Cinephiles Recommend Films In These Genres

Thanks for the A2A! If you love movies, then you’re already a cinephile, by definition. But if you want a higher level of discernment and sophistication, I could suggest that, like any art, exposing yourself to both more movies and a wide range of movies will deepen your appreciation almost automatically. Try genres that you’re not already attracted to, even (or especially) disreputable ones. What makes for a distinguished work in each genre? Take thrillers, for example. How is a great thriller constructed, from the story down through performances to editing? What are the hallmarks of a great thriller, as opposed to hackwork? Look at how Hitchcock developed his style and his approach over the decades.Or comedy. Count the ways that the mastery of, say, Preston Sturges or Billy Wilder showed itself.Two good questions to be asking yourself are In what ways does this movie serve its subject? and What does it do to work on (and for) its audience?One last suggestion: Tony Zhou’s YouTube series Every Frame a Painting is fantastic for providing insight into effective film form.PS Special bonus suggestion from the estimable Mr. Fishkin (in the comments): read reviews from intelligent reviewers (historical examples: Pauline Kael, Roger Ebert; currently, Mick LaSalle at the San Francisco Chronicle) after you see a film. Let that be food for thought.

This is my opinion:There are some films, and even some television series that are artistically important, regardless of how popular they are. Find these, and watch them. Especially the movies; artistically important television series are both harder to come by, and much more time consuming that films are.And then there are others, which are primarily culturally significant, though have less artistic importance. The Star Wars films are a good example of this. Arguably, only 2 out of 8 current movies in the series hold a great deal of artistic significance, yet nearly all of them (excluding the Clone Wars movie) hold cultural significance. Certain TV shows hold some modern cultural significance as well, such as CSI, or The Walking Dead. I suggest at least being familiar with culturally significant TV and film, knowing their concepts, plot points, and perhaps watching a few of the episodes. But don’t worry about keeping up with the whole series, as a good majority of it is really just fluff.Then, there are those media that are both culturally unimportant and lacking in artistic importance. Peruse these with caution. There are hidden gems among them, but to delve too deeply in filth with ruin your mind. I’m reminded of a story I once heard about an artist who refused to look at inferior art. He would only let the finest works into his mind, because he never wanted the bad artwork to influence him. I think the same goes with media and your mind. You put crap in, you get crap out.There’s my 2 cents. I think a love of the true arts is highly important, and that by seeking refined works, we ourselves find that we too seek to be refined as well.

A cinephile needs a working knowledge of film history. That is, the most significant movies made in every decade, the trends, the films which have a long shelf life, and the movie directors who had honed a style that is unique to them. This is not limited to Hollywood, but is an international familiarity.A cinephile should be familiar with the greatest movies of all time, according to revered lists, whether it be Sight & Sound’s prestigious once-a-decade survey, or from the late Roger Ebert’s “Great Movies” series. They should not only have seen the movie in question, but should understand why the film is so revered, and what landmark choices the movie made that had been passed down from filmmaker to filmmaker over time.A cinephile should not be afraid of black and white films, foreign films, documentaries, kiddie films, movies with explicit-content, movies with subject matter that are personally unappealing, movies with sad endings, movies with ambiguous endings, midnight films, or experimental projects.A cinephile is free to disagree with any or all opinions as to the merits (or not) of the general consensus, so long as the critic can provide an earnest attempt of logic and understanding as to why. There may be a lot of critics who disagree with you, but you do not need to march in lockstep with the consensus.A cinephile should be familiar with the filmmaker’s vocabulary and use such judiciously.

The first difference is that a regular fan mainly focuses on the story, while a cinephile also has attention for the way it is filmed, for the editing, the camera angles, the use of colour and sound…A second difference is that a regular fan will follow the hype of the day, while a cinephile will actively search for more obscure films in different genres, eras and countries in order ro develop a broader knowledge and a more personal taste.

What I see, more and more every year, is what I’ll call good Friday Night Movies (I’ll capitalise that), and movies that tried but failed to be special.Look at last year: Hidden Figures, Get Out, The Post, and Darkest Hour, all great Friday Night Movies. Not particularly special, but with special elements in them. Then there’s Three Billboards, Call Me By Your Name, and Dunkirk, all movies that aspired to greatness but fell well short.This year looks much the same. Green Book, Crazy Rich Asian’s, Avengers Infinity War, and Bohemian Rhapsody are the Good Friday Night Movies. (Black Panther to me is an Okay Friday Night Movie, not worthy of consideration.). All very well done, with some outstanding elements, but not much that stays with you.Movies that shot for the stars but failed include A Star is Born, and First Man. They both have the look, but some pieces are missing.I don’t know what to think about A Quiet Place. It is fundamentally a Friday Night Movie, but it really transcends the genre, it is so perfectly conceived and executed. It deserves consideration.Leave No Trace is, really, a French-style movie shot in America. It was brilliant and beautiful, but doesn’t conform to American storytelling stereotypes, so it won’t get much consideration.I still have a few to see. 2010 for me was the last really good crop of nominees, and indeed most years 2000–2009 had a number of great movies up for consideration. These days, it’s harder to get excited about them.

They Shoot Pictures, Don't They? has absolutely comprehensive lists of the 1000 greatest movies of all time, and the 1000 greatest movies of the 21st century, according to film critics, scholars, and filmmakers. It essentially compiles every top-10 list ever offered, weighting them by authority and recency. The main source is the once-a-decade poll from Sight and Sound magazine, but there are hundreds of other sources.You will find a great many movies you have never heard of, and that are of interest more to hardcore cinephiles than average viewers. But if you have heard of a movie on that list or of its director, you ought to find that very useful.There are movies high on the lists, such as The Rules of the Game at #5 all-time, that have been seen by relatively few contemporary viewers but are just flat-out masterpieces and have broader appeal than just to cinephiles. A good rule of thumb is to check the IMDB rating of any high-ranking film there that you are unfamiliar with. If that score is 7.7 or higher, just see the movie! If you have reasonably broad tastes, you are almost certain to at least like the movie a lot. If the IMDB score is lower than 7.7, look into the movie and see if it's to your tastes.(Yes, 7.7 is a great IMDB score for a widely-seen movie. So why do I cite it as the minimum score to indicate universal appeal of these obscure movies? The reason is that the only people voting on these movies at IMDB are the cinephiles. So the films with less than 7.7 (like many of the films by Jean-Luc Godard) are films that have a strong but divided following even among cinephiles. But when all the cinephiles agree a movie is great, average viewers should all find it at least very, very good.)