In the July 31, 1928 issue of the
New York Daily News, the newspaper's film critic Irene Thirer began grading movies on a scale of zero to three stars. "Three stars meant 'excellent,' two 'good,' and one star meant 'mediocre.' And no stars at all 'means the picture's right bad,'" wrote Thirer.
The Port of Missing Girls received one star;
Carl Bialik speculates that this may have been the first time a film critic used a star-rating system to grade movies. ==Censorship==