Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Film

Is there a better way to handle genres in the opening sentence than we currently do? I've noticed Nikkimaria changing these for WP:SEAOFBLUE purposes (to avoid scenarios such as "action horror film"), and I don't disagree with what they're doing, but I'm not a fan either of adding "and" in between "science fiction" and "horror film". I'm looking at the genre pages and they're so disorganised. Science fiction horror film, which would be an option for Prometheus (2012 film), as an example, redirects to a generic list of science fiction horror films, which I think categories make redundant anyway. Surely, if there is no specific science fiction horror page, then it should redirect to science fiction film with a subsection on hybrid genres or specifically science fiction horror?

The other option, would be for them to link to an anchor on Film genre, which has a table featuring sub-genres (though science fiction horror is missing). I note there is an additional article List of genres, which seems to duplicate content in the former article, but covers more ground. I'm not sure what the answer is but I think now would be the time to fix this and maybe consolidate some content. Though, at the very least, I think science fiction horror film should redirect to science fiction film or film genre. Thoughts? Darkwarriorblake (talk) 13:00, 7 February 2026 (UTC)

The recommendation at WP:FILMGENRE is to just list one primary genre, so this shouldn't really be an issue. If there is no clear primary genre and multiple need to be included then that shouldn't be handled in the opening sentence, it should be explained later in the lead and that would probably avoid any SEAOFBLUE problems. - adamstom97 (talk) 17:07, 7 February 2026 (UTC)

FILMGENRE also allows for a sub-genre too, which I feel is sometimes necessary. For example, Pretty Woman is quintessentially a romantic-comedy film, and either "romance" or "comedy" would not be a good fit for it on their own. Maybe the answer is to not link sub-genres unless they have their own article i.e. Romantic comedy film (one link) as opposed to "Romantic-comedy drama film" (two links)? Another option would be to red-link sub-genres without an article (such as "Science fiction horror") and encourage article creation for established sub-genres. That might have the added benefit of discouraging loading the lead with loads of genres too. Betty Logan (talk) 00:00, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

I would argue that "romantic comedy" is a subgenre but "romantic-comedy drama" is just a list of different genres and would not align to the guideline. Perhaps you are right about using the existence of a dedicated genre or subgenre article to determine, we could update the MOS to say something about that. - adamstom97 (talk) 10:04, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

I agree that we should link to the sub-genre and not the two parents. Gonnym (talk) 11:09, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

In that scenario, romantic comedy has an article, it's an obvious huge aspect of many romance films, but as mentioned in my original post, science fiction horror redirects to a list of science fiction horror films instead. Perhaps we could establish the primary sub-genres and reach a consensus on whether they need an article or should at least redirect to a subsection. So sci-fi horror could easy redirect to a subsection of science fiction (I don't think to horror film as sci fi would be dominant here). This is obviously one example, science fiction action redirects to action film, so maybe we need some clear universal guidance on how this should work? I don't mind doing redirects but we need a consistent rule system. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 11:22, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

I've commented on this in some recent discussion but I don't remember which. The problem with how we use genres (and this isn't limited to Wikipedia), is that we mix genres with settings. "science fiction" is not a genre but a setting, while "action" is. So in both examples above, the sub-section should be in the genre page (so Horror film#science fiction and Action film#science fiction). Gonnym (talk) 11:28, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

So you'd argue that a science-fiction horror like Alien would fall more under the horror side and the science fiction is more dressing? I guess that is possible. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 15:34, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

Wouldn't a simpler solution to WP:SEAOFBLUE concerns be to stop linking every genre (or sub-genre)? It's arguably overlinking anyway. Everyone knows what "a drama film" or "a horror film" is. Barry Wom (talk) 11:54, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

It would, though I don't know how often you'd end repeatedly de-linking editors who do link them. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 15:34, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

To give you an example, Nikkimaria delinked Comedy Film on the 27th of Jan, and an IP has put it back today. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 18:32, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

I don't know what the solution is, but I agree with everyone's thoughts above. Link the primary sub-genre when it exists and/or create a redirect when one is needed and the target is clear. Try to avoid linking common genres when possible, as there will generally be an abundance of links in the opening paragraph as it is. Less is more!

