Weekend Website
Anytime that I’ve needed to lookup information regarding a movie, I’ve always turned to The Internet Movie Database. They’re considered to be “the biggest, best, most award-winning movie and TV site on the planet” and they have all kinds of information available. While IMDB remains my favorite source for TV and movie information, I thought it was worth taking a look at some alternatives because there are some great ones out there. Today we’ll be looking at three sites to visit which include Movies.com, Yahoo! Movies, and MovieWeb.
–Movies.com–
Movies.com has actually been around since 2000 and they include everything related to movies. If you’d like to keep up with movie news or you want to buy tickets and view show times, you can do it all at Movies.com. Here’s a quick run-through on what you’ll find at the site:
Homepage
The homepage includes the movie spotlight which shows the box-office leaders, movies opening during the week, upcoming movies, and new DVD releases.
The Buzz
The Buzz is where you’ll read all about the latest buzz! At the moment, of course it’s all about the Oscars. Right now you can take the Headless Oscar Fashions Quiz or see the list of Oscar nominees.
New & Upcoming
In the “New & Upcoming” section you’ll find a spotlight for the week. This week it’s Jumper which is now in theaters. You can get all kinds of info on the movie of the week as well as other new movies including movie details, tickets and times, trailers and clips, and reviews. They also post an upcoming release calendar by week so that you know when movies you want to see are headed for the big-screen.
Reviews
Want to know what people think of a movie before you see it, this is where you can do that. They graph results which include their opinion, the opinion of critics, and what their site visitors have to say. For example, Jumper was given a C rating by Movies.com, a C- by the critics, and a B by site readers.
Other “Stuff”
Additional components to the site include a fan forum, a place where you can see photos of your favorite actors and actresses, as well as a section to view trailers and clips from upcoming movies.
If you end up visiting the site frequently, you’ll want to become a member and then you can customize the content that you see on the site, keep track of reviews that you’ve written, and more.
–Yahoo! Movies–
Yahoo! Movies is another great site to go to when you want to keep up with movies. Out of any of the sites we’re talking about today, Yahoo! Movies has the best interface. The main components to this site include the list of the top movies at the box office, a list of movies opening this week, the option to get showtimes and tickets for movies in your area, and a section with movie news and gossip. They too have trailers and clips for new movies.
Below you’ll find a quick run-through of what you’ll find when navigating through Yahoo! Movies.
There are three main tabs on the Yahoo! Movies site – “Movies,” DVD,” and “My Movies.” Today we’re just focusing on the content that you can find under the “Movies” tab.
In Theaters
This is where you’ll get all of the information you could ever want about movies that are opening in theaters shortly, and those already in theaters. One of the best parts about the information that they provide is the user reviews. There are SO many user reviews for movies so you really get a good idea of whether or not it’s worth seeing. For each movie, they provide a brief summary, but then they also provide links to more detailed movie information, showtimes, trailers & clips, and user reviews.
Showtimes & Tickets
Just enter in your location and it will pull up a list of theaters and showtimes in your area. They also provide the address and phone number for the theater, and a link so that you can map it on Yahoo Maps.
Coming Soon
By visiting the “coming soon” section, you’ll be able to see a list of movies that will be coming out over the next several weeks.
Top Rated
Remember how I mentioned all of the user reviews? They are most useful in the “Top Rated” section. A list of movies that are in the theaters is displayed, and then they display what the average grade was that Yahoo! users gave the movie. For example, The Bucket List has been given, on average, a B by users. They also included a list of Top Movies of All Time which includes movies like The Shawshank Redemption, The Godfather, Star Wars, and more.
–MovieWeb–
MovieWeb’s slogan is “The Best Seat in the House” and like the other two sites we mentioned today, they include all kinds of information on the latest movies hitting the theaters, those just coming to DVD, and more. While their site can be a little difficult to navigate, there’s a lot of great content there so searching through it is worth it. Some of the main components you’ll find on their homepage include a list of movies on DVD this week, the latest Blu-Ray and HD DVD movie reviews, today’s box office numbers, and all kinds of news, features, and interviews.
Below you’ll find some of the information that you can find on MovieWeb’s site.
Releases
Under the “Releases” tab you’ll find a list of the movies that will be in theaters, those that will be released on DVD, and HD DVD and Blu-ray releases for the week. What I like about MovieWeb’s release section compared to the others is that they show the movie cover instead of just listing the movies which is nice.
