I notice Savant does the 'classic' films and Gross does the 'exploitation' films - but who gets to review what?

Is it just a case of "eeny, meeny, miny, mo... okay, Jason gets to review ____", or is there a system?

I notice a couple of reviewers don't get to review bigger titles very often - Don Houston gets a lot of straight-to-video stuff from Vanguard, for instance.

Well?

There is a system. I'll let Geoff explain it in more detail if he's feeling up to it. First, there's a "wish list" with upcoming titles, and reviewers can flag titles from that list as being of interest. If DVD Talk HQ gets that screener in, there's a process for deciding which of those reviewers gets the title. There's also a screener pool where reviewers can request available titles currently hanging the DVD Talk compound. Reviewers are at times assigned unrequested titles, but for the most part, reviewers review what they request.

G! can fill in the details better than anyone but here's my take on it all. I mostly review adult titles-that's what I was recruited to do when I left another website. Most of the other reviewers aren't big porn fans so a few contribute a review from time to time. As I've grown more interested in reviewing mainstream stuff, I've requested some of the titles that the other reviewers aren't interested in. Most of the time, that translates into obscure foreign movies, documentaries, and stuff of a decidedly niche market taste.

The few bigger titles I've reviewed have gone over pretty well but I'm still learning the ropes (and the others are better reviewers for them on a few levels). By reviewing things the others don't care for, I get the benefit of taking chances and sometimes pick a real winner. On the other hand, I sometimes get really bad flicks...

In all though, the system has been evolving for a long time, and seems to work really well. Us reviewers talk about this type of thing a lot too-but if you ever have comments about a review, I know virtually all of us like getting emails that discuss what we wrote (good or bad). Feedback is the only way we know if we're addressing the audience and being helpful. Right Holly?