Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

I was talking to my sister, asking about my niece's piano lessons, then talked movies, and she gave me her username and password. I browsed every single movie on there. I saw "Taxi Driver", which I have on VHS, which I've seen many, many times.


Why don't they have a classic movies section? Or by the decades? Or independent and/or low-budget movies from the past? I will try to find a way to send them e-mails from every burner account, saying I'm 19 (so they know I could be a potential customer for a long time) but that I prefer movies from the 30-70s, including documentaries and other things from that era. I also noticed that out of the hundred movies I do like that are new, that none of them are on netflix.


If you have a recommendation, please list away. I browser every single movie, taking quite a while to read the description, and then checking out the trailer. I added "The Florida Project" after turning it off after 5 minutes a year ago, but nothing else came close to grabbing my attention.

I believe they have several classics. But you have to search for them using the search feature.

Seems to me that The Big Sleep and a number of others were on there. Hope I'm not conflating that with Amazon.

But I agree, they should have a Classics section, or a noir section.

Netflix isn’t really geared towards the cinephile. Their library tend to go no further back then the 1970’s typically. Which is fine. I tend to watch it only for the newer releases and the occasional older film like the dozen films they have from Youssef Chahine.

Temper expectations in regards to that they offer, and understand that they don’t have the depth or quality of Amazon Prime, Tubi (if you don’t mind ads) or of Criterion (especially in terms of quality).

Netflix is only interested in the average viewer.

Netflix sucks. No movies that I really like. I cancelled my subscription in favor of Tubi TV, which is free.

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

When I had Netflix I spent untold countless hours looking through their movies, not much there to my liking.

It's geared more towards people who like tossing their money in the garbage.

Ha, yeah I hated Netflix streaming. Their DVD in the mail service was decent though...But I could find more movies to watch on Youtube than I could on Netflix streaming.

I used to get their DVDs and burn them onto my computer. A lot of their DVDs are cracked and could ruin your player.

I got one DVD that was cracked from them, took me awhile to figure out why it wouldn't play. Lots of their DVDs are scratched up pretty badly too.

They have a handful of big-name films that are older (Terminator, Guns of Navarone), but aside from that their pre-1970 content is almost non-existent.

But I do think they have some decent stuff on there:
Edge of Seventeen
Paddington
tick tick BOOM
Mitchells vs the Machines
Hell or High Water
About Time
There Will Be Blood
The Killing of a Sacred Deer
Moneyball
Hunt for the Wilder People
Tangerine
Lady Bird
Stardust
I am Not Your Negro
I Don't Feel at Home in This World Anymore
Roma
Gerald's Game
Philomena
Cop Car
A Monster Calls
Dick Johnson is Dead
Crip Camp

I'll also say this for Netflix: they are the home of a lot of comfort watches. I get that this might not be the cup of tea of people who are looking for "serious cinema" (I don't say this sarcastically).

When I want the good stuff, I go to the Criterion Channel or Kanopy.

When I want to go to bed to something light, I often turn to Netflix.

And while the question was about films, they have some pretty good/great television series on there.

Oh yeah; I mean, Breaking Bad, Cowboy Bebop (the original, of course), and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine are basically worth the price of admission just for those three alone, if you ask me...

:shifty:

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

Netflix is awful mainly. They seem to put out maybe 1 or 2 decent films a year only. Roma and the Lost Daughter were good. I only have their service for my children who like the kids movies and tv series.

Here in the UK we don't even have Criterion channel, Hulu, or TUBI.

We have BFI, MUBI and Curzon which is expensive. I tend to wait until the Blu-Ray is released most of the time.

Even the few classics are movies my non-existent dog has seen.


Comcast has a section where you can go by decades. I just wish they would have a filter to separate those free with commercials and those that are completely free.. I hate commercials.

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

Netflix is aimed at your average Joe who just wants to watch something when bored. Cinephiles have no business looking for anything there. Sure, there are a few good films there, but even a monkey solves a puzzle right once in a while.

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

It's hard to find stuff on Netflix for a reason. The entire interface is designed to create the illusion of copious selection to mask the reality that they're gaming on having enough gems in the dirt will keep you digging and not pulling stakes.

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

Netflix is perfect if you just kind of want to be mildly entertained forever. At least as far as movies are concerned. There are definitely some gems, and I don't think it's especially hard to find most of them if you have a good sense of what you like and put a tiny bit of effort into it, but you almost never wanna just browse on Netflix itself for movies.

TV shows, on the other hand, it does pretty well.

All you need is a VPN or a friend from the States to open an acount for you and then you can use Criterion from anywhere in the world without worrying about your IP's location. Just saying.

On a Laptop? The quality is awful, even if connected to a TV via HDMI.