FYI...SEAOFBLUE doesn't really prohibit putting multiple links side-by-side, but the more you have strung together, the stronger the recommendation is to avoid doing so. --GoneIn60 (talk) 17:53, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

Maybe the best option is checking the redirects then, so that (again as an example) science fiction horror goes to science fiction or horror if no article exists, rather than a list of science fiction horror films. Maybe we could create a defined list for easy refernece in the MOS. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 18:32, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

Slightly off-topic, but I'm kind of shocked that Horror_film#Sub-genres_of_horror_film does not list science-fiction horror. If it did, science fiction horror could link to the specific sub-section. Betty Logan (talk) 01:26, 9 February 2026 (UTC)

I have redirect science fiction horror to horror per Gonnym's suggestion. The page does mention science fiction, but I agree it's weird there isn't a section for it specifically. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 20:06, 9 February 2026 (UTC)

Coming to this late, but this kind of redirect may not work. I had tried to create survival thriller to redirect to survival film, but it got deleted per WP:XY. So for hybrid genres and sub-genres, this may be an additional challenge in terms of where to point it. Erik (talk | contrib) 14:05, 24 February 2026 (UTC)

The problem with hybrid genres was something I dealt with previously when I expanded the action film article. There is barely any writing about these kind of hybrid genres, and it's especially complex when it comes to thriller film, where research suggests that nearly all thriller films are hybrids of sorts. When trying to write about things like science fiction horror, you generally don't get much info beyond "a combination of horror film and science fiction film" so it's most of the time putting you back to square one. I did have some luck in action comedy film however. Andrzejbanas (talk) 21:06, 9 February 2026 (UTC)

Maybe smaller stub, almost enhanced dismabiguation pages would help? Kinda like these articles on radio signals I see come through Page Reviewer now and again. "A science fiction horror film is a film (redundant I know) that combines elements of horror and science fiction. See: Science Fiction Film and Horror film"? Science fiction horror is just an example btw, I'm kinad surprised given entries like Alien. Horror and sci fi seem to be pretty common.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Darkwarriorblake (talk • contribs) 21:20, 9 February 2026 (UTC)

It L's definitely common, but this kind of definition is just like "cool. probably could have figured it out on my own." The other issue is when we say "elements of" it's not clear what specifically is being talked about. As the hybrid partninnaction films goes, when journalists or academics say this, it's not clear which genre is emphasized either. Andrzejbanas (talk) 21:27, 9 February 2026 (UTC)

Coming to this late, but unfortunately a lot of hybrid genres will probably be in WP:NEO territory, where reliable sources may use the term often, yet there is not in-depth coverage about it. I do think another challenge is that encyclopedic coverage about genres in general can be pretty contained to print sources. Most sources online may be relatively frivolous. That said, I sort of like the idea of a table. I don't know if it's possible to do something like having a blue link for the hybrid genre (if one arrives at the table directly), links for each genre, link for a list if it exists, link for a category if it exists? If there cannot be an article for the hybrid genre, at least the reader would have navigational options? EDIT: This is what I had in mind. EDIT 2: I threw this together: Draft:List of hybrid genres in film. Erik (talk | contrib) 14:11, 24 February 2026 (UTC)

Sorry for replying weeks later but I'm a bit late to this one as I was travelling in Japan. This is okay, but like, kind of a glorified disambiguation? Most academic sources I've read are kind of critical of the idea of "sub-genres" even though I hear them used within fan circles all the time.

I remember in the past I tried to focus on sources that go more into detail on how a film does or does not fit a genre, or the complexity of a genre. The Lighthouse and Drug War. This usually helps ixnay random tossed about trivial mentions of genre and focus on something a bit more in depth. Even in print when genre is mentioned, even on books dedicated to film genres and beyond, the "what it is" and what people mean when they say it is usually foggy and inconsistent. Andrzejbanas (talk) 18:00, 12 March 2026 (UTC)

I think a centralised and standardised list may help. I came across this template earlier and the list of genres is huge, and includes things like Comedy of remarriage which seems pretty niche, but maybe I'm just unaware of it. It'd be easier if we had top level "comedy film", "action film", whatever and these article explicitly are changed to include more clearly their subgenres, potentially with the same content across both articles, such that content for "action comedy" appears in both action and comedy film articles. This might help refine and strip down on redundancy. But it's a hard ask as it's not something I have the time for, at least not alone. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 20:58, 12 March 2026 (UTC)

Hmm. Not a bad idea but still kind of complex. I think my only worry is that this comes across as kind of giving things sort of "peacocky" terms. Maybe (well, no there's no maybe here) I've been on Wikipedia too long, but how many times do we see some lead of an article say "[cool sounding film] is a 1989 [country here] psychological thriller[1][2][3][15]" etc. Editors tend be really attached to sort of promoting their films here where we say "oh it's not just a thriller, it's a psychological thriller" I'm presuming this is sort of to give films some "weight" as to clarify that the film is "no mere thriller". I see a bunch of similar terms used for some early 1930s films where it's often added that the film is "Pre-code". Simiarly, for "Comedy of remarriage", I'm sure we could find sources discussing this niche genre, but as it's something neither you or I was that familiar with, I think in terms of writing for a more "general audience" for Wikipedia, we're probably giving too much weight to it without explaining what this means. Even genres I presumed to be popular like "psychological thriller" have such little writing about it, probably because the thriller film is vague enough on its own.

