letterboxd, the vexing and sometimes OK film logging website

I've been using letterboxd again after chatting with some younger cinephiles...if the whole thing were just the Activity page and your friend's ratings/reviews I would unabashedly love it. unfortunately ppl who are not my smart friends exist

anyway, do you use it? or read anyone on it? or? etc

i think i started referring to letterboxd as the new tumblr five years ago, so now that it has been written about in the nyt and has an ilx thread it is no longer cool, sorry

was the NYT thing recent? my acct is like.....five years old and has been dormant almost as long, lol

yeah it was like last month?

This was all very recent on the Last (x) Movies thread, so I'll cut-and-paste it into here.

Have people shared Letterboxd accounts on ILX anywhere? Mine is https://boxd.it/ENrV. I used it sparingly in the past but am logging every movie i watch in 2021.
― na (NA), Wednesday, January 20, 2021 7:07 PM (two weeks ago)

I think I've shared mine before, but here it is again: https://letterboxd.com/jer_fairall/
― edited for dog profanity (cryptosicko), Wednesday, January 20, 2021 7:27 PM (two weeks ago)

Have shared mine before: https://letterboxd.com/PollyPrecoder/
― Infanta Terrible (j.lu), Wednesday, January 20, 2021 7:43 PM (two weeks ago)

https://letterboxd.com/souleraser/
― flappy bird, Thursday, January 21, 2021 3:25 AM (two weeks ago)

Mine's just two lists of favourite movies; this thread is actually my Letterbox for what I watch.
https://letterboxd.com/hunsecker/lists/
― clemenza, Thursday, January 21, 2021 3:30 AM (two weeks ago)

I like looking at those lists.
― Dan S, Thursday, January 21, 2021 9:26 PM (two weeks ago)

i generally like it. though the excessive listing and gag reviews can get tiresome, it's a great way to know what my friends/people with opinions I respect are seeing, and general attitudes. though of course, this is the internet, so you're gonna get a lot of challops all the time

i was very upset i could not find the original breakfast at tiffany's list today

I mainly only use it for 1. writing gag reviews and 2. 'liking' actually good reviews / getting movie recs from ppl I trust for whatever reason

my favorite letterboxd writer, bar none, is nathaxnne: https://letterboxd.com/unawarewolf/

Mainstream or not it remains one of the only good websites because it doesn’t have Sharing, any activity from people you don’t follow is below the fold and optional, and the most genius design choice is you can use it however you want: star ratings, likes, reviews, diary entries, and lists all sort of slot together nicely and each aspect is optional. Just don’t tell yourself it’s “a community” or any of that garbage, it’s just a good website.

The other good websites are Bandcamp and Lichess. This is my theory of websites.

post feels kinda otm to me. it is def one of the few places on the internet where i feel very little stress

I feel some stress when I read certain types of exceptionally dumb or bad faith shit that gets a lot of shares/likes tbh

but yknow I should really just get tf over it

a few things I don't like about letterboxd

- we all know this, the TV non inclusion or semi sometimes inclusion is bad and silly and completely arbitrary
- certain types of bad takes rewarded
- a minor thing, but as with RYM, odd preferences/fetishes for certain types of content or certain stylistic or formal features. sometimes it's interesting other times it's just annoying

definitely wish that they allowed TV and episode reviews. or hell, spin off another site for that and video games. the personal logging is what i most like about it, i guess

i use it mostly as a tracker of stuff i've watched and don't really "engage with the community" but it's a really well-designed site that is a pleasure to use if you just want to track some films and make or read a watchlist.

I would be fine with one entry per series, only added once it's finished airing / being released. that also means no MCU reviews :)

i am furious that i cannot write a review of true detective season 2 on letterboxd but someone can write about the queen or the queen's gambit or twin queens the return

it's so silly

one other thing that's dumb: apparently if you log a movie without rating it, you drag down its rating

what? that's stupid. no rating should not = 0 rating.

