding a reference is to allow someone to know the source of a particular bit of information. It should be implicitely obvious that when you are describing the plot of a work, the source of the information is the work itself. Thus, no reference is necessary. Raul654 19:03, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

• Support Excellent article that is now ready to be featured. Cvene64 01:09, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

• Object—2a.
  • 'as well as' is a marked version of 'and'. Why does it appear twice in the lead, in contexts where you're just listing items that don't appear to deserve marking (i.e., their inclusion is not unexpected or suprising or otherwise notable)? <--The excessive use of 'as well' has been addressed based on this suggestion.--P-Chan 03:20, 13 May 2006 (UTC)
  • 'wide variety' should not be hyphenated. But why not remove the final five words—they're so vague that they're unnecessary ("V for Vendetta has been the target of both criticism and praise from a wide-variety of groups.") <-- The vague "wide-variety of groups", has been changed to "various political groups", based on the above suggestion. --P-Chan 03:28, 13 May 2006 (UTC)
  • "set in the near future, where Britain is ..."—when, not where? <--'"where" was replaced by "when", based on the this suggestion.--P-Chan 03:36, 13 May 2006 (UTC)
  • "ends up helping V escape"—nicer as "helps V to escape" <-- "ends up helping V escape" changed to "helps V to escape, based on this suggestion. --P-Chan 03:44, 13 May 2006 (UTC)
  • "Evey is eventually told"—in this type of account, words such as "eventually" clag up the text, and are unnecessary unless you need to mark a duration, which I don't think you do here
  • "raid Gordon's home shortly thereafter"—the final word is now over-formal and convoluted in this register; OK in a national constitution <-- Addressed by changing "shortly thereafter" to "shortly after"--P-Chan 04:55, 13 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Why is "released" italicised? It's not contrastive .... - fixed. Cvene64 03:44, 13 May 2006 (UTC)
  • "Then a bioterrorism attack occurred killing approximately 100,000 and spread even more fear and panic across the country." A few more commas would ease the reader's task. "about" preferred to "approximately", because it's plainer and shorter. "100,000 people, spreading ..." would be better. - Changed to "...a bioterrorism attack occurred, killing about 100,000, spreading more fear and panic across the country".Cvene64 03:49, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Possible POV problems (2c/d)

• • The film tones down the anarchist themes that were present in the original story and revised the story to better reflect current issues." Or is it just too vague? <-- It was vague and is now fixed.--P-Chan 21:45, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Needs a careful copy-edit throughout, not just a fixing of these examples. Tony 03:01, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

• Support. I'm happy with this article as it is (but hope some good objections are raised). Sarge Baldy 04:12, 13 May 2006 (UTC)
• Oppose. Uses six copyrighted images, far more than necessary for identification of the film. One of them, Image:Vendetta8comiccover.jpg, really isn't fair use in this article, because its tag says it may be used "to illustrate: the issue of the comic book in question; the periodical comic book series of which this issue is a part; or the copyrighted comic book character(s) or group(s) on the cover of the issue in question", not to illustrate an article about a movie based on the comic book. Angr (t • c) 00:07, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Ok. The fair-use images have been reduced to four. Cvene64 10:09, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Hello, I've never actually seen a policy or guideline that speaks to what the maximum amount of copyrighted pictures can be in an article and still qualify for fair use. I was wondering if you could share with me some of the documents you use to help you decide this. This is something that I'm really interested in, just because I plan on contributing to additional feature articles in the future. So far, this is the only guideline I've used [1]. Because of all the various policies, rules and wikiprojects, I find the whole FAC process quite interesting and painful at the same time. :) Cheers. --P-Chan 03:29, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Most fair-use tags simply say "a limited number" without being specific as to what that means. The policy at Wikipedia:Fair use says "The amount of copyrighted work used should be as little as possible." In the case of V for Vendetta (film), my own opinion is that using the poster and the one image of the two main characters sitting together (plus the free image of Natalie Portman at the press conference, of course), should be sufficient. Angr (t • c) 08:52, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

If that is the key policy that we have to work with, then there seems to be room for interpretation. Looking over the other FA articles, from Blade Runner to November (film) to Ran (film), the number of copyrighted images seems to vary a lot. The Fair-use descriptions, however, are very different. I have no idea if the Fair-use descriptions are used in judging the number of FA allowed or not, but I think they would be a very important factor. Otherwise this would be a totally subjective process and would involve a lot of guessing. I'd love to speak with you about this further and hope we can keep an open dialogue on this. It's important to have a picture depicting the graphic novel in the article. It is a major line of discussion about this film and can be justified based on past FA articles. Starship Troopers for example, is a recent FA that shows a poter of the film, etc. Thanks. --P-Chan 15:44, 14 May 2006 (UTC) (BTW, I know we can create a great fair-use justificiation, that I believe should be able to satisfy your standards).

Unfortunately, we can't allow precedent to take precedence here, if you'll pardon the pun. The earlier FA's should not have used so many copyrighted images either, but no one thought of it at the time. Angr (t • c) 05:14, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

• Comment, quotes should not be in italics, see the MoS.--Peta 06:42, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

User is quoting policy WP:MOS#Quotations. Result: The italics on the quotes in the article have been removed. Thank's for pointing that out. (It's really appreciated). --P-Chan 06:53, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

• Comment I don't object at all and I would support this, but I don't feel I have been nearly active enough to deserve that. The Wachowskis' article says "It should also be mentioned that many critics have accused the brothers of being overly pretentious, giving their works just enough of the appearance of being philosophical to be seen as deep, while in fact being shallow metaphors. This criticism was especially pronounced in the comments of fans of the brothers' adaptation of Alan Moore's V for Vendetta (along with Moore's own scathing remarks)..." I don't see that in the Reception section. That also isn't sourced, but if you have a chance and can find a source for such criticisms add it. The lack of this information, if it exists, certainly doesn't make it not FA worthy, but it would be a useful addition. Atropos 04:40, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, there are mountains of comments (from IMDB, critics, commentators, blogs, forums, etc) that all have their various angles on the film. I've never come across those comments myself, but I'm sure they exist. Cheers.--P-Chan 04:58, 17 May 2006 (UTC)