8 Ways To Get Paid To Review Movies And Improve Your Finances

Get easy money by reviewing any of your favorite movies today!

Do you love watching movies? Do you like arguing about movie controversies and making criticisms? Do you often recommend movies to your friends? Have you ever wondered if you could get paid to review movies? — Well, you can. It's more like a dream job for many people, so it's a competitive field to venture into.

In this article, we're first going to enlighten you on how to write a good movie review, and then we'll go into detail on how you can get paid for watching movies by writing reviews. Let's dive in.

How do you write a review and get paid for watching movies?

Starting with a summary of the movie plot before pointing out the positive and negative aspects of the movie is a decent style. Make sure everything is vague to avoid exposing spoilers and establish a convincing argument on why the movie under review isn't or it's worth watching.

Now, because you're engaging in web writing, list any core cast and crew members that are part of the movie production process,—This will enable your review to pop up in search results.

Wrap up everything with a summary of your thoughts and a recommendation to whoever is reading your review. For instance, you may be like, “this movie is perfect for romance-lovers,” or “this movie is a waste of time for viewers who don't like the genre.” Anything, in particular, that tells the readers of your review whether you think the movie is good for them or not.

Finally, rate the movie using the scale your website or publisher uses. You can give ratings through stars, numbers, letters, or anything else.

Let's now go into how you can earn money by reviewing movies online.

What are the ways to get paid reviewing movies?

1.ScreenRant

ScreenRant began operations in 2003, and today, they are known as one of the most popular and successful entertainment news websites. They major in TV news and movies, interviews, reviews, and more.

ScreenRant is recruiting contributors/content creators to write for several of their top categories. If you get hired as a contributor, you can earn money watching new videos online and writing articles on them.

Payment rates are not listed on ScreenRant's website. However, Reddit user reports say that payment is a combination of a flat fee, including incentives for the level of performance of the content.

To fill out the application form, you'll have to include three samples of your writing portfolio and tell them about your previous experience with similar projects.

2. Bustle

Bustle is a famous website that majors in women's affairs. Among their top subjects are style, wellness, life, and entertainment.

Periodically, Bustle recruits new contributors for their website. If you're searching for a writing role in their entertainment category, you can check their website for any job opening.

To be considered for the contributor position, you'll have to provide some samples of your previous work along with your application.

4.Cineaste

Cineaste was established in 1967 as a quarterly publication. “America's leading magazine on the art and politics of the cinema” is their subtitle.

They accept pitches from writers for feature articles, film reviews, interviews, book reviews, and DVD reviews. If you want to increase your chances of being accepted by the editor, make sure your content has the recommended word count and formatting guide outlined on the Cineaste website.

The payment scale varies per article. If your article is approved, payment will be :

  • Features articles: $ 90
  • Film reviews: $45
  • Book and DVD reviews: $36
  • Short take reviews:$18

5.Animation Arena

Animation Arena, a hub for all types of animation, recruits writers to create movies, comic book reviews, and video games.

The standard word count for each review is about 550 words. And writers get paid $15 per review, and you could write as many as ten reviews in a month as a writer on Animation Arena.

You don't need to be an Expert freelance movie critic to get the job; you need to have good grammar and present two of your best writing samples alongside your query.

5. Cracked

Cracked is a website that deals in comedy and contains content on diverse subjects, including movies.

The contributor role on Cracked is open to anyone that wants to sign up. However, it doesn't mean they will publish any article you write.

Cracked uses a high standard in scrutinizing articles before they get published. So, you may have to send in one or more pitches before your content gets published. If your article passes the approval stage and gets published, Cracked will pay you $100. Later, if you write another four articles and they get approved, they'll increase your pay to $200 per article.

To give you a clear picture of the kind of movie content they are after, some titles of their recent posts are :

  • 12 Scientific Findings About The Filthy Rich & Wealthy.
  • ‘Elden Ring' And ‘Dark Souls' Were Inspired By A Little-Known Game From Spain.
  • Why Comedy Needs Joe Pera.
  • 17 Celebrities and the Foods They Can’t Live Without
  • 18 Now-You-Know Movie Facts To Keep the Ghosts Away

6. Taste of Cinema

Tate of Cinema's specialty in “list” articles is why they get enormous page views every month. They are hiring contributors to create movie review content and decent movie lists.