VPN change your location to the UK/Canada it unlocks most classics

I was just offering some help on your qualm about not being able to access Criterion. The quality is a completely different issue and to be honest it doesn't really matter in most cases if you are after the classics.

Appreciate the assistance but I'm a bit of a stickler for image quality. n

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

The only thing that caught my fancy was a documentary, and maybe a stand-up special I've seen before.


If you know of a movie you think I'd like, I'd appreciate the post.

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

I couldn't get this to work (inserting numbers onto the search), but it is a UK site, and maybe it won't work for me.
https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-e...-b2014625.html





I typed out "Classic Movies" and got a category - "Classic Movies From The 1950s" -- only FOUR movies... I will be happy when this piece of shit goes out of business. I've already seen the great movies, but the average person starting out doesn't know better. My sister says Netflix stinks (don't know why she got it) and when I ask her what movies she's watched, she always says, "I can't get into anything"... Before, I used to blame it on lower attention spans with those kinds of people who have "smart" phones, but I think if they'd see something great, they'd forget all about it. Consequently, people give up, and move onto something else.


The lack of soul nutrition might explain all the suicides I keep hearing about, substance abuse. If only someone with power and talent spoke up. But there's also this establishment army that squeals "OK Boomer" and the conversation seems to end right there.

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

Netflix's search engine is alot like Amazon's search engine. Both are designed to return search results for everything but what you were looking for:rolleyes:

Something not being engineered for your preferences =/= it not having value. I watch plenty of good entertainment on Netflix. If it's not what you want, do not subscribe! It's like if someone got a Shudder account and then complained about the lack of romantic comedies.

I would be very sad if Netflix suddenly disappeared (among other things I get DVDs from them and that catalog is pretty decent). Don't yuck someone's yum just because it isn't to your taste.

Or is it, don't yum someone's yuck because it is to yours?

Agree with the attitude. I do feel an enormous degree of frustration regarding Netflix at times. When I have my less severe migraines, I tend to want to put something on without thinking and use the “Play Something” feature. Tailored as it supposedly is to my preferences, I usually can’t help but marvel at the sheer awfulness of the majority of content.

I certainly don’t think any of that is reason enough to bully Netflix out of business. It’s good to have Breaking Bad etc. at one’s fingertips, but it’s a bit disappointing how readily they forego quality for the sake of quantity. That could change in future, I guess, if Ozark is anything to go by.

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

Netflix has nearly all Miyazaki movies, so its great. Doesn't need anything else. :D

I think that the best strategy for Netflix is to have your watchlist ready with both favorites and stuff you want to check out at some point.

I agree that their model seems to be 7% good stuff, 93% crapolla. But I legitimately love the 7% that I enjoy.

They've sort of boxed themselves in by indulging and facilitating binge culture, but that means people finish a whole season of a show in a few days or a week. Keeping up with that demand AND producing solid stuff across the board just isn't going to happen.

Just to back up Takoma here, and I mentioned this previously, it’s actually pretty good for keeping up with more recent releases. This is especially true with foreign films.

I found Svaha there, which I preferred over The Wailing.

Instead of playing Mr. Netflix, you should have read my first sentence. I did not subscribe - my sister gave me her password. Read my next post. It's not about me. It's about people who stop watching movies because they think THAT is the norm. I want people to watch great movies so we (and many more) can get back to discussing them, too.

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

The only reason we have Netflix: One of our friends let's us use their login.

We had gotten rid of the service a while back for pretty much this exact reason the OP is talking about - a dearth of decent films to watch - and had sort of run out of TV shows to watch. It's nice to be able to dip in now and then to watch something like The Witcher, but if we didn't have the free login, I doubt we would use Netflix at this point.

I wonder how many of y'all complaining use the rating function on Netflix. They certainly have a quantity over quality mandate but there's plenty of good stuff.

Just pulling up the "Top Picks For Me" list and I immediately see:

Phantom Thread
Raw
The Nightingale
Stand By Me
Labyrinth
Leon
The Exorcist
True Grit
Blade Runner
Hunt For the Wilderpeople
The Wind
Hail Caesar
Monster
Apocalypse Now

Etc.

There's titles I haven't seen mixed in there but that took two seconds to look at.

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

Netflix is 95 percent awful, and I think their business model is disgustingly cynical, and I hate them, but they are hardly at fault for people not watching good movies. The majority of people have always passively watched films, and not really cared much about digging deeper. It's not Netflix's job to provide anything better if some people are already getting what they want from them.



As for those who want to dig deeper, there have always been options for them out there. No, they might not be as convenient (sort of like back in the day there was always 50 Blockbusters for every 1 independent and curated video rental store), but that's because most people don't care about movies enough to require anything more than Blockbuster/Netflix etc. But for those they care enough, they'll eventually find better avenues. Just like they always have.

