Cinema as Poetry and My Taste in Film
A lens of film interpretation that I employ and details about things I look for in films I like.
There are 772 words in this article, and it will probably take you less than 4 minutes to read it.
This article was published 2026-05-01 00:00:00 -0400, which makes this post and me old when I published it.
I like to think of films through the lens of poetry (importantly different than a film poem). Or maybe its perhaps simpler to say that I prefer films that feel like poetry. Not all films are best understood through this lens, like Marvel movies for example because of their primary focus on entertainment and narrative arcs over thematic messaging (which isn’t to say that there is no thematic content).
How might we judge cinema as poetry? How do we judge poetry?
“Much of the muddle one finds oneself in when theorizing about poetry results from the fact that we look at a poem from two not easily reconcilable perspectives: we demand that the poem be successful by virtue of its form, yet we also find its significance by virtue of what it communicates. A poem is incompetent if its form is flawed; trivial if it fails to make us feel or think more deeply.”
A good movie then uses its formal elements to make us feel something or think about something in a new way.
What are the formal elements of a movie?
- Mise-en-scène: everything that appears before the camera within a shot
- Cinematography: Camera Angles, Camera Distances, Camera Movement
- Editing: Linking different images
- Sound: Diegetic and non-diegetic noises/music
I love movies that could not be anything else other than a movie. I think Wes Anderson is a great example of a filmmaker who understands and delights in his medium. The visuals, sounds, editing all are in