IB Extended Essay: Primary Text Research - Class of 2020: Film

Google Scholar

Keywords with Boolean Operators work here, too! If you find an article and can't read the full text on Google Scholar, we may have access to the same material in the databases.

Questions? Just ask!

Public Access Databases

Who is responsible for the material you find here? If you use one of these sources, take a few minutes to research the author of the material. Do you trust their authority, credibility, and reliability on the topic? Or is the information written by a random film enthusiast?

Questions? Just ask!

Public Access Databases: In some cases, dig for articles, critiques, blogs, etc. on these sites. 

• Internet Movie Database: http://www.imdb.com/

• American Film Institute: http://www.afi.com/

• Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences: http://www.oscars.org/

• Strictly Film School: http://www.filmref.com/

• British Film Institute: http://www.bfi.org.uk/

• Palace Classic Films: http://www.moderntimes.com/palace/

• American Movie Classics: http://www.amctv.com/

• Independent Film Channel: http://www.ifc.com/

• IFC Films: http://www.ifcfilms.com/

• Motion Picture and Television Reading Room: http://www.loc.gov/rr/mopic/

• National Film Preservation Board: http://www.loc.gov/film/

National Film Registry: http://www.loc.gov/film/filmnfr.html

Internet Resources

Who is responsible for the material you find here? If you use one of these sources, take a few minutes to research the author of the material. Do you trust their authority, credibility, and reliability on the topic? Or is the information written by a random film enthusiast?

Questions? Just ask!

• Criterion Collection

• Film Education

• Indie Wire

• National Film Preservation Board

• National Film Registry

• The Nerdwriter

• Norton- Looking at Movies- An Intro to Film

• No Film School

• Project Muse 

• RocketJump Film School

• Women in Film

Critical Reviews

Who is responsible for the material you find here? If you use one of these sources to find criticism, take a few minutes to research the author of the criticism. Do you trust their authority, credibility, and reliability on the topic? Or is the criticism written by a random film enthusiast?

Questions? Just ask!

• Critics.com: www.critics.com: “For every film, we list the ratings of 15 prominent critics.  Some are the usual suspects (e.g., Roger Ebert) but we also try to use critics from different parts of the country and from different media in order to give a more representative idea of the national Critic Consensus.  Then, under the title Dueling Critics, we include two quotes, one from the critic who gave the film its highest rating and one from the critic who gave it its lowest rating.”

• CineFiles (Pacific Film Archives): https://cinefiles.bampfa.berkeley.edu/cinefiles/: A growing collection of searchable, online reviews, press kits, festival and showcase program notes, newspaper articles, and other documents from the Pacific Film Archive Library’s clippings files.

• Cineaste: www.cineaste.com:  “America’s leading magazine on the art and the politics of cinema” (Scroll down to “Recommended links” for an AMAZING catalog of further sources!)

• Metacritic: www.metacritic.com/film/: Compares reviews of current films between critics (with links to online text of reviews when available.)

• Movie Review Query Engine: www.mrque.com: Perhaps the BEST single search engine for locating full-text reviews online, including reviews in journals and newspapers.

• New York Times Movie Reviews: www.nytimes.com/pages/movies

• Variety: www.variety.com/index.asplayout=advanced_search: Database of articles and reviews in Variety, 1914 to present

• Women’s Studies Database Film Reviews: http://mith.umd.edu//WomensStudies/FilmReviews/

Books & eBooks

Feel free to browse the library catalogs (Robinson and other schools as well) for books. If you find something you want from another FCPS school, you can request it!

Questions? Just ask!

• Library Catalogs & Academic eBook Collection - Search within the library catalogs or Academic eBook Collection

• The Schirmer Encyclopedia of Film (Gale Virtual Reference Library)

Check out some of the print resources available in the Robinson Library. Listed below are some general reference books in the library, but browse the 791s generally to see if there are books that might be of help or interest to you!