TheAuteurs.com offers social network for film lovers

In our haste to highlight the awesome new Criterion Collection website earlier this week, we failed to mention the new site TheAuteurs.com, whose creators were the principal architects for Criterion’s new ventures. The fledgling site, pitched as an online movie theater as well as a social-networking start-up for adventurous filmgoers, features message boards, daily features and free streaming movies.

“Think of it as a virtual cinematheque,” the site reads, “a place where you leave the dark of the screening room, and find yourself amongst friends.”

The message boards currently include the expected (“Guilty pleasures”), the sheepish (“Closet Oscar fans?”) and the lofty (“Film: Is it art or entertainment?”). There is also a forum in which a 12-year-old kid asks for advice on how to get started on “Kurosawa, Fellini, Antoinoni, and Truffaut,” and gets it. And that’s the real surprise so far: The site has managed to attract a refined group of contributors, or at least ones willing to hear each other out before they fall into the attack cycle.

The Auteurs also partners with Criterion to create an online film festival, which offers a collection of films to stream for free (and like Criterion, it has others available for $5 apiece). The site is in beta, and its creators turn up often to ask for advice on what users want to see in the future.

Related links:
News: Criterion offers streaming movies for $5
Ctrl-V: Judging films by their covers
TheAuteurs.com

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