Ladders

What do ladders have to do with movies?
The "ladders" concept here at Half Popped Reviews stems from a few different ideas coming together into a shared concept that I've baked into the "game" aspect I'm working to cultivate.

Idea 1: To hold a well-informed opinion of an actor or director, there are certain films of theirs you should see before your view of them carries any weight. Certain films are more essential than others.
If a person wants to judge Steven Spielberg as a director, their opinion isn't a very informed one if they've only seen Adventures Of Tintin and Bridge Of Spies. Those films can factor into what a person thinks of him as a director, but I want to hear back from them after they've seen Raiders Of The Lost Ark, Jurassic Park, and Jaws.

This is where the "ladder" concept comes into play.

I've taken a list of movies directed by Steven Spielberg and placed them on "rungs" of that "ladder" in an order that I believe starts with the most essential of his films and moves towards others which I felt were less important towards forming an opinion of his work.

Spielberg isn't the only director for whom I created such a "ladder", he's just the example I'm using here to illustrate the first idea that played a part in the creation of the "ladder" and "rung" concepts. Are the lists flawed? Biased? Absolutely possible, and I'd be up for debate about them, and I'd even consider switching some things around, adding some things in, taking some things out. The list of ladders can be found below, but first, look into the second idea that spawned these concepts.


Idea 2: I would like to be able to say that I've seen all of the Academy Award Best Picture Winners dating all the way back to... a specific year.
Now, this one's a little tougher to maintain, and each year, many people will invariably fall off the "ladder" when the latest winner joins in at the bottom rung, but it's something I was interested in nevertheless.

I came up with the technical aspects of implementing this sort of ladder, all you have to do is watch the movies!

Now, on this ladder especially, there's a likelihood that a person has seen movies on a ladder for rungs which they've yet to reach. For example, perhaps someone has seen the Academy Award Best Picture Winner from the past four years but haven't seen last year's winner yet. This is quite likely, especially because many people will watch a movie once they know it won Best Picture. In that case, once a person sees a film, they don't have to go back and "re-achieve" rungs they had already covered. They've provided their opinion on a film, that's all that matters. So having seen last year's winner, now they've suddenly jumped up the ladder.

Ah, yes, the rating.

In order for Half Popped Reviews to KNOW that you've achieved a ladder rung, you have to provide your opinion about it in the form of a numeric rating. At some point, perhaps I'll decide to come up with a means to simply let people indicate that they've SEEN something without telling us what they think about it... but for a variety of reasons, I'm going to have people provide a numeric rating for now. Why? Because part of what I like to do is to take into account what people think of a variety of movies and try to predict what they are going to think about other movies, and thus I can make recommendations for them. I can also see if anyone else has similar opinions, and use those ratings to help make recommendations for both individuals as well. But, don't worry, we're not doing any data mining. There aren't any cookies involved here where we'd be figuring out how old you are, your gender, your political leanings, what brand of soap you buy... Nope. Just a set of movie opinions in the form of numeric ratings!

Full List of Ladders


1 Best Picture Oscar Winners
2 Essential Steven Spielberg
3 Essential Tom Cruise
4 Essential Alfred Hitchcock
5 Essential Wes Anderson
6 Essential Bill Murray
7 Essential Christopher Nolan
8 Marvel Cinematic Universe
9 Essential Meryl Streep
10 Essential 80s Comedies
11 Essential Quentin Tarantino Films
12 All Time Greats
13 Essential Tom Hanks
14 Essential Nicolas Cage
15 Faster and More Furious
16 DC Extended Universe
17 Essential Sam Rockwell
18 Essential James Cameron
19 Essential Jimmy Stewart
20 Essential Stanley Kubrick
21 Essential Orson Welles
22 Essential Ridley Scott
23 Essential Guillermo del Toro
24 Essential Martin Scorsese
25 Essential Miloš Forman
26 Essential Jessica Chastain
27 Essential Amy Adams
28 Essential Anna Kendrick
29 Essential Kate Winslet
30 Essential Emma Stone
31 Essential Octavia Spencer
32 Essential Kirk Douglas
33 Essential Martin McDonagh
34 Essential Michelle Williams
35 Essential Heath Ledger
36 Essential Christian Bale
37 Essential Michael Keaton
38 Essential Denzel Washington
39 Essential Reese Witherspoon
40 Essential George Clooney
41 Essential Morgan Freeman
42 Essential Robert De Niro
43 Essential Warren Beatty
44 Essential Anthony Hopkins
45 Essential Robin Williams
46 Essential Michael Douglas
47 Essential Gene Hackman
48 Essential Harrison Ford
49 Essential Al Pacino
50 Essential Jack Nicholson
51 Essential Shirley MacLaine
52 Essential Sean Connery
53 Essential Robert Redford
54 Essential Audrey Hepburn
55 Essential Doris Day
56 Essential Clint Eastwood
57 Essential Elizabeth Taylor
58 Essential Paul Newman
59 Essential Laurence Olivier
60 Essential Sidney Poitier
61 Essential Gene Kelly
62 Essential Bette Davis
63 Essential Michael Mann
64 Favorites of Martin Scorsese SnS 2012
65 Sight And Sound Top 50 polled in 2012
66 Evolution of The Rock
67 Essential George Miller
68 Essential Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu
69 Essential Richard Curtis
70 Essential Pixar Films
71 Lone Wolf and Cub Series
72 James Bond Saga
73 Star Trek saga
74 Video Game Movies
75 DC Animated Movie Universe
76 Essential Brian de Palma