As filmmaking marches towards celebrating it’s 130 year anniversary, a glance over our shoulder is all we need to remind ourselves of the blisteringly fast invention and sweeping transformations which led to cinema being the beloved form of art and entertainment it is today.
Cinema belongs to everyone now; from behemoth studio handlers’ and their blockbuster summer fare, to independent filmmakers breaking boundaries with experimental storytelling, and everything in between. It’s short, colourful history already runs deep – take for example these handful of topics a movie lover may stumble across as they immerse themselves in its history;
- Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin, Harold Lloyd and the wonder of silent comedy.
- The Historical Epics of Cecille B. DeMille, David Lean or Anthony Mann
- The French New Wave & Auteur Cinema
- Hollywood’s obsession with Westerns and their scruffy Italian cousins the Spaghetti Westerns
- Screwball Comedies of the 30’s and 40’s
- Exploitation & Grindhouse Cinema
- The Shaw Brothers Kung Fu extravaganza’s
- Bollywood, Tollywood and the numerous other flavours of Indian cinema
…all without touching upon the craft of filmmaking itself with its legions of departments, roles and their unique skills required to pull a film from script to screen.
Why then, could we never find a single online hub weaving this tapestry into one canvas? Why do cinephiles and blockbuster lovers alike not have somewhere to call home, somewhere to get lost exploring and submersing themselves in the expansiveness of cinema? Frankly, we don’t know… but it’s something Explore Cinema launches today to change.
Explore Cinema sets out to build a crossroads from which film enthusiasts can walk their own road deep into any aspect of cinema, past and present, or the filmmaking process itself. Millions of words and countless hours have already been sunk into crafting websites, books, apps, podcasts and more devoted to cinema and our goal is uncovering the very best of it, bringing it to the surface and presenting it to the audience it deserves – you.
Whether it’s seasoned filmmakers recounting memories and mentoring a younger generation, or devoted fans painstakingly detailing obscure slices of cinema history, Explore Cinema will herd it all into one home and offer visitors a friendly, intuitive navigation, including expansive categories, to guide you towards new discoveries, or deeper into familiar ones.
If you visit Explore Cinema and walk away having found only one new community, one new website, or one new tidbit of cinematic history that has excited or educated you then our job is done. Our hope that we can do a little better than though, and in time we hope to bring together a community of fellow audience members who enjoy discovering, sharing and discussing the beauty of cinema.