I can't personally prove that but I have heard it alleged

The other good websites are Bandcamp and Lichess. This is my theory of websites.

what about ilx i can has cheezburger

A friend of mine worked there and it was a train wreck as you might imagine

1. !!

2. "A group of investors acquired the website in September 2007 for US$2 million"

3. oh

looool

having worked at some sketchy ass train wrecks, I salute silby's friend

brad thank you for the nathaxnne tip, anyone else have accts they like?

I've been using Letterboxd for years, but literally the only thing I use it for is to maintain the film diary I've been keeping since 1992. So I just go on and log a movie and leave. I don't do ratings or write reviews. I do follow a handful of people, but I honestly don't spend much time there. I do like being able to look up when in 1997 I saw The Ice Storm or whatever.

we all know this, the TV non inclusion or semi sometimes inclusion is bad and silly and completely arbitrary

The rule I made in 1992 (when I was 12 lol) was that I only logged movies that had, at some point, been released theatrically (regardless of where I personally saw them). So no TV movies, no straight-to-video, no Netflix-only. (But film festival releases are OK.) The last year has made me rethink that, though. Esp. since there's lots of stuff in the Letterboxd database that would be easy enough to log, if I wanted to.

here's mine: https://letterboxd.com/adamt/

Oh hey, look at that. I just assumed this thing was already passe and that's why no one ever talked about it. I use it pretty regularly, mostly to keep track of what I've watched/intend to watch (because my brain is sieve-like with respect to keeping track of such things), partly to read what others think of what I've watched (I follow some of y'all, I'm PlooplePop). I guess there's a social media aspect to it but I don't really engage with that as such.

Oh right, the polite way of doing this: https://letterboxd.com/plooplepop/

xp i would definitely rethink the TV/STV/streaming exceptions. i mean, even decades past, there were notable TV movies, sadly never to be seen or heard from again!

i don't find Letterboxd vexing at all! it's fun! my movie watching habits got way better since i started using it. i like the challenge of trying to write funny blurbs, which has kinda gamified movie-watching

My frustration is actually less about the hot takes and more the dudes who seem to watch only hyper-canonical stuff and dutifully give everything five stars. Then I remember I was 18 once, too.

I think the site is best for finding out about off-the-beaten-path films rather than engaging with long reviews that could be blog entries - I'm sure there's ppl out there who do that well but I've not found much so I stick with Xgau-style capsule reviews in both reading and writing.

The stats are super fun tho my regular viewing of shorts means my most watched actors always end up being Mel Blanc or Buster Keaton.

100% would not want TV to be included, far too many places online to talk about that shit. I do agree the currently available TV should be removed tho.

Anyway: https://letterboxd.com/Reifferschizzle/

The lists (+ the presence of hyper-obsessive users) are one of the best features imo. Would you like to see all of the hard sci-fi films written by first-generation Italian Americans between '75 and '80? There's probably a list for that.

https://letterboxd.com/glumdalclitch/

If Letterbox had a recommendation engine I'd be all in, but outside of meme lists and pithy gag reviews I'm not sure I've much use for it. I've been using Movielens for the last decade for movie discovery and it hasn't done wrong by me so far.

I use the Activity feed as my de facto recommendations guide

i’m like nearly on the verge of paying for a subscription just for those sweet sweet activity feed filters

The fav streaming services feature is also good, and they’ve started sending notifications when something on your watchlist appears on one of your services.

I'm really unclear on what the actual benefits of a paid membership are. Like, if it included the ability to get really fiddly with the filters or, say, compare the content of different lists, I'd pony up in a heartbeat.

doc casino is an excellent letterboxd follow btw

As are you! ILXors unsurprisingly showing the other users of that site how it's done.