On trying to expand some articles on genre earlier, specifically crime film, adventure film, action film, thriller film, and mystery film, its really come to my attention how academics state that trying to find wide approaching definitions that work for everyone just do not really exist. I'm not saying we abandon genre tags, but perhaps for these hybrid ones, we could take a page from what I found when trying to research them. For example, in both the thriller and action film articles, they state that action films are rarely just described as straight "action films" and often have some other genre attached to it, especially during and beyond the 1990s. This is similar to the thriller film, where it's hard to find characteristics that just make a film just a "thriller". I think when we have things like "action comedy" (which does have its own article), we could accept hybrids being presented as "crime thriller film" as linking to their individual articles rather than awkwardly linking to Crime_film#Hybrid_genres. I think unless specific information is found about "crime thriller" as its own genre (before, I believe the article only linked to the "Allmovie.com" overview of the genre, (which is acceptable, if not exactly useful as we only had one source really discussing it.) My heart isn't set on this as the continuous problem with genres in most media is for individual films, even the best writers will give a one or two sentence summary for a genre for a film without really going into the nitty gritty on why some films fit certain categories. Andrzejbanas (talk) 13:41, 13 March 2026 (UTC)

While there's only one WikiProject Film coordinator still active (Bovineboy2008 (talk · contribs)) and MichaelQSchmidt (talk · contribs) (another project coordinator) passed away not too long ago, what is to become of Wikipedia:WikiProject Film/Coordinators since no voting for a new coordinator has been made over the past 13 years or so? sjones23 (talk - contributions) 13:39, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

Is this even still a common thing across the site? Feels like it should be depreciated given we just have a list of the participants of the project already. Doesn't feel like we need a "coordinator" for the whole thing when editors can work in the areas of their choosing for the project for as much as they choose to. - Favre1fan93 (talk) 18:36, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

Favre1fan93, we might not indeed need a coordinator since it has been many years since a coordinator was elected and things around the project have changed over the past 13 years.

Should we consider deprecating the Coordinators page or remove it altogether? sjones23 (talk - contributions) 21:32, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

We should definitely deprecate the Coordinators page. I think this WikiProject is mainly focused on MOS:FILM and WT:FILM these days. Erik (talk | contrib) 17:51, 17 February 2026 (UTC)

Agreed. BOVINEBOY2008 18:43, 17 February 2026 (UTC)

To close this out, I marked the page as historical and removed the link to it from the WikiProject navboxes. Perhaps there could be a future discussion to overhaul these pages and simplify the presentation of this WikiProject. Erik (talk | contrib) 13:38, 19 February 2026 (UTC)

Late reply, but we can make a future discussion to overhaul these pages. sjones23 (talk - contributions) 09:05, 5 March 2026 (UTC)

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:The Fourth#Requested move 12 February 2026 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. TarnishedPath^talk 03:41, 20 February 2026 (UTC)

Per WP:NOMOREARCHIVETODAY links to archive.today should be replaced with other archive sites. If you maintain GA, FA, or FL articles, please make sure those links get replaced as soon as possible. See Wikipedia:Archive.today guidance for more information. Gonnym (talk) 10:31, 22 February 2026 (UTC)

What an absolute shame that they decided to sully and tamper with their website like this. In my experience, archive.today remained uniquely superior in providing quick and clean access to paywalled sources to Wikipedia readers and editors. For those reasons, it has long been my preferred archiving method here. That being said, I completely concur with the community decision here. It had to be done. I'll see what I can do. Οἶδα (talk) 22:28, 22 February 2026 (UTC)

I generally agree with you, although in that RfC I voted for Option C not because of what is happening with archive.today but because, as I said there: "removing the links will make many archived sites inaccessible" and adding that "Wayback Machine is terrible at archiving Instagram and Twitter links. I understand the cons of using the site, bu[t]...it has usefulness here as the Internet Archive...has been taken down by DDOS attacks, and sometimes cannot be used. I strongly disagree with depreciating or banning any links to archive.is on here. I...worry that not using it will lead to a LOT of link rot...I always try to use archive.org when I can, but sometimes the Wayback Machine doesn't work...If the site does go belly up, we can discuss...what to [do then]...but until then, I say a blacklist would be big problem which will weaken many articles on here." Sadly, views such as mine, and others, were disregarded.