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

IMO, Netflix has some good/decent films but very few. A lot of sub-par films. Mostly now days it's their own content. They did take some of Stephen King's short stories and make into films like Gerald's Game and 1922, which I found to be interesting. They are raising the monthly rate in March to be $16.99. Not sure if I will keep it.

There is a site that tells you what's showing for the next month and what is leaving as well.

https://www.whats-on-netflix.com/com...ch-2022-02-13/

Has anyone here used HBO Max? It's way better than Netflix and has tons of great films on there. I was pretty blown away by the app when I first searched through it.

Hint: anything anyone says about Netflix here won't effect Netflix or how they do business at all.

I have HBO Max. It is better than Netflix. I have watched their new movies that are at the cinema, like the new Dune. They have quite a few Criterion films on there. One night, my friend and I went through every movie they had for that month. It was a nice mix.

Nightmare Alley is playing on HBO MAX and Hulu.

My "you" was a general pronoun. Here: If one does not care for the contents of Netflix, one should not subscribe to the service.

If Netflix disappeared tomorrow, people would not blink their eyes a few times and then suddenly come thundering over to the Criterion Channel, desperate to get their hands on the first Fassbinder film they saw.

I think that you have an overly rosy view of what people used to watch and discuss. I worked in a video store before Netflix streaming even existed. You know what people rented? Click, Grandma's House, Waiting. Really great films just sat on the shelf while I couldn't restock Failure to Launch fast enough. Despite having HUGE LABELS that read "SUBTITLED", people would be angry if they rented a film that was *gasp* not in English?!?!?!?!?!

Most people treat film in a not serious way. And that's okay. If McDonald's shut down tomorrow, people would not suddenly seek out fancy restaurants with hand-crafted meals. They would look for the next best way to get a quick burger.

For people who do want to pursue film and film-watching as a more serious pastime, there is an abundance of streaming platforms at an affordable price. Where I used to live, I had to drive 30 minutes just to get to a RedBox at a grocery store. Without Netflix streaming (and DVDs!) or other similar services, I would have spent 2009-2016 watching nothing but the most popular films.

You can't force people to approach art the way that you do. If you want to introduce more people to the world of film, start a film-watching/discussion club at your local library once a month or something. That will do far more than e-mailing Netflix to scold them about their collection.

I will grant that Netflix is part of a huge cultural shift toward mass consumption, but that's an entire societal problem and not confined to any one platform. (And they've even taken some steps on that front, like only releasing one episode of Bake Off a week instead of dropping the whole thing at once).

Some might not, but many do... I also think an audience can be cultivated. You mentioned Criterion. Let's say that was the replacement on Netflix. At first, they might be taken aback, like I was when I first saw "Minnie and Moskowitz", because so many movies are similar, regardless of how different they appear on the surface. Every movie buff probably started watching mainstream stuff. Some get sick of it, and some (like me) rent things they haven't seen, and after a while, they become more self-aware and start to enjoy Criterion type of movies, because they've had practice, and can prepare for another movie that is unique from the rest.

The problem is those in power think very lowly of the audience, because they're out of touch, elitist, and think they're smarter than everyone else. Great art doesn't leave anyone cold. People just understand varying degrees of it, usually relating it to their own life. I read it all the time. "Yeah, ME and YOU appreciate great works of art, but the audience is dumb".. If you keep giving them dumb stuff, they'll watch it, like the movies you mentioned (that I didn't quote), because they're not given much choice and the public is being treated as children, which is the rise of movies made for children, even if the characters are adults. Problem-solution type of movies. Formulas.

"Rocky" was an low-budget independent movie, but when it made a ton of money (like "Easy Rider"), the indie label went away because of commerce. I'd add that studios never take chances, and make many less movies, hoping everything is a blockbuster, which many film historians admit after Star Wars, Jaws, etc..

But some people have no interest in cultivating an appreciation for the films in the Criterion wheelhouse.

There are many purposes with which a person can approach art. Some people just want something unchallenging and bright/loud/fun at the end of a long day. Criterion is great---and I watch a lot of movies from them--but not when you just want to turn your brain off and unwind.

This just isn't true. At all. I'm frequently enthralled by movies that few would consider "great art" and can think of at least a few "great" films that don't raise my pulse one bit.

Netflix has plenty of films that are great or at least aspire to legitimate artistry, like tick tick BOOM or There Will Be Blood or Phantom Thread or Passing or Wind River or Hell or High Water, The Exorcist, The Killing of a Sacred Deer, or the recent Power of the Dog.

