Filmmaking is a chance to live many lifetimes.
Robert Altman
Cinema has been the pinnacle of entertainment since the early twentieth century. A medium for the masses, drawing in crowds old and young. One hundred years later, we still march to the movies every week or so to catch the new release.
Okay… maybe the theatre experience doesn’t live up to the hype that it used to in the post-war years. Sure, there’s Netflix, Hulu, Prime and half a dozen more platforms, where you’ll be spoiled for choice in what to binge-watch as you try to bore yourself to sleep on a Sunday night. And that’s discounting the streaming platform’s predecessor – television. I, for one, won’t miss scrolling endlessly through the TV channels during sub-prime hours. Or even fighting over the remote control with my brother.
But while TV and streaming has divided and individualised the way we consume stories, the cinema is a uniting power. Where else would you find a room full of strangers, willingly sitting in an enclosed, dark space together? The only thing in common you shared being the choice in movie you made that fateful day. Whoever you go to the movies with, be it friends, family, a date or even alone, there’s always something to chew over after the credits roll.
While this publication will pale in comparison to actual movie tributes – the like of Damien Chazelle’s Babylon or Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood – the weekly movie recs serves as this writer’s own ode to cinematic history. A history that reaches beyond the anglophone world. Through this exercise, I hope to discover new gems and recover some old favourites. Along the way, I’ll be exploring cult classics, unpopular genres, and global cinema beyond Hollywood.
Now, let’s watch movies!
