Upon its creation by a small team located in Auckland, New Zealand in 2011, Letterboxd was made by Matthew Buchanan and Karl von Randow as a way for people to share their personal rankings of movies and socialize with other film enjoyers on the platform.
The website, which is available on all devices, is an easy-to-navigate space with plenty of things to do. You can add friends, write diary entries for films, make lists to rank films in whatever category you want, and even scroll through long-form articles that professional accounts write on a wide range of topics from film releases, deep dives into specific films, and just basic entertainment news.
On the surface, it looks similar to other movie review sites like Rotten Tomatoes and IMDB, but many users argue that Letterboxd is going to be the quintessential website to use when you want to get other opinions before seeing a movie. Scott Tobias, a writer for the online film newsletter The Ringer describes Letterboxd as a “vast warehouse of opinion and hard data, an opportunity both to survey reactions to popular films and head down various rabbit holes,” a place where, unlike other sites like Rotten Tomatoes, is filled with diary entries of obscure unseen films and polarizing reviews of the year’s biggest blockbusters. Letterboxd, unlike others, is much more of a spectrum of reviews, rather than based on popular opinion.
Letterboxd prides itself on being a place for people to write digital diary entries of films they watch and log how much they enjoy or dislike the film. It allows users to post their unfiltered, unapologetic opinions on what works and doesn’t work in a film. There’s been discourse comparing Letterboxd to other review sites like Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic, and the consensus through many posts is that people agree Letterboxd is the best platform to use because of how the rating system works.
On Rotten Tomatoes, there are only critic scores and audience scores. Critic scores are strict, in that one critic can rate a movie as being decent, it has some flaws but was overall enjoyable, say giving the film an even 60 percent. That same review would be in the same category as another critic who says the film is the worst thing they’ve ever seen, giving it a flat 0 percent. This in turn lowers the overall critic score, as it averages out two vastly different ratings.
On Letterboxd, this rating system is much more equal and fair to the films and users on their platform. Rather than simply being rotten or fresh, films can be rated anything from half a star to five stars, and anyone that downloads the app and makes an account can rate any film. With the application being free, it allows anyone to put their opinions on films out easily for anyone to see.
Along with the star system, people can attach their own public entry to their star rating, and share their thoughts on a film that further justifies their feelings on the film and gives other users an idea of what it is about, or share if it's worth their time to watch.
Letterboxd is a good source for unbiased reviews, as many users make it a point to give fair ratings to films as it supports their favorite directors and puts a good stamp on their projects. It’s also a fun place to meet other film nerds and industry workers as it’s incredibly easy to make friends and everyone’s accounts are on the same level.
There aren’t verified accounts like on Twitter and other social media platforms, users can only become Pro or Patron accounts, where they pay for special perks that enhance the things they can do on the app. Anyone can pay for Pro or Patron and have that title, it’s not a title automatically given to influencers. Anyone can have thousands of followers on Letterboxd, and it’s not a big deal if you do. Anyone’s reviews can go “viral,” and anyone can be featured on the site. It’s one of the only social media platforms I’ve seen that isn’t bound by toxic interactions, it’s a place where people just gather to rate and share thoughts about films.
Even if you’re not deep into film discourse like myself, I recommend giving Letterboxd a chance, it’s easy to use, and a great place to learn new facts about films and be introduced to some of the best visual works of art made throughout history.
Mia Ashby is a senior studying journalism at Ohio University. Please note that the views and opinions of the columnist do not reflect those of The Post. Do you agree? Tell Mia by emailing her at ma237419@ohio.edu.
