the state of the forum

[Blarg]

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as for the movie thread, isn't there some value in having the long history so if someone wants to know about a specific film, they can sort of skim around for it, or do enough people employ the search function?

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I'd agree if the movie thread was deeper. But the vast majority of posts there are just a few lines or a paragraph and not really much of a discussion or well-developed. There are some nice posts there, but they're such a minority that the thread doesn't seem to have the character of a place you go to check out what people think about a film. It's more like chat. Mr. Wookie's and Katey's back and forth analyses of So You Think You Can Dance in the t.v. thread put to shame most of what's in the movie thread, and we are fine with chopping that up because it's so ephemeral.

If the movie thread were more thematic(Fish Out of Water Comedies) or deeper(Movies That Make You Feel Like One Smart Feller), or developed an argument(How the Hayes Code Shaped American Ideas About Sex and Marriage), then there's a unity there worth keeping whole. The current long-running movie thread is mostly just heads-ups for cool movies coming out or to rent, movie chat, and some back and forth about some films some of us like.

Anyway, that's my take on it. Not meaning to slight any of the good posts in the movie thread.