If the darkroom industry suffered badly during the pandemic, planetary confinement proved extremely beneficial for domestic cinema. The global community of film lovers has developed unprecedented closeness thanks to a New Zealand social network, Letterboxd, which has become the forum of choice for fans of 7at art.
Along with the ever-increasing number of streaming video services, offering richer and more varied content than ever before, Letterboxd has seen its popularity over the past two years, from 1.7 million members in 2020, to 5 million in 2021.
Canada ranks fourth in the world for Letterboxd user activity, behind the US, UK and Brazil. The number of members in the country has risen 60% this year, compared to 2021, according to figures provided by the company.
Letterboxd finds particular resonance with Gen Z and Y, which dominate the platformrefers to the Canada Media Fund (CMF) in a document detailing consumer trends.
By betting on a strategy based on a formula of influencers, which can be followed by subscribing to their account, the platform has developed its own ecosystem of amateur reviews guided by authenticity.continuation of FMC.
Launched in 2011, Letterboxd was born out of the desire of two web entrepreneurs from Auckland, the metropolis of New Zealand, to create a Goodreads for cinema. Matthew Buchanan and Karl von Randow wanted to replicate the user-friendly environment, open to all, that characterizes the popular rating and book review site.
We want to create an experience that combines a little bit of Twitter, a little bit of Tumblr, and an IMDb dash [pour] create a space where people will be comfortable sharing their experience with moviessaid Matthew Buchanan in the FMC press release.
Freedom of content and form
There is a small, relatively crowded Quebec community in LBsays Maude Trottier, co-editor of online film magazine Hors champ, and one of many professional critics in the province who frequently use the platform.
There is an intimacy specific to LB, I don’t know how they managed to achieve that, but it really works. People feel they have the power to give their rating in a very free wayhe added.
The notion of freedom is a constant that appears regularly in site reviews, both within and among its members or media specialists.
In a long paper published last year on the company’s meteoric growth, the New York Times this freedom has been upheld gives writings posted on Letterboxd of the Wild West quality.
What goes on at the top of the site varies greatly: there are anonymous memes, personal essays and extensive spiels full of pseudo-academic jargonchecking the log.
The article states that it is one of the most consulted publications (New window) Letterboxd’s story is a mysterious and short review of the film Joker : That’s what happened to my housemate Eric.
This diverse voice, unobstructed from hierarchies of expertise, gives the site particular charm, Maude Trottier believes. There’s something really weird about LB; it’s a mixture of intimacy and knowledge, of debates and often funny phrases of appreciationhe says.
Open up new horizons
In 200 countries, Letterboxd can be considered one of the most important tools for democratization. If a mega-production like dune is the most commented film there in 2021, making it possible for the forum to promote works that often pass under the radar of Western cinephiles, which are exposed mainly in Hollywood and European cinema.
Particularly encouraging is the community’s ability to discover and develop gems from independent industry.said Matthew Buchanan.
The co-founder of Letterboxd suggests drama here yunia low-budget co-production of Indonesia, which took third place in the category of highest-rated films last year on its site.
The rest of this most eclectic podium consists of another Marvel achievement, Spiderman : no returnand an eccentric Japanese animated feature film, evangelion : 3.0+1.0 Three times at a time.
The intensive networking that takes place at Letterboxd allows even the most flooded moviegoers, such as Sylvain Lavallée, critic who has been published in various journals in Quebec and former lecturer in acting at the University of Montreal, which made significant discoveries. .
Current events films inevitably stand out, but they also allow us to communicate with cinephiles that are different from ours.he said.
For example, following a horror fan releasing hidden gems that can’t be found, another going through movie history year after year (no kidding), or watching all the movies from a particular country. , etc.
Same story with his critical colleague Mathieu Li-Goyette, editor-in-chief of Panorama-cinéma, who appreciates the possibility of cultivating privileged contacts with big names in the industry, here and elsewhere.
He cited the example of Quebec director Pascal Plante (Nadia, Butterfly) and fellow screenwriter Éric K. Boulianne (nonsense), avid letterboxers, as well as respected American independent filmmaker Sean Baker (Tangerine, The Florida Project) or the co -writer of pulp FictionRoger Avary.
A social network where Sean Baker recommended me to review Female Prisoner #701: Scorpionfrom Shun’ya Itô, this is the kind of social network where I like to waste timehe assured.
Cinephilia 2.0, new era
The growing popularity of Letterboxd has had the effect of competing with the world’s most frequented moviegoer area, IMDb – or Internet Movie Database – a database of movies, television and video games launched in 1990, which is one of the most visited sites on the Internet.
In 2017, IMDb discontinued its virtual message board, which offers the ability for millions of people to chat anonymously. Over time, the trolls established their leadership there, and artistic discussions began to sit in the background. The company ultimately judged that service has no longer provided a positive and rewarding experience.
The vacuum created by the demise of the bulletin board from IMDb has certainly solidified Letterboxd’s relationship.
The community there is more engaging, curious, quick to discuss, than the non -functioning IMDb forums, which are often very bad, like some blogs.believes Sylvain Lavallée.
” Letterboxd moved our conversations to the exit of a room to offer them a virtual living room. “
Make your diary public
Beyond the stimulating exchanges between cinephiles, Letterboxd offers its members the possibility to form their love of 7at art.
In general, it mainly allows you to keep a personal diary of views, the interface of which offers quite a lot of freedom: rate movies or not, make a written review or not, the possibility of drawing listsexplanation by Sylvain Lavallée.
For Mathieu Li-Goyette, the platform has proven to be an ideal place to archive his impressions in a virtual rather than analog medium.
Like many other colleagues, before LB existed, I kept a small notebook, I wrote down all the movies I watched and where I saw them. It’s very important, not only to remind me of everything I’ve seen in a year, but also because over time it makes great memories.
This habit has been completely replaced by LB, where our watch records are public. […] And then create lists, rearrange and share our little imaginary cinema museumshe says.
Finally, Letterboxd offers the opportunity to launch unexpected careers, such as the case of Sydney Wegner, a single mother living in a remote Texas town, who never intended to write professionallyreport of New York Times.
But his texts, which use a very liberating and personal form – his criticism of slaves (New window) reads like a poetic ode to his daughtersaid by New York Times -earned her guest appearances on popular movie podcasts, hosting movie screenings in theaters, and writing paid reviews.
” Unless it has a personal aspect, I find criticism very boring. “
This is in a way a concretization of the famous saying of an emblematic filmmaker of the French New Wave. As François Truffaut said, we both have two professions, ours and those of film critics: Letterboxd is the very epitome of this idea.end by Sylvain Lavallée.
Source: Radio-Canada
