How the Movie Pool works

A season runs inside a league. Each week has a slate of films opening that weekend, chosen by your commissioner. You start with a fixed bankroll for the whole season — it is never topped up, so what you spend in week one is gone.

Bids are blind and sealed. You place one bid per film, in whole dollars, on as many films as you like. Nobody sees anyone's amount until bidding closes — you can see that someone bid, never what.

Bidding for a week opens at midnight on the Monday of the week before those films open, and closes at the day and time your league sets — never later than Thursday, so it always closes before the films reach cinemas. That means two weeks are usually taking bids at once: the one closing soonest, and the one after it.

Ownership goes to everyone who bid one of the top three distinct dollar amounts for that film. Ties are honoured, so a film can have more than three owners — and fewer than three bidders is fine too.

Every winner pays their own bid, and every winner earns the film's full score. The score is not split. Two people owning the same film both bank the whole thing, which is why a cheap winning bid is worth so much more than an expensive one.

Score = opening box office ($M) × (Tomatometer ÷ 100)

A film that opens to $40M at 90% scores 36. The same $40M at 30% scores 12. Both halves matter, which is what makes a well-reviewed mid-budget film a better buy than a blockbuster nobody likes.

Highest cumulative points takes it. There are two side awards: best efficiency (points per dollar spent) and the dessert prize for the season's worst pick.

Create a league, set your bankroll and your bids-due day, invite your players, then lay out the season's weeks and pick the opening slate. You will be the commissioner — you can add co-commissioners at any time, and the last one cannot be removed.