What comes to mind when you think of these two terms? For the former, it’s probably the moviegoer who prefers more mainstream, popular films. For the latter, it’s likely someone with more refined and less accessible taste. These concepts have been around for awhile, but really pondering about them, it becomes clear that the morals of throwing moviegoers under one term simply because they enjoy Tarantino just doesn’t sit right.

FILMBROS:

Realizing that some readers may not know the actual definition of a filmbro, I would definitely like to clarify. Principally, the basic gist of the word is to describe a moviegoer who generally prefers more accessible directors, who although for the most part make good movies, are still the butt of the joke when it comes to throwing the word “overrated” around. Not questioning the actual morals of this, what are these people assumed to be like? I would deduce that so-called filmbros absolutely adore directors like Martin Scorsese, Christopher Nolan, Quentin Tarantino and more extremely iconic directors. If Pulp Fiction or Fight Club or The Dark Knight are in their favorites, they are automatically classified under this word. Additionally, we can also unfairly generalize these typically mainstream cinema enjoyers as haters of foreign language films or reading subtitles while watching. Basically, it’s American cinema or bust. Tarantino over Tarkovsky and Fincher over Fellini. Not to say that these people don’t exist, because I have met a few, but I would call it extraordinarily insensitive and hasty to call every single admirer of all things David Fincher a term which simplifies an entire moviegoer’s taste. In all honesty, why does one care if their friendly neighborhood cinephile prefers Se7en over Stalker? I do myself despite adoring both, so it’s disappointing to see things like this happening.

CINEPHILES:

Now this type of moviegoer is expected to be the utter opposite. The antithesis of a filmbro if you will. It’s a lover of Tarkovsky, Fellini, Kurosawa, and other lesser known filmmakers to the general mainstream. The awful thing is, these moviegoers are pinned to the ground and thrown under this term if they do so much as dislike Fight Club. People inherently assume that these are pretentious, snobby and “fancy” elitists who believe they are superior to other types of moviegoers. It all falls apart when you examine the overall morals of the concept “types of moviegoers” in the first place, so these arguments should really be discarded. Seriously, one move against a popular flick and you can be written off as a snob. Is that truly how one should be treated? Of course not. Let them love their Ikiru. Let them cherish their Criterion disks of Come and See. Then again, I am not assuming that none of these people do believe that they have superior taste in cinema, but these oversimplifications are incredibly rash.

ISSUE #1: BLACK AND WHITE

One of the several glaring problems I see with these two terms are the oversimplifications in the world of opinions that it brings. We as humans always attempt to think outside of the box, to transcend the normal. This counteracts uniqueness. It forces us moviegoers to see everything in black and white, in ones and zeroes. It doesn’t let us transcend the two boundaries of “filmbro” and “cinephile”. You’re only allowed to stick with one. Solely permitted to either worship Fincher or Tarkovsky. Not both, not neither. It becomes almost controlling to really think about how far one could take these terms. Everything incredible about opinions have been diminished for the sake of keeping order with these two words. In mockery or irony, it is harmless, but in a serious way, this can absolutely ruin one’s self-confidence in their taste. Perhaps I am taking this too seriously, but do not think that I can’t enjoy it when these terms are used in memes. I have burst out laughing at several. The thing is, memes about these words are usually to make fun of how simple and boring they are, not to glorify them.

ISSUE #2: A CROSSOVER?

Similar to the previous section, it is interesting to test the many ways to break these concepts. What if a moviegoer is not restricted to one of these two words? To be clear, these are the vast majority of them, so does it really make sense to write off someone as a filmbro or cinephile when they’re a bit of both. What if I enjoy both Ingmar Bergman and David Fincher. Impossible, right. Not at all. Not in the very slightest. Looking at my top 25 films, my favorites can vary from Joker to Silence or Blade Runner 2049 to I’m Thinking of Ending Things. I am only one of the many examples of this debacle, and it becomes difficult to defend otherwise after listening to opposing arguments. I would even argue that several filmmakers can have traits that would fit the two categories equally. These include Denis Villeneuve, Paul Thomas Anderson and Martin Scorsese. Obviously, these three are for the thinking man, but they have some serious popularity as well. So what can be drawn from all of these scattered statements? This is the beauty of opinions. Something that cannot be constrained by boarders such as these terms.

ISSUE #3: A FILM BECOMES POPULAR

I will try and keep this last section fairly quick, but the third major flaw that I have found with this system is the fact that a lot of films that can be considered “filmbro movies” started out in a far more cinephile-type way. These are movies such as Parasite, Her, Moonlight, and even Portrait of a Lady on Fire to a certain extent. Art house, independent movies that happened to blow up in popularity and be recognized by the mainstream (within the Filmstigram community). These movies are unfortunately over saturated and commonly written off as “overrated” just because of being popular. I covered most of this in my “Overrated or Popular?” post, but it’s worth revisiting a little. It becomes an insanely complex situation when you add this in to the equation, and harder to side with the other opinion.

IN CONCLUSION:

Wrapping this up, there are a few valuable lessons to be learnt from this, but the primary one is don’t be an idiot. Do not butt your nose in someone else’s opinions and assert superiority of their taste simply because they like a certain movie. Is it really that important to you if some random moviegoer has some IMDb Top 250 films in their favorites? Or if someone despises that list and sticks with the Letterboxd Top 250? This topic truly irritates me occasionally, so it was nice to have a good rant about it. Hopefully readers didn’t fall asleep or anything.