Letterboxd

So, normally my posts are about movies or award season,  but this time I wanted to talk about a new site that I've come across.  It's not entirely accurate to say that I "came across it." More accurately,  I was pointed in the direction of it.

While I'm at work,  I usually listen to music when I'm getting shit done. But recently,  I started listening to a movie podcast that I've been aware of for a while,  but haven't always had the time to listen to.  That podcast is Operation Kino,  off of CinemaBlend. Last week,  in OpKino 96, one of the guys, David Ehrlich,  talked about a social networking site that revolves around movies that was in beta stages.  That site is what I'm here to talk about: Letterboxd.com

This site is really cool,  especially for people who love movies as much as I do. This site works very similar to Twitter,  in the sense that you can "follow" people that you like/know, but it's function is much different, in the sense that it completely revolves around movies. It reminds me a lot of the old Flixster app for Facebook, before it became super shitty.  Pretty much you can say which movies you saw,  if you liked them or not,  and give them a star rating. And on top of that,  you can also write movie reviews of the film,  if you want.

The best thing about this site is how versatile it is. I don't think that this site is only for people who love movies,  it is for anyone who has even the slightest interest in film. A couple of the best features of this site seem to be really geared towards people who aren't as devoted to film as I am (which isn't to say people like me won't enjoy it,  but I'll get to that later. )

On top of just being able to keep track of what movies you've seen,  you can also keep a "diary" of when you saw specific films (and if it was a film you had seen before.) While all of these features are cool,  I think the best thing about this site is how it can help you branch out your film choices. I've only been on this site for a week now,  and I've already learned about completely obscure movies that I never would have heard of otherwise. I also think that the reviews on this site,  since they are coming from people who are really passionate about films,  are much better representations of the quality of the film. When you go on sites like RottenTomatoes and such,  you are mostly just seeing if critics liked it,  which usually isn't the opinion of the general public (I'm not saying RT is bad,  I just have found that I disagree with the scores fairly often.)

One last thought on this site,  I promise. I think that,  now that I'm out of college and in the real world,  most people don't have time to waste on shitty films. I guess it's even more than that: most people don't hear enough about the slightly more obscure movies. If you aren't looking out for a specific movie and when it comes out,  you can miss some of the best movies of the year when they make it into theaters. I think this site is a great and easy way to keep up with what has just come out and what people (those that you choose to follow) are buzzing about.

I hope this all doesn't just sound like a shameless pitch to get more people onto this site, but I really think people will enjoy it, especially my friends who enjoy reading my reviews on here. If anyone is actually interested in joining, I will gladly get you a beta code. All you have to do is ask.