how do you choose a movie to watch?

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hi, I want to ask how do you choose a movie to watch (from friends on social networks, festival's members, favorite actors)



IMDB suggestions mostly, although this option is exhausted now, coz the they go around in circles . And those endless lists you find on Google.
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My Favorite Films



Sometimes by actor but if it's film noir or horror, I'm always happy to watch it who ever is in it. Usually find film trailers on utube to get me intregued.



That elusive hide-and-seek cow is at it again
I don't choose the movie; the movie chooses me. I can't be bothered running around begging movies to hang out with me for an hour or two at a time. No, if they want to be watched they know where I am. I'm tired of it, what with them always just assuming I'm going to dote over them. Not anymore! Stupid movies. Tired of it. TIRED!
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"Ever try to forcibly pin down a house cat? It's not easy." - Captain Steel

"I just can't get pass sticking a finger up a dog's butt." - John Dumbear



There’s so much to watch and such a huge variety of films with different styles, genres and so on....

So for me, what have worked the best, is the pick a period (maybe a week or so) and then narrow in my watchings. It could be movies from a certain director, it could be purely noir films, it could be films that are sentimental or maybe all the entries in a franchise.

I’m perhaps a bit systematic with all this. But it works really well for me to pick a “topic” to focus on for more than one movie. And it also kind of helps me to cover larger areas of cinema in a shorter period of time. It’s more fun, rewarding and I feel like I learn more about cinema and stuff by doing this focus-type watching system.



Toss 'em up in the air and whichever lands on me noggin gets throwed on. If it's a tie I have a run-off. If multiple run-offs are required I just end up skipping that day and going to bed with a cpl of paracetemol.



for me first:
the actors
the setting
the plot
if it has many scenes during the day with so much sun.



If it gets a decent review in The New York Times or The New Yorker I will give it a shot. If either publication slams the movie I will not watch it. Very imperfect way of choosing movies, but it does somewhat narrow down the choices.
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Sometimes what I do is use wheel decide, I put in the years 1920-2019, and which ever year it lands I then put in any random film from that year on wheel decide and whatever film it lands on, I watch it.

For example, say I land on the year 1988. I just pick a film (out of 20 random ones) from that year. Which in this case that includes:

1. My Neighbor Totoro
2. Die Hard
3. Akira
4. Beetlejuice
5. Grave of the Fireflies
6. Heathers
7. Who Framed Roger Rabbit
8. Rain Man
9. Cinema Paradiso
10. They Live
11. Big
12. The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!
13. The Last Temptation of Christ
14. Coming to America
15. A Fish Called Wanda
16. Dead Ringers
17. The Vanishing
18. Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
19. The Land Before Time
20. The Thin Blue Line



matt72582's Avatar
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If I find a movie I love, I'll try to watch everything that director did until I'm no longer interested. Sometimes I'll go by actors, but only if the movie is good. There are still a couple of Brando movies I've never watched. Sometimes, I'll watch a movie because I'm running out of space on my DVR, or if a certain movie is going to expire on TCM for example. I do browse my IMDB watch-list, too. It gets tougher finding a movie the older I get, after there's little left that I've seen. I like to watch a movie I haven't seen before.



I have a long list in Notes that had taken years to compose, so I just scroll through it and watch anything that hadn’t been marked as seen, unless it’s something I’m really not in the mood for. Then I pick another entry from the list.



Being on withdraw from movies in real theaters for the time being, it's a late night thing for me now and a nearly random choice. Look to see what pops up on Amazon or Netflix, check the Xfinity "on demand"....etc. Something grabs me and that's the movie of the night. As we journey deeper into the gloom of lock-down, lately, they've been horror or disaster movies where it seems like life there is worse than life here. At least I don't have an outsized dinosaur ravaging the city. Not yet anyway.



I subscribe to the Criterion Channel, and I like the way that they upload their collections thematically. So sometimes they have several films with the same actor, or by the same director. Sometimes it's a collection of film noir or right now they're featuring LGBTQ themed films. Films whose titles I might not have heard of (like My Name is Julia Ross) sometimes turn out to be a total delight.

I also use the IMDb to check out films by directors or actors I like. There's a website called JustWatch that lets you filter and search based on which streaming services you have, so that's a good way to get a big list of films that I have access to. Between my Netflix queue, my IMDb watchlist, and my JustWatch watchlist I have about 450 films. My only problem is that I tend to go for light stuff a lot of the time, and so slowly what's left is like bleak drama, bleak drama, war film, bleak drama, bleak documentary, etc.



Sorry if I'm rude but I'm right
I look up IMDb top 250.
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Look, I'm not judging you - after all, I'm posting here myself, but maybe, just maybe, if you spent less time here and more time watching films, maybe, and I stress, maybe your taste would be of some value. Just a thought, ya know.



It depends....


A.) What my Library decides to bring in I select holds
B.) What's screening on TCM
C.) What this site recommends for me
D.) Varying RT lines (Horror films that are over 40%, animated films at 80%, Dramas at 90%)



“I was cured, all right!”
I usually type "violent yakuza movies" on google and go for it.
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I'm kidding! Usually, I watch based on directors, sometimes by actors and sometimes by genre.



If it gets a decent review in The New York Times or The New Yorker I will give it a shot. If either publication slams the movie I will not watch it. Very imperfect way of choosing movies, but it does somewhat narrow down the choices.
Stirchley i didn t get it yet, are you a woman or a man??