I would go "pro" just to check it out but I don't want it to say "pro" next to my name, that's nerd shit

some of my other favorite writers:

- claire diane: https://letterboxd.com/fieldmouse/ (doesn't update often, but when she does, watch out. responsible for the most beautiful film criticism i've ever read, this review of nightmare on elm street 3: https://letterboxd.com/fieldmouse/film/a-nightmare-on-elm-street-3-dream-warriors/ )

- scumbalina: https://letterboxd.com/scumbalina/ (if you want earnest well-written discursive five star reviews about shot-on-video horror, look no further)

- sydney: https://letterboxd.com/campbart/ (a lot of the writers i love on letterboxd have an almost stream-of-consciousness thing going on, but sydney's reviews are all precision, and she has the best taste on earth. currently going through a bollywood thing, very cool to keep up with)

- j0siah m0rgan: https://letterboxd.com/josiahmorgan11/

j@ke c0le and j0sh l3wis are also very good but are very popular on the site. m@tt lynch ostensibly shares a lot of my taste and priorities but i think he's just terrible. i don't exactly know why i'm google-proofing but simon did it earlier and it seems like a good practice lol

one of the appeals of letterboxd when i joined was finding all of these trans writers writing these beautiful reviews that explore both their own identity and the hidden or not-so-hidden depths of trashy horror films. i assume that is not covered in the nyt piece but that's the no. 1 reason the website is so so valuable to me

My updates have gotten extremely sporadic, but here's me: https://letterboxd.com/ephender/

brad thank you for those, most of the ppl I'm encountering online who use it are like 19 which is.....cool but not all the time lol

3 and a half stars imo. The half star is for Mel Gibson's accent.

I upgraded to Patron

https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/434045500476620840/1230981105230938235/Screenshot_20240419_213742_com.letterboxd.letterboxd.jpg?ex=66354b7e&is=6622d67e&hm=bb3ab9a6bb535c03391b20a11b2e2d2bd60cfe91c9097cb6bf10a22171ac12ac&=&format=webp&width=210&height=454

https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/434045500476620840/1230981125774512318/Screenshot_20240419_213818_com.letterboxd.letterboxd.jpg?ex=66242802&is=6622d682&hm=aac48ab0cea8eeb6799b1b466890405ba7ac67f4d29c3cfd80046935aeea0125&=&format=webp&width=210&height=454

lol, small image size led me to wonder what A Simple Plan did to piss you off.

https://resizing.flixster.com/edCns7oCRFGZToHUcqvKFtQmrXA=/fit-in/705x460/v2/https://resizing.flixster.com/-XZAfHZM39UwaGJIFWKAE8fS0ak=/v3/t/assets/p21705_v_v10_ac.jpg
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/dh0AAOSwyQtV3MGD/s-l1600.jpg

(I was impressed with myself for catching that visual parallel but of course there's already a Letterboxd list for that: https://letterboxd.com/cinemommie/list/hello-id-like-to-report-a-poster-theft/)

Xpost
I'm actually not keen on A Simple Plan but it's been a long time

4 stars for That's My Boy is fun

And Poltergeist and Femme Fatale are, in fact, both 5-star movies, so glad I could clear that up here

Brain De Palma's horniness is truly powerful.

Brain lol

ha, love that cover connection

is that rated higher/lower than average only at the Patron level? I'm on the cheaper sub and don't see that part

Yes, that's Patron-only. It would be a neat feature to have, but I'll live.

I think it will be coming to Pro in the near future. Patron gets early access to beta features.

You can also get a pretty clear idea of divergences by looking up only the movies you’ve ranked high or low and then organizing according to average user rating

I've never given star ratings to anything, so this is kinda lost on me. (my watching queue is so long that if something isn't working for me, I'm out - can't hatewatch anymore)

You don't have to rate anything, you can just log and/or review and/or like

Letterboxd stats have been expanded so now you can keep clicking to expand the most watched director/actor lists. A fun game to play is to keep doing that and see what's the first name to make you go "who?".