User Reviews
There are pages upon pages of reviews for movies in the theater as well as those on DVD. I clicked to view a review of Spiderwick and I was able to get reviews as well as all kinds of information regarding it. Aside from the review, here’s a list of all of the information you can get for movies:
- Summary
- Synopsis
- Videos (like the Trailer and different clips)
- Photos
- Headlines
- Comments
- Show times if it’s in the theater
Hi-Def
Unlike the other sites we mentioned, MovieWeb has a section dedicated to the latest Hi-Definition News. The only downside is that you can’t subscribe to the news which would be great if you were keeping your eye out for movies being released on the Blu-ray format. Aside from the news, they also list the latest HD DVD and Blu-ray movie reviews which can be found on the homepage as well.
I actually like Movies.com a lot, use that site more than IMDB. I read some where that Movies.com is actually #2 movie site barely behind IMBD.
[screenrush.co.uk] for people in the UK, it also lets me subscribe to an rss feed for my local cinema. Otherwise I usually check out IMDb and Apple Movie Trailers but I will certainly be looking at the sites above.
I never like IMDB’s page design, way too much yellow. Thanks for some great alternatives.
Coming Soon is another good place. I move between it and Movies.com.
Y! Movies is generally pretty good, but once I planned w/ a friend for a certain showtime, then the next day I checked and it was different. I certainly want to be able to trust my showtimes.
Another good one is [allmovie.com]
Good article Ashley
[RottenTomatoes.com]
I believe they may have given their site an update because there is very little yellow now. On most pages, it’s just a fairly thin strip across the top.
Thanks for yet another alternative. Just so other readers know, it’s [comingsoon.net.] It looks like they offer similar content to the other sites available. Nice find.
Hello
Good to find this.
IMDB is an AMAZON company who has been engaging in all sorts of ILLEGAL Behaviour.
They do not honour freedom of religion, they discriminate against GAYS and they have been
bullying small publishers into having to have their books printed through them (one of them fought
back and WON the case)
They act as if they want to take over the world, actually, they probably do, so please spread this information
and BOYCOTT them if you are against discrimination of this kind and i would imagine everyone (except for
some sickos) is.
Thanks.
and guess who owns amazon(says partialy but..)?? Time Warner Company [[cjr.org]]
IMDB will only accept credit cards and no other payment method – No PayPal, no debit card, no cheques, no cash – nope! You gotta give them a credit card. Whose interests do they serve? The people? Or the corporations where everyone is forced to carry one of their credit cards.
Find an alternative!
IMDB now translates some film titles into the local language of the viewer (it detects your location), which makes it very difficult to find a film title. I live in Scandinavia, and IMDB is now useless to me, since some titles are in english, some in my local language. A senseless mess.
I used to love MoveWeb but, lately, their website has become nearly impossible to navigate.
1). You can’t just skip to a given month in the current year; instead, you have to keep clicking on the previous or next month link until you reach the month you desire.
2). If you want movies listed “By Release Date”, for example, you have to keep clicking on “By Release Date” if you move to another month or year. This becomes extremely annoying if you’re looking over several dates/months/years.
3) You can no longer print the film release pages without migraine-inducing formatting changes on EVERY page. Also, long titles are copied with ellipsis instead of full titles.
4) Their idiotic Facebook banner contracts and expands EVERYTIME you load a page, so you have to wait until it expands before clicking on anything or you’ll end up clicking an undesired choice.
The only reasons I still visit the site are a) it does seem to be more accurate than most sites and b) they include the poster art, when available, for the movies listed.
It is true that IMDB will accept only major credit cards. No PayPal, no cheques, no cash, no – nothing but credit cards. And when you ask they say “we have no plans to offer alternative payment methods.”
Whose interests do they serve? Well, IMDB is owned by Amazon which sells movies which wants your credit card purchases.
Amazon is owned by Time-Warner which also owns much of the major media which controls what you learn about the world and the spin given the news by the owners of these major corporations.
We need a good alternative to IMDB to take back the ownership of the arts. Anyone got any good updates on alternatives to IMDB? Thanks!
never knew, never tried any alternative to imdb.
until minutes ago while i clicks, something popped-up,
and it said: free 15 days upgrade to imdbpro!
i realized that its about the time to get rid of imdb
it always happens. all the time.
one good site will one day become a annoying commercial device.
spam, scam, ads and more ads..
the same path that would be also taken by google and wiki