Is the rating for this film biased by vote-stuffing? A viewpoint.

Let me start by noting that I am not a cast member, relative of a cast member, roommate of a former high school classmate of the cousin of a cast member, or in any other way connected to the film. Nor have I been bribed to write this review, either by the film's admirers or by its detractors. (Though I would welcome such bribes should you be so inclined; bids start at a c-note.) I say this, because some reviewers have suggested that the high weighted (and average) rating this film has received is a result of a concerted ballot-stuffing effort on the part of the film's makers. Here are my thoughts on that (for my thoughts on the film itself, see my review).

First, let's be clear. OF COURSE the makers of this movie asked their cast members, friends, relatives, and anybody they could find with an internet connection to give this a high rating as a means of attracting folks like you and me to going to see the movie. Lots of people do this. That's why the gnomes of IMDb came up with their weighting system, to try to mitigate the influence of such efforts. My own sense -- and I don't work for IMDb, so I'm no insider here, but I am a cooker of numbers by trade -- is that the system works pretty well. I say this because I have observed the way in which the "raw averages" diverge from the weighted averages substantially for some low-vote films. Check out "Manna from Heaven," a film being distributed by its producers and relying almost entirely on word-of-mouth and every bit of free publicity it can get. As of this writing, the average vote ("arithmetic mean") is 8.1; the weighted average is only 5.8.

Now, what is interesting about Gabriela is that the weighted average (8.1) is GREATER than the arithmetic mean (7.9). This means that the few people who are giving this film a low mark are, on average, less reliable than those giving it a 10! One reason may be that, in reacting so strongly and voting low, they trigger the flags in the system that discount their votes. I don't know, of course, since (see above) I am not an insider. What I do know is that a system that seems pretty good at ferreting out frauds is not being tripped by this film. Interesting, says me.

Another bit of evidence against the "fraud" claim is the number of voters. Over 600 people have registered their opinion of this film so far. If that is ballot-stuffing, then the makers of this movie must have an awful lot of internet-savvy friends. As near as I can tell, the average Indie filmmaker is lucky to get 40 or 50 people to stuff the ballot box here.

My third observation is that the recent trend of votes seems to be consistent with the early trend. Despite the presence of some pretty harsh reviews on this site, the fact is that since I became aware of this film and the controversy around its rating, over 50% of the NEW votes have been a 10. (I'm not one of them; I gave it a 7).

Fourth and most convincing for me is that 71 of the "Top 1000" voters have seen this film and rated it -- and 75% of them gave it a 10. The arithmetic mean is 8.7. This is a group of film lovers who are not easily bought off (hell, IMDb won't even tell you who they are!).

My take is that this film is for real. It is not everyone's cup of tea, but for most who see it, it is a VERY enjoyable film.

What do you think?