For reference purposes, here are some of their movie list topics :

  • 10 Great 2022 Movies You Probably Haven't Seen.
  • 10 Great Horror Movies Favored By Jordan Peele
  • All 9 Martin Scorsese And Robert De Niro Movies Ranked From Worst To Best.
  • 10 Great Sci-fi Film Favored By Steven Spielberg

If you're hired as a contributor for Taste of Cinema, it's up to you to bring up ideas for movie articles.

After you develop an idea, you'll write your article and pitch it to their editor. If the article gets the editor's approval, you'll get paid depending on the number of clicks or views your article receives. ( What this means is that payment is not promised.). 

Nonetheless, if you're a newly recruited to write movie reviews you can build your portfolio by having published movie articles. There's no limit to how much you can write if you're hired as a contributor on Taste of Cinema. The more you write the more money you make.

7. Create a YouTube Channel or Movie Review Blog

If you want to be the boss of your content, you can create your own YouTube channel on movie reviews or a blog.

It will take time and consistent efforts before any of these ideas become lucrative. But if you're serious about it, you can build a movie review empire that could become a full-time gig later.

The good thing about having a content channel of your own is that you can decide on which niche to specialize in. For instance, you could decide to write reviews on only horror movies, Netflix movies, lifetime movies, etc.

8. Become a writer for Revenue Share Websites

If you don't fancy starting up your blog but still want total control over your content, you can write for revenue-share websites.

How do these websites work?— They allow you to sign up to become a content writer on their website. Then, as you're creating content for them and your content gains popularity, it generates revenue through product sales, affiliate links, or ad networks.

The revenue generated gets shared between you and the site you're creating content for.

Let's look at some popular revenue-sharing sites to start with.

Hubpages

Hubpages is among the oldest revenue-sharing sites on the web. To join Hubpages, all you have to do is to sign up and create a profile. Then, you can join the Amazon or ad program to earn money from your articles.

After you've finished those steps, you can start writing.

Once you're done writing, the next thing to do is to publish the article. After that, Hubpages will run a quality assessment check through it, and if it passes, your movie review will be accessible on popular search engines like Google.

By gaining visibility on search engines, your chances of getting traffic on your content improve, and so do your earnings.

You can make a lot of money, depending on how much content you produce.

Medium

Medium brings storytellers and authors together to share their experiences and knowledge. It's a platform open to everyone who can write.

However, before you can make money writing movie reviews on Medium, you must get approval for the partner program.

To be eligible to apply, you must publish a minimum of one story and have more than 100 followers.

After your application is accepted, you can start writing.

You can earn money in two ways:

One depends on how much time members of Medium spend reading your content. The more time they spend, the more your earnings. The second way is when a reader upgrades to a paid medium membership after reading one of your stories. If readers now upgrade after reading any of your stories, you'll get paid half the amount of the membership cost they paid.

How much do Movie Reviewers Make?

Film critics work as journalists or freelance writers, making money by publishing opinions in article form. Because pay differs by publication and annual salary depends on the number of hours a professional film critic decides to work, it's difficult to narrow down the exact range of pay.

However, for the sake of reference, a journalist earns $42,062 annually on average, according to payscale.

As a new movie reviewer, you'll typically be earning between $15-$200 depending on the review length and publication.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can you make money from movie reviews?

The amount of money you earn writing movie reviews is depending on the number of people that read your review. Money may come from as revenue or subscription fees. You may have heard these sites known as pay-per-view sites or revenue sharing sites. There's a variety of sites which you can submit your film reviews to and earn royalties.

How do you become a film reviewer?

You must be fluent in English, hav critical thinking skills in deciphering information, good communication skills, attention to detail, open to corrections and work well under pressure. Good writing style and exceptional language abilities.

What makes a good movie review?

A good movie review should be entertaining to the reader, persuasive and informative, providing a clear opinion without exposing a great part of the plot. 

How long is a film review?

Although, film reviews are generally short articles, adequate preparation is required before you can begin writing. Before watching the movie, you might want to know the job done by the director, individual actor or writer.

How do you evaluate a movie?

After watching a movie, you have to consider the plot first : what was the movie about? Next is the theme and tone: what message was the movie trying to pass across? Next is Characters :Did you like how the characters performed their roles? Did you like the way the movie director told the story?  Score: Did the background music support the tone of the movie?

Conclusion

If you're a movie fanatic and have arguments about what you watch, you can make a legit side Hustle income by getting paid to watch videos.

To do well in this field, you'll need impeccable grammar and writing skills and the eagerness to learn how to structure and nearly format articles. Do you have these skills? Waste no more time and send article pitches or applications to the above-listed sites.

Or, you can start up your movie review blog or YouTube channel if you want to have complete control of your content.