Re-Think Genre

There is something obvious about movies that nobody talks about, even though it’s life-changingly important: We watch movies because we want to feel.

This means that we need to re-think genre.

The Feels

First thing’s first, think about this and prove me wrong. When you look for something to watch, don’t you pass on movies because you don’t want to feel a certain way? No dumb comedies this time; I don’t want to roll my eyes at easy jokes. No dramas this time; I feel defeated and can’t take more negativity in my life right now. And so on.

And on the flip side, don’t you pick something because you guess that it’ll make you feel a certain way? I’m feeling goofy, let’s keep that going with some slapstick. Or I need to cry right now, I need guaranteed sadness.

The Therapy

Because we watch to feel, changing genre to be more descriptive would get us more quickly to that feeling that we’re trying to feel. Or at the very least, it’ll help us understand what we want to feel, which is a task in itself.

Imagine it. You go to your favorite streamer, and instead of a comedy section, there are sections like: I’ve had a tough day and need some light-hearted laughs, or, I want to feel OK for being clumsy. Instead of drama, there are sections like: I’m still angry at my mother and need catharsis, or, I’m struggling with my sexuality and need to feel seen. What if next time you go to the theater, there are movie sommeliers asking you about what you’re searching for, and making a recommendation?

The End is the Beginning

This may sound like an unnavigable maze of movies, but my guess is that it’ll help us. That it’ll be therapeutic.

Watch the Credits

Think of the fridges of your life for one moment. Have they been covered with things?

And do we not smile when a child takes its first steps?

Yes and yes. Throughout life, we find it important to recognize and celebrate worthwhile behavior.

So then, why oh why do you leave the movie before the credits are over? Why do you skip the intros and the endings?

If what you’re watching is good enough to pay for and sit through for two hours . . . if what you’re watching is so good that you can’t get enough and you simply need to skip the credits to get more . . . if you’re refusing to go to the bathroom . . . you should recognize that (i) it’s because people worked their asses off to bring this to you and (ii) they did a great job. These people deserve recognition.

We put the picture on our fridge. We hug our child in pride. Let’s acknowledge that the movie that moves you is a special thing, too; a miraculous team effort much harder and more impressive than you can imagine. Let’s give credit where credit is due.

stixpicks reviews are different

I like the movie L’iceberg (2005), so let’s start there.

One (non-stix) review of it begins like this:

“This debut feature by the filmmaking team of Dominique Abel, Fiona Gordon and Bruno Romy earns two adjectives that rarely go together: breezy and bold. The film charts one woman’s journey from dronelike suburban mom and fast-food manager to would-be Arctic explorer. It starts when the heroine, Fiona (Ms. Gordon), is trapped in a restaurant freezer overnight and realizes she enjoyed the experience. She subjects herself to increasingly severe endurance tests and becomes obsessed with images of icebergs, even carving one in her freezer at home (like Richard Dreyfuss creating Devils Tower from mashed potatoes in “Close Encounters of the Third Kind”).”

— Matt Zoller Seitz, in the New York Times. May 4, 2007.

That snippet teaches us, as a movie review should. But it teaches too much too fast. The first sentence alone includes at least seven pieces of information (the movie (1) is feature-length; (2) is someone’s first; (3) was made by a team ((4) here are there names); (5) was breezy; (6) was bold; and (7) its combination is rare in movies). The rest of the paragraph is similarly swollen. Adjectives thicken nouns and an unrelated movie/actor/scene are referenced.

I don’t know about you, but after reading it I feel more tired and self-conscious than informed. So what’s this movie about? I ask myself. Something about a freezer-person, I answer, because I can’t remember most of the review. What I do remember I am probably confusing. This is why stixpicks exists.

Unlike the currently established conventional review style we see used everywhere else—the one that both overfeeds and desperately tries to condense a movie for us—a stixpicks review selectively shares information. It is written to concisely answer the fundamental question that all moviewatchers ask (and answer) before they watch: Will I like spending my time with this movie?

To visualize the difference, take a look at this stixpicks-style paraphrase of that first snippet:

“What do you do when you’re stuck in a freezer? Fall in love, of course!

