Homescreen heroes: The ultimate app for film buffs
During the pandemic lockdown period in 2020, lots of people got deep into hobbies. Baking, drawing, whatever – mine was movies. Obviously, I already enjoyed films as much as the next person, but recently I’d been far more likely to bounce from show to show. During lockdown, I really got into the art of the movie – the structure, the form, the cinematography, the auteurism. Coming out of lockdown, this translated into me becoming a fixture at my local movie theater, where I still go three times a week regularly.
Last year, I watched 200 movies. The first movie I saw that year was The Matrix Resurrections, the last was Carol. My most-watched directors were Stanley Kubrick, Paul Verhoeven, and Sam Raimi (five each). I know these things not because I am a walking film encyclopedia, but because I can just look them up in Letterboxd. This app has been invaluable for helping me keep track of all my thoughts, and in solving the most annoying thing about having many streaming services.
Letterboxd is a movie database, personal journal, and social network all in one. The basic use of it is simple: when you watch a movie, you can log when you watched it, and it keeps a diary for you. Easy.
But then you can add a star rating to the movie if you want, or Like that particular movie, or both. Or you can add a written review. But again, we’re still keeping it simple, and just for yourself.
But when you look at a movie in the app, you’ll see that you can view other people’s reviews, and you can „Like“ them or comment on them, and if you think they write fun and insightful reviews, you can follow them, and what they watch will show up on your main ‚feed‘ screen.