Anyway, with the decision being what it was, it is going to be an absolute pain. I continue to worry it may create a lot of dead links too, and you can't archive links from archive.today or archive.is (or any of the related archive links) on the Wayback Machine (nor on ghostarchive) either. I tried the latter today. Historyday01 (talk) 23:03, 22 February 2026 (UTC)

Linking to their versions of paywalled articles was in violation of WP:ELNEVER anyway. Nardog (talk) 11:01, 23 February 2026 (UTC)

There is a discussion about the setup for the articles Alien Autopsy (1995 film) and Alien Autopsy (2006 film). The discussion can be seen here: Talk:Alien Autopsy (1995 film) § 2026 revisit. Editors are invited to comment. Erik (talk | contrib) 19:12, 22 February 2026 (UTC)

I am running a discourse about whether to have a list of "high-quality" sources that meet 1c of the Featured article criteria. As it turns out, there is a separate standard of sources from the reliability of them that is higher than what is set at WP:RSP, so I'm planning to start a similar list for those. If you have any film publications that you'd think would meet it, not just reliable, but high-quality specifically, feel free to bring it up. HUMANXANTHRO (What you say about his company is what you say about society) 20:36, 22 February 2026 (UTC)

I have not seen this used in WP:FILM or WP:ACTOR articles, so I thought I'd share this table feature that I saw at List of Super Bowl champions. Template:Sticky header could be good for some tables, like what I just implemented at David Koepp § Credits. Thanks, Erik (talk | contrib) 17:12, 25 February 2026 (UTC)

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:Sonic the Hedgehog in film and television#Requested move 17 February 2026 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. Vestrian24Bio 08:04, 26 February 2026 (UTC)

There is a discussion at The Bride! about whether or not the full title of the source material Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus should be used in the article body, or just Frankenstein. The discussion can be seen here: Talk:The Bride! § Use of the full title of the novel. Editors are invited to comment. Erik (talk | contrib) 17:55, 26 February 2026 (UTC)

WP:NFF has been revised to explicitly number the criteria needed to have a standalone article, and a subsection serving as a guide for future-film coverage has been added. This was added after discussion here (since it is long, you can jump to the more pertinent section break here). Editors are invited to take a look and comment. Erik (talk | contrib) 18:11, 26 February 2026 (UTC)

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:Proposed acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery#Requested move 27 February 2026 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. — Trailblazer¹⁰¹🔥 ^{(discuss · contribs)} 02:00, 28 February 2026 (UTC)

 You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Jay McCarroll § Create film article about documentary?. George Ho (talk) 07:52, 28 February 2026 (UTC)

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:Angel on My Shoulder (film)#Requested move 22 February 2026 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. TarnishedPath^talk 04:48, 1 March 2026 (UTC)

The topic of the article List of Maldivian films of 2026 seems to me to be a violation of WP:NOTCRYSTAL. Even though the article uses approved verbiage ("scheduled to be released", not "will be") as required for legitimate topics about the future such as 2028 United States presidential election, at least the latter already has massive coverage in sources. I question whether this applies to film release schedules, which, as I understand, are routinely subject to alteration. Is this really a legitimate topic, and what has been the attitude in the past about film topics covering future releases? Mathglot (talk) 23:36, 1 March 2026 (UTC)

Imho I think it is fine for lists like these to exist if it's a list of films which have articles and sources.★Trekker (talk) 01:01, 2 March 2026 (UTC)

So applying that to this article, with three tables containing ten films, four of which have sources (one each) and none of which have an article yet, should we have a list for that? Or, maybe have a list, but remove unsourced rows? Mathglot (talk) 01:45, 2 March 2026 (UTC)

At the very least the unsourced entries should be removed. Since we're only a couple of months into 2026 I think we can give the list a chance to grow, I don't think deletion is the right choice at the very least.★Trekker (talk) 09:15, 10 March 2026 (UTC)

I've never understood why MPA ratings aren't on the Wikipedia pages for movies. G, PG, PG-13, R, they're part of a film's information and identity. Shouldn't they be part of the ID box alongside the director, writer, budget, etc.? NinjaBluefyre (talk) 21:47, 2 March 2026 (UTC)

The short answer is that the rating systems vary from country to country. See MOS:MPAA for a longer explanation. Jauerback^dude?/_dude. 23:04, 2 March 2026 (UTC)

