Interested in becoming a movie buff... Please help.

Hello all...

For the past two months or so I've been feeling this urge to get myself acquainted with the seventh art after disregarding it for way to long. To become a film critic I wish not, I only want to feel "civilized" when people around me speak of the Cohen brothers, Blade Runner, etc.

My question is, aside from 100 movies lists, is there any material in book form to help me with my enduring quest?

I thank thee all mates for your time and (possibly) effort.

But, then you would be missing all the fun! Watch films, then, watch MORE film!

After that, I recommend watching more film...

You get the idea.

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First of all, it's Coen without an H.

Second of all, there's no magic list or formula that will make you know what you're talking about better than watching movies. Just start watching movies, as many as you can get your hands on. When you find ones that you like, get more from that director or with that actor or then come back here looking for help wanting something similar. That we can help with. But just a blanket what should you watch or how can one stay in a conversation about movies? To me that brings to mind the line from Niel Simon's Biloxi Blues, which was turned into a terrific movie by Mike Nichols in 1988. Eugene Morris Jerome (Matthew Broderick in the film) is Simon's alter ego and an aspiring writer. When he asks his intellectual friend, Arnold Epstein (Corey Parker), what books he should read if he wants to become a great writer, the answer is "The entire third floor of the New York Public Library." Meaning, EVERYTHING.



If you're in the U.S. and your cable system has Turner Classic Movies, I quite seriously recommend watching that as often as possible, if not more. You don't get an overwhelming amount of foreign language stuff there and not very much from the past twenty years or so, but if you're looking for a broad film education (with no rental or late fees to boot!) I say watch TCM.

Otherwise, just follow your likes.

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"Film is a disease. When it infects your bloodstream it takes over as the number one hormone. It bosses the enzymes, directs the pineal gland, plays Iago to your psyche. As with heroin, the antidote to Film is more Film." - Frank Capra

If you're looking for Joel & Ethan Coen or Blade Runner specifically, there are many books devoted etirely to them. But the Coen Bros. have only made thirteen feature films thus far, including next month's Burn After Reading. Even just watching one or two a weekend you could catch up with their entire filmography very quickly. As for Blade Runner, it's a single film, right around two hours long. And if you get your hands on the recent edition with the three and a half hour long documentary "Dangerous Days: The Making of Blade Runner", you'll be a neophyte expert in one single evening.

If you want a decent book on general film history from the silents to digital, Mark Cousins has a nice tome called The Story of Film. Cousins is a film critic from the U.K. and this is more readable than a dry text book (lots of pretty color photos, too). If you want brief sketches of people associated with all eras of the movie business, David Thomson's New Biographical Dictionary of Film will give you an overview of many of the biggies. I rarely seem to agree with Thomson's editorial assessment of what a director or actor's best works are, but even with that you do get information on a lot of film folk. And while I don't particularly like the way it's layed out, there is a ton of information in The American Film Institute Desk Reference.



So if you must go the book route, there are some places to start. But reading those cover to cover is no substitute for simply watching movies.

You want to know more about movies by reading a book. C'mon guys it's obvious this post is waste of time.

Just watch films and try to find a director who's style really clicks with you and go from there. While he isn't even one of my top directors it was Quentin Tarantino and his movies most specifically Pulp Fiction that really hooked me and made me just want to watch more and more movies.

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"A good film is when the price of the dinner, the theater admission and the babysitter were worth it."
- Alfred Hitchcock

Welcome.

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"If you can't be funny be interesting."
Harold Ross

I'd be careful about reading books before seeing movies, though. If I had a dollar for every classic movie I ruined for myself because I read the plot details in some book...just...damn.

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Iro's Top 100 Movies v3.0

Hello there,

to echo the sentiments of my fellow MoFo's above. Simply watch as many films as you can, mentally noting directors and actors you like. Try and vary film genres, nationalities, and periods, and be selective. I recommend buying a film guide for general reference, and using the internet Movie Review Query Engine or MRQE.

http://www.mrqe.com/


Let's say hypothetically that you like Quentin Tarantino. Note down all the directors and films that have influenced his movies (there are many) and watch those too. Do this with other film makers that you like to gradually build up a modicum of knowledge. Ask friends for recommendations, go to film fairs and boot sales armed with your movie guide. If you see an interesting film going cheap, snap it up.

I also recommend a great series of books interviewing famous well respected directors (two of which are pictured below). They're highly informative and insightful, entertaining reads.

