b. The list is missing the two most important movies to HN: The Shawshank Redemption, which is about how you're never going to close funding until you give up on ever closing funding, and Ghostbusters, the greatest startup movie of all time.
If I recommend you Fight Club, the recommendation would be of poor quality because everybody has seen/likes this particular movie already, but does that have to mean the movie itself is bad too, just because it is "common" ?
http://www.cyberpunkreview.com/cyberpunk-movies-by-decade/ http://www.cyberpunkreview.com/hacker-movies/ (also in the comments)
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Festive_Fifty)
(I'm a bit surprised by the comments about affiliate links. Affiliate links are much more preferable to me than ad-heavy pages.)
It needs a different dataset, but I'd be more interested in developing a metric of how much people disagree on a movie (or any non-average). With the same food metaphor-- the flavor of a dish is not always supposed to be sugary pleasant, but it's supposed to make you feel something and surprise your palette. I actually think this method of evaluation is what sets apart the great critics of any art. They focus on experience rather than simple emotion.
That's actually a really interesting idea. Some of my favorite movies do not have universal appeal, in fact, they fall under that polarising category. An example of this is There Will be Blood. To me, it is quite possibly the most interesting piece of film I've ever seen. But it exists as one of those love or hate movies. Just about everyone I know found the movie insufferable, while I've happily watched it at least 10- 15 times. A way of of sorting that favored love it or hate it movies could probably yield some really interesting results.
Full disclosure: I'm the author.
It would be boring and a giant circle-jerk if every member had the same opinion. What would we discuss then?
Considering the affiliate links offer the exact same user experience as if they didn't use affiliate links, I find you comment perplexing.
Joint Security Area and Old Boy - two movies of totally different style from brilliant Korean director Park Chan-wook
A Separation - an excellent Iranian family drama, great actors, a surprising script, my personal favorite from the last few years
Reservoir Dogs - and almost all Tarantino movies
Gran Torino - Clint's beautiful farewell
The Celebration - Dark comedy/drama, the highpoint of Danish Dogme 95 movement for me
I wish I could say something like Aguirre, or Tokyo Story, but that's the honest list.