dumbprism 
My love for films and analyzing them
I love watching films. Filmmaking is one such hobby of mine which I’m very passionate about and I always enjoy the process. I always believe that it is us who choose a film and not a film that chooses us. A film only chooses the emotions that it must target once it has finished.
I love to analyze films and sometimes catch any easter eggs and once I am on a spree of watching films of a particular director I like capturing the patterns a director follows. Once such directorial pattern that I noticed was in David Fincher films.
Apart from his mind bending mysterious plots, David Fincher always has this feeling of sharing a sense of loss by the end of the film. Again, this is just a perception which I feel and not an analyzed news report that I’m trying to present. For instance, by the end of Gone Girl, we notice that there is no meaning to their relationship anymore (loss of love), In “The girl with the dragon Tattoo”, there is a loss of trust, love, friendship which I noticed. Similarly in “the game” the protagonist loses his ego, his trauma and much more. There are many other movies with some sort of loss.
The purpose of this blog is not how well I analyze films or how much I love films. Well, it is my perception of how letterboxd comes into the picture and how it has transformed the way I look at cinema.
The plot
Well, it all starts when I installed Letterboxd and found it very cool by logging films and adding them into my diary. I love writing reviews to each film that I watch, not because someone would read it, but I like writing down bits and pieces of my emotions once I finished watching a film, so that when I look back, it would at least make me realize what gem of a film or what utter crap of a work I just saw. Thus, Letterboxd felt a very cool place to be.
A few more reviews later
Well, as I kept logging and updating my profile and filling in the diary section with tons of movies, it just felt amazing. Along with me, my best friend also installed it, which made it lot more fun. I started creating a lot of lists in the app that captured a particular genre and also came across some hilarious and worth noticing reviews that just made the place much more better.
By the end of December 2024, I had watched 10 films, which felt a lot, because I never spared any time before. even though I loved watching films so much. I did not stop there though, March 2025, I had watched 32 films which was thrice as many as I did during December and I was awe struck with the numbers and the count of films I watched.
Problem #1
Well, here comes the problem. I had started to notice that as time passed by and I as I kept watching and reviewing films, the very first thing that came to my mind even before the film ended was
how much am I gonna rate this film on letterboxd?
I recently watched the F1 film with one of my friend’s and as soon as I got out of the theatre, I opened Letterboxd and started reviewing and rating the film. I was very much into it. That’s when I realized, that I was missing out the older gist of discussing films, analyzing frames and just going on and on about it for hours with your friends. I always loved discussing about a film once it ended and all of a sudden it was like an eco chamber of thoughts dumped inside an app.
Problem #2
At a point, I also started comparing my monthly watches with my highest streak of watches and all of a sudden it all became a numeric competition with myself. I also felt the need of watching a film was to understand the perception of a concept from the directors view and how well has a director come out with their art and where are these numbers coming all out of the blue suddenly?
It felt like I was watching films for the sake of these numbers to increase and be a film geek with these numbers increased. I was missing the concept of art and the emotion that a film left behind and sometimes got restless to finish a film, just to log it in letterboxd, which felt quite a stupid thing to do.
Problem #3
Letterboxd has this section of lists that had caught my sight and I had also created lists, where I create lists based on a particular emotion, song, language and much more. Thus, when I look at other’s list, it shows a percentage of the number of films I’ve watched in their list. Again , the concept of numbers did haunt me here as well.
Give a list a fancy title and it will definitely catch people’s sight. That’s what happened to me as well. Just for the hype and the countless occurrence of a film in many lists, I had watched quite many films just for the sake it, resulting in not getting anything out of me. I agree some of the films were absolute wonders, but at the same time, there were a few that I felt were quite over hyped. Thus, I understood, it is sometimes pointless to watch a film just for the hype of it. I believe that how big, great a film is, watch it only when you have the interest, mood, and the desire to explore something new. Else it would result in disappointment, many big yawn’s and sometimes make you even sleep.
Never go with the hype. Go with the plot, the storyline and then decide to watch it.
Problem #4
I also noticed that I started only watching the good, the best films ever possible, just by the ratings. Call me a maniac, but, before letterboxd, I came across some utter crap, brain rot, wasting my time worth films and then hitting a super amazing, why did this not win an oscar again?, mind boggling films which just lived as a memory. Thus, that sense of exploration of the bads and goods was lost somewhere between those 4 star, 5 star ratings. Trust me, watching some bad films in a spree and then hitting yourself with a great film is indeed the best feeling that you’ll ever come across. It would just stay in your mind for quite a long time. I always remember that the films that I explored and felt bad and later hit a film which was just peak, felt just really good. An amazing feeling.
End notes
Letterboxd is indeed a great platform for someone who uses it with the right intent. Any application is, indeed. With letterboxd, you would indeed get tons and tons of suggestions for new movies, which would help you explore a great genre of films. It is up to the user on how they are using the app. Well, in my case, I lost the feeling of enjoying a film and at a point felt like I was watching it for the sake of logging it inside the app. I hate maths. I see numbers and I run. Thus, when the numeric stats and everything came into picture and started taking over, it felt a lot of more non sensical and I indeed, at a point, lost the interest to watch films. Imagine, loving something so much and then all the numbers, lists, stats just don’t make you feel the same way. Thus, I indeed needed a break from the app and of course only come back with the right intent. Else, the whole purpose would be lost. It was indeed hard hitting the uninstall button, but I at least got the gist of exploring a “film”, irrespective of its vivid perceptions by people, it’s ratings, on how many lists is it on and much more. This blog post, would indeed be helpful for people who are just chasing numbers instead of doing what they love, forgetting the sole purpose of why they started and why they love it in the first place.