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100 Favourites From The Future: REWIRED

First thing you gotta do is get yourself a "Movie Buff" name tag. On Saturdays we like to sit around the internet campfire and compare them. Except for Holden, he doesn't like to share with the rest of the group. That's OK though I've seen it. I like to peek in his windows when he thinks he's alone. He keeps it inside a big bowl that is also full of old Lincoln logs, Cracker Jack prizes, little Origami birds and Star Wars action figures.

Seriously though just watch movies. A lot of movies. Pick a genre and watch as much of it as you can, the good and the bad. Then branch out to more movies. You're in for a helluva ride.

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We are both the source of the problem and the solution, yet we do not see ourselves in this light...

Pike has already mentioned TCM as a good source for film, but you should especially take advantage of the weekly Essentials program, where they pick, discuss, and show movies that they have tabbed as being essential for understanding and appreciating film. Another great feature that turns up occasionally is specials on various directors and sometimes on actors. But the ones on directors are especially good because you can see their evolvement from film to film. A director--good or bad--has probably a greater influence on a film than even better or worse actors.

As for books, my favorites are collections of reviews of movies or even just picture and text summaries of films, and I especially like books that have pictures and thumbnail biographies of character actors, stuntmen, and B-movie stars, people who kept turning up in film after film after film under the old studio system--you might not know their names, but their faces are so familar and they usually added some special "color" to every film.

I understand all of those question marks that pop above your heads because my request is indeed rather weird (I did the same in a Jazz forum, they were... less tolerable). But see, the thing is, I want to start something that I call "blank slate" (forgive for all the sp./grammer mistakes, I'm not a native speaker). I want to know all the classics/cult flicks first (Run Lola Run, Citizen Kane etc.) and only THEN get on to the summer hollywood blockbusters like Batman and Hancock (which was rather bad IMHO, and this is from a person who went to the cinema about 7 times in all of his life, right?). There is this book that I'm counting on called 1000 movies to change your life, I think I'll start there with a David Lynch thing. I'm into surrealism etc.

I appreciate all of your help, thanks!

I don't think your request is weird at all Rasputin (and your English is very good btw!).
It's kinda like when my sons were growing up, I wanted them to see all the old classic and cult films, so we set out to do that and now they've both grown up to be avid film fans.

Holden's idea about watching TCM is a great one, cos there's so many classic films on there. Don't know which country you're in but if you're in the UK, then we have TCM too and we have Film4 and also BBC4 which shows more culty type stuff and foreign language films.

The Guardian (UK newspaper) did a good list once called 1000 films to see before you die. If you pick through that list to find the ones that interest you it's a great start.

http://film.guardian.co.uk/1000films/0,,2108487,00.html

I second that notion. Mark Cousins book is extremly informative and very interesting. An enjoyable read

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'I have nothing to declare but my genius!'

I love Lynch. Mulholland Drive is one of my favorite films of all time.

This site here. Is a site I look at now and then, it has many great films. Most of them are also on the various AFI lists that are also worth looking at.

We have our own MoFo Lists section which is worth a look.

Besides that I would highly suggest poking around This section of MoFo. There are some very talented writers that have written some pretty great stuff for this site over the years.

Yeah, I have that book. It's fine as a guidepost for a "blank slate", with dozens of filmmakers and actors listing the movies that most touched and inspired them. There's a good mix of stuff there, from the silly to the sublime, from the mainstream to the most obscure.

Any book with Amelie on the cover must be at least decent, IMO.

i so agree with holden on this. start with tcm. it gives you a chance to see what hollywood was like when the studios ran the stars every move career or personal life. i would start with a bela lugosi or lon chaney movie to see how horror truely began. watch hitchcock to see how masterfull he was at subtle underlining fear. move from decade to see how far film as come and understand some filmmakers today cannot compare with griffin or vidor. back then, the epics were nothing like today's fares. it was on a much grandier scale with a budget that today seems so paltry. so just sit tight and learn about the history of films thru the decades.

That's agreed. Watching a lot of film is a good way to become a movie buff, and, if you have a favorite movie or movies, you might want to also learn as much as possible about what went on behind the scenes during the film making, etc.

TCM is a good way to watch film, but, as many people here and on other forums have pointed out, watching TCM films on one's TV at home isn't nearly the same as seeing movies on a great big, wide screen, in a real movie theatre, with the lights down low.

Good luck, Rasputin..and welcome aboard! (pardon the pun.)