But, you’ll admit that some films are simply poorly made and poorly written, right? There may not be some inherent metric for judging a film’s quality, but the fact that we keep trying to create metrics to assess films (Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic, IMDB, etc.) shows that we are aware of inherent quality differences between the movies we watch.
Film’s qualities are subjective. We can personally think “some films are simply poorly made and poorly written”, and nothing is wrong with that, but that will only be a subjective opinion. What Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic, IMDB, etc. are creating is simply a generalisation of multiple opinions, which ends up as a sort of a popularity score.
It’s like how we know the Mona Lisa is a better work of art than a child’s drawing. The child’s parents may have a greater subjective attachment to their kid’s art, but it’s almost universally understood that the Mona Lisa is better conceived and better executed as a work of art…
No, we do not know that the Mona Lisa is a better work of art than a child’s drawing. I will first have to see the child’s drawing, then I will judge. Saying things like “we know the Mona Lisa is a better work of art than a child’s drawing” and “it’s almost universally understood that the Mona Lisa is better conceived and better executed as a work of art” is either pretentious, or basically being brainwashed (herd behaviour), or both.
…even thought we have no way of quantifying that.
You have just contradicted yourself.