For me that's my 19th most watched actor (Hong Kong character actor Paul Chung Fat, who has failed to make an impression on me over the 17 times I've seen him in something) and 35th most watched director (Wilfred Jackson, 9 films, all Disney animated features and of course I didn't pick up on who that was, wasn't checking credits when I saw them as a child).

For me, it's my 10th-most-watched: Peter McRobbie. Definitely has a familiar-looking face.

And ditto for Wilfred Jackson as a director

I hate sorting by genre and you have to weed through a bunch of superhero cape shit, animated children’s movies and anime to see movies with people in them.

there's stats provided for your lists now too

for example https://letterboxd.com/pfunkboy/list/pfunkboys-favourite-100-films-of-all-time/stats/

this is a fun game! i also have Wilfred Jackson high, and his Disney colleagues Hamilton Luske, Clyde Geronimi and Jack Kinney. biggest "who?" actor was stuntman Thomas Rosales Jr. (16 films!).

boy howdy tho, does the app love to lose your place whenever you switch away to something else, like the browser where you're trying to compose an ILX post.

carrieandtracy at letterboxd. 🎥

— Carrie Coon (@carriecoon) December 13, 2024

darmokandjalad at tanagra

taramian letterboxd would be lit

> darmokandjalad at tanagra

lol

this is cool

Letterboxd should have a feature to show you if anyone has the same top 4 as you

— Rachel Lapides (@rachellapides) December 17, 2024

You can! type fan:[TITLE] with a space between each one (no one has my top 4 but me)

— Aloysius Cappadocia (@kvo2021) December 17, 2024

And substitute hyphens for spaces in the titles eg: fan:bull-durham fan:along-came-polly

— Alex Mitchell (@AledMitch) December 17, 2024

does fan cover the "like" button or only if you put in your top four? I've never been able to decide on those

that particular search function finds users who have a film in their top 4

my new-to-me list for 2024:

https://letterboxd.com/reifferschizzle/list/new-to-me-24/

the Beavers count themselves as a 2024 release due to the final cut being post-festivals iirc

they didn't send letterboxd the memo, alas

Best new watches '24

24 for 24 https://boxd.it/BTAxa

Best new watches '24

24 for 24 https://boxd.it/BTAxa

Here's mine:
https://letterboxd.com/anniella/list/best-first-watches-of-2024/

the Beavers count themselves as a 2024 release

Letterboxd used to base the year on theatrical release, but then they began using the year it first appeared at a festival or whatever and it screws up everyone's lists/stats for a given year.

Here's my list
https://letterboxd.com/mondosalvo/list/40-favorite-first-time-watches-of-2024-1/

Letterboxd used to base the year on theatrical release, but then they began using the year it first appeared at a festival or whatever and it screws up everyone's lists/stats for a given year.

Also removes the fun of going to a festival and getting to log something from the FUTURE.

mine for last year: https://letterboxd.com/jamesdevine/list/fav-first-watches-24/

Think I'm gonna actually log this year instead of just lurk/use the list function to keep track of things. I'm particularly interested in seeing how much great new (to me) old stuff I might see in the span of a year.

my discoveries of 2024

https://letterboxd.com/adamt/list/discoveries-of-2024/

here's mine:

https://letterboxd.com/mattmc387/list/best-first-watches-2024/

Kinda interesting:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZ0lJcxqJq4

You know what might be better than 32 minute video? A list on film-logging site Letterboxd.

https://www.dazeddigital.com/film-tv/article/66346/1/jeremy-corbyn-is-on-letterboxd-reviewing-up-a-storm-ken-loach

5 star review for 2001, mark s will be heartbroken

If it's really his account.

haha yeah, NME is covering it so not really certain

13,441 followers to date and the only one he's following is the TUC - "Reviewing movies from the only perspective that matters - workers' rights" which seems to be a spoof account itself.

https://letterboxd.com/unawarewolf/film/the-silence-of-the-lambs/