Not with someone, but with the experience. Like Fiona in L’iceberg. Her travels through life were painfully dull until being locked in a freezer overnight. Confusingly, hilariously, the experience transformed her.

Mom has a new zest for life now, subjecting herself to increasingly outrageous feats of cold-endurance. What’ll she do next?! I don’t know, but I’d like to find out. Her family remaining oblivious somehow adds humor to the strangeness, and lets us have Fiona all to ourselves.”

— stixpicks (hypothetically)

OK, this time my interest in L’iceberg is piqued. I’ve learned the plot (freezer transforms bored mom into Arctic explorer) and the overall feeling of the movie (strange, funny, adventurey) without unnecessary detail. Already, I have a good sense of whether I’ll want to give this movie a try.

Let’s look at the second paragraph of the non-stix review, though. It’ll crystallize what makes a stixpick.

“The movie is structured as a series of brazenly metaphoric slapstick tableaus, with little music and less dialogue. Relying on static wide shots that pin the characters to their color-coded environments (a style choice that links the film to the work of Buster Keaton, Jacques Tati, Jim Jarmusch and other deadpan fabulists), “L’Iceberg” treats Fiona’s journey as a mythic quest. Its simultaneously silly and grave tone finds humor in the characters’ delusions and obsessions while celebrating their uniqueness.”

— Matt Zoller Seitz, in the New York Times. May 4, 2007.

We’re learning again. The snippet explains how certain of the moviemakers’ choices affect the movie’s vibe. Continuing the effort to connect this movie with others (or to establish the writer’s keen eye and knowledge of cinema?) it proposes links between L’iceberg and other (recognizable, respected) names of movie history. OK. Well, what if I’m not familiar with those names? What if I don’t know what a static tableau is or disagree with the assessment that the movie’s aesthetic is somehow linked to the work of those other moviemakers? To understand whether I’ll enjoy this movie, do I truly need to know where the reviewer thinks it fits into the eternal webbed chart of our dear cinema?

There is nothing wrong with that writer, that writing, or that style. In fact, it’s important that they and others exist because perspectives give perspective. My point is simply that stixpicks aims to provide a new perspective for us to consider, one that elucidates above all else whether we’ll like experiencing a movie. For all the rest of it—info about the production, the inspiration, the analogues, the business, the art, the moviemakers, and so on—we can consult so many other wonderful resources.

So that’s it! Brevity plus helping you is the stuff that makes a stixpicks review. Read a non-stix review from anywhere else and you’ll get the picture.

K.I.S.S.

I’d like you to try something: Watch a movie you know nothing about.

No, don’t check its ratings first. And don’t watch that thing your friend might’ve told you was good. Look for something different. Pick the thing that you are spectacularly ambivalent about—or the one that your internal compass points you away from.

Yes, this exercise might be a boring or repulsive waste of your time. If you do it enough times such a reaction is almost certain. But sometimes, it might open your eyes to a wonderful surprise, one that makes you feel good or that teaches you something.

Remember your first kiss? You knew you wanted to try it; weren’t sure about the details or how it would turn out, but you went for it anyway, hopeful and trusting. Exploring movies is no different.

If that’s not your thing, fine. Read a stixpicks review to get a sense of that movie first. I recommend! ;)

But once in a while, you could do worse than to keep it simple, smartypants, and just go for it.

xoxo,

stix

A Bite-Sized Movie Manifesto

I wish we didn’t call them shorts.

Movies are stories, and good ones leave impressions that are timeless. Referring to a group of them based on runtime is an oversimplification at best, and at worst, using a word that our brains associate with concepts like small, brief, or cursory unfairly colors our perception of a movie before it even begins. Our mindset affects how we experience things, and calling a movie a short can trick us into thinking it’s somehow less than its feature-length siblings.

Of course, the runtime of a movie can be an important fact to know. As few of us have the luxury to play movie roulette, we shouldn’t get rid of a quick way to distinguish between longer and briefer movies. But we should be more thoughtful about how we express that difference.

So I propose the following; if we’re calling these movies anything other than movies, let’s call them bites—a digestible experience giving you all the flavors that something has to offer.

Tasty, no?