Craig’s Movie Madness: A Tournament of Our Favorite Films

Back in May 2024, I launched my own version of a March Madness-style tournament—but instead of basketball teams, it was all about movies. The idea was inspired by my friend Craig, who had started something similar a few years ago, but his version never made it past the nomination round. I decided to take the concept and actually run with it.

The goal? To figure out what our favorite movies really are.

I invited a group of close friends, and to my surprise, nearly 30 people jumped in and submitted over 900 movie nominations. To structure the tournament, I divided the entries into four broad genres:

  • Action / Adventure / Western
  • Comedy / Musical / Animated
  • Drama / Thriller / Mystery
  • Sci-Fi / Horror / Fantasy

Seeding was based on the number of nominations each film received, with ties broken by their critical reception. From there, it was a six-week head-to-head tournament, with each round determined by popular vote.

I built the whole thing using Google’s free tools: a site on Google Sites, the bracket designed with Google Sheets, nominations tracked in Google Sheets, and voting handled through Google Forms. It took a bit of work to get the voting process set up in a way that felt fair and manageable (Forms isn’t exactly designed for tournaments), but with under 30 participants, it held up just fine.

If I run this again, I’ll probably rethink how nominations and voting are collected—but overall, it was a fun and engaging way to share our favorite films and discover new ones.

Check out the full project, including all nominated movies, voting rounds, and the final bracket here: Craig’s Movie Madness

Leave a Comment