@Erik has been adding a new "Metacritic review breakdown" to articles about recent films. Testing for a possible template is at User:Erik/Metacritic review breakdown. If Erik or anyone else wants to talk about it I've opened this. RanDom 404 (talk) 23:56, 2 March 2026 (UTC)

Just notifying members of this project that there is a Conflict of Interest edit request relevant to this WikiProject at the Rakontur article. DrThneed (talk) 01:36, 4 March 2026 (UTC)

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:Sonic the Hedgehog 4 (film)#Requested move 4 March 2026 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. silviaASH (inquire within) 07:43, 4 March 2026 (UTC)

There's an ongoing discussion regarding the year the film takes place in the plot section of Joker (2019 film), if project members are interested in it. It can be found at Talk:Joker (2019 film)#Year in the plot section. sjones23 (talk - contributions) 13:59, 5 March 2026 (UTC)

Everything comes down to sources, and not everything is spelled out. The setting is inspired by NYC in the 1970s, but I don't think it gets more specific than that. Harizotoh9 (talk) 20:21, 8 March 2026 (UTC)

Don't fork the discussion please (WP:DISCUSSFORK). Gonnym (talk) 20:34, 8 March 2026 (UTC)

Anyone heard of this before? It was an older print journal that started in 1959. I don't think it was published by anyone and it doesn't seem peer reviewed. References refer to it as a fanzine, and published by one Greg Shoemaker in the 80s. The 2023 book Film and Fashion in Japan, 1923-39 by Lois Barnett published by Edinburgh University Press cites it, so at least that author from an academic book thinks it's a reliable source. I'm curious if anyone else has more familiarity with the source? Harizotoh9 (talk) 20:20, 8 March 2026 (UTC)

Basic googling turned up . Internet Archive seems to have some issues, as do libraries. Nardog (talk) 11:44, 9 March 2026 (UTC)

Ah yes, wanted to double check that it is indeed a proper self-published fanzine and that there was no major publisher behind it. A curious bit of history, but may not be a proper reliable source. The sister fanzine Japanese Giants has its own page, but it's most certainly not a notable topic in and of itself. Harizotoh9 (talk) 06:22, 12 March 2026 (UTC)

Just notifying members of this project that there is a Conflict of Interest edit request relevant to this WikiProject at the Changeland article. DrThneed (talk) 04:28, 9 March 2026 (UTC)

The article Atorrante has been proposed for deletion because of the following concern:

Tagged as Unreferenced for almost 11 years. No other language has a reliably sourced article from which to translate; the Spanish language article is sourced to a directory and IMdB. A Google search found only definitions of this slang word, meaning either "lazybones" or "shameless", which I think is the point of the film. Much of the current article appears to be a close copy of IMdB. Lacks significant coverage.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{proposed deletion/dated}} notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the page to address the issues raised. Removing {{proposed deletion/dated}} will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. In particular, articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion based on established criteria.

If the proposed deletion has already been carried out, you may request undeletion of the article at any time. Bearian (talk) 11:16, 9 March 2026 (UTC)

Hmm, could it maybe become a redirect to Irma Córdoba since she is one of the stars of the film? Or no? Otherwise, the Spanish-language version of the page cites two sources...

• https://www.cinenacional.com/pelicula/atorrante-la-venganza-de-la-tierra
• Manrupe, Raúl; Portela, María Alejandra (2001). Un diccionario de films argentinos (1930-1995) pág. 40. Buenos Aires, Editorial Corregidor. ISBN 950-05-0896-6.

However, every other page (in languages other than English) only cites IMDB as a source. Historyday01 (talk) 16:04, 9 March 2026 (UTC)

Report discussion. DanielParoliere (talk) 10:53, 10 March 2026 (UTC)

Just notifying members of this project that there is a Conflict of Interest edit request relevant to this WikiProject at the Twin films article. DrThneed (talk) 01:03, 11 March 2026 (UTC)

The article Straight (2007 film) has been proposed for deletion because of the following concern:

Tagged as Unreferenced 3 years. No other language has a reliably sourced article from which to translate. I asked the Project for help in finding sources, because I could find nothing reliable in a Google search. Lacks significant coverage.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{proposed deletion/dated}} notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the page to address the issues raised. Removing {{proposed deletion/dated}} will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. In particular, articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion based on established criteria.

If the proposed deletion has already been carried out, you may request undeletion of the article at any time. Bearian (talk) 18:26, 12 March 2026 (UTC)