Streaming companies that double as content generators are in an unhealthy cycle with consumers. There is a constant demand for more, more, more. As a result they generate a lot of junk. I don't think it's driven by contempt for consumers so much as just the reality of producing a lot of content. If tomorrow Netflix announced, "Hey, ya'll, for the next year we will be releasing only five films a month, two big budget and three indies with established or up-and-coming directors!" their business would flop.

You say that those in power think very little of the audience, but it sounds like you're assuming that they're not smart enough to know that there are good movies out there. You're assuming that people need to be "saved" from Netflix. It's like assuming that people in line at Burger King have just never heard of a steak dinner.

I do not need to be saved. Just let me watch Glow Up and James Acaster stand-up, Stardust for the billionth time and British cooking shows and awesome-trashy movies like Brazen in peace. I've had a long day. It's not the time for Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant.

There are some definite not-Blockbuster films/TV on Netflix: Florida Project, Tuca & Bertie, Tangerine, Raw, etc. They also just put out The House, which is not something I imagine you sling in front of a group of people you think are morons.

Not a movie, but Episode 1 of Murderville made me laugh really hard just now. Looking forward to the rest of the series.

Sadly that might be the best one. The Kumail one is very good though.

will more than likely be the high water mark in any comedic undertaking.

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

Personally, I like Unsolved Mysteries.

Here’s a blast from the past: Netflix and the producers of Stranger Things revived the old CBS series (which many of us know from endless repeats on Lifetime) as an episodic alternative to their wave of true-crime series. The result is a snappy update of the open-ended format, but as always, the one about the UFOs is the best.

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

I like Adam´s project

Haha - no kidding! I tried to search for IMDB lists of "Independent Movies" (I've seen most the rest), so I could arrange it from Release Date, and go back to the oldest movie. They don't exist, but there are a couple of Egyptian movies that I have already seen that are good.

I just looked, and gee, I get it for free, and I still can't find more than one thing per three months, but it wasn't a movie, but I'll try to check the trailers of the movies that the people have posted.

"Schulz Saves America" tries to be a referee in modern society. I was reminded of a few things. And they're broken up in 15-minute episodes (4)

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

"Cairo Station" is probably the best movie on there. I highly recommend it. But it's all free with English subtitles on YouTube.


https://youtu.be/JYAG_Gi2iDA

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

ARQ was pretty cool. Not too original, but a nice and enjoyable movie about time loops.

https://www.cnet.com/culture/enterta...the-full-list/


From the looks of it...little to nothing for 10 months. Five movies look okay...


The Killer -- Nov. 10: Based on the graphic novel series The Killer by Alexis Nolent (a.k.a Matz) and illustrated by Luc Jacamon. "After a fateful near-miss an assassin battles his employers, and himself, on an international manhunt he insists isn't personal."


Leave The World Behind -- Dec. 8: Based on the novel Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam. "A family vacation on Long Island is interrupted by two strangers bearing news of a mysterious blackout. As the threat grows more imminent, both families must decide how best to survive the potential crisis, all while grappling with their own place in this collapsing world."


Spaceman: "As an astronaut sent to the edge of the galaxy to collect mysterious ancient dust finds his earthly life falling to pieces, he turns to the only voice who can help him try to put it back together. It just so happens to belong to a creature from the beginning of time lurking in the shadows of his ship."


The Deepest Breath: Documentary. "A champion freediver trains to break a world record with the help of an expert safety diver, and the two form an emotional bond that feels like fate. This heart-stopping film follows the paths they took to meet at the pinnacle of the freediving world, documenting the thrilling rewards -- and inescapable risks -- of chasing a dream through the silent depths of the ocean."


Reptile: "Following the brutal murder of a young real estate agent, a hardened detective attempts to uncover the truth in a case where nothing is as it seems, and by doing so dismantles the illusions in his own life."


Untitled Wes Anderson/Roald Dahl Film: "Wes Anderson's adaptation of several Roald Dahl short stories including The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar."

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

Most of their high quality content is their mass of Korean TV shows.

subbing to this thread for some good recommendations

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

If I ever paid for streaming, it would be Criterion, but I figure I can find them elsewhere without even downloading (which I don't do anymore)... My cousin gave me his password last week. I saw an Elvis documentary and by the next day, I guess he hadn't paid his bill.... It's back working today and kinda watching the Jerry Lee Lewis since it's going away soon..

Do you have anything to recommend to me? Any good movies from the 1930-70s? I've looked, and it seems like there is nothing for me (which is why I barely used it years ago when my sister gave me her password).

Re: Where Are The GOOD Movies From Netflix?
 

Be patient, the chatbots are getting better everyday...

Here's another pitch for a new Christmas favorite, the animated film Klaus. I really love both its take on an "origin" story for the holiday, and its overall messaging.