It is widely considered that the history of cinema and movies starts with the 1878’s series of cabinet cards by Eadweard Muybridge called The Horse in Motion. It is estimated that millions of movies have been made since, meaning that we’ll only ever be able to watch a tiny fraction of them in our lifetime. With that being the case, selecting the ones to spend your time on is of utmost importance.
Most people rely on the box office, film critics, and recommendations from family and friends to pick out the movies they will watch. While this is usually a good tactic, it may result in missing out on some quintessential films. If you don’t want this to happen, then you will appreciate the recent video made by Los Angeles-based filmmaker and screenwriter Sam Kench.
In the clip posted on his YouTube channel Brickwall Pictures, Kench took a deep dive into cinema history and recommended one essential film for every year of cinema starting from 1878. In picking out the movies to recommend, Kench didn’t rely on his personal preference. Instead, he took into consideration “importance, cultural relevance, innovation, etc.”
“Basically, if you are going to watch just one film from a given year, it should be this one,” Kench says in the video.
Besides recommending movies, Kench also includes some context about each movie and the year it has been releasing in, turning the video into a film history crash course as well. Check it out below, and never wonder what to watch for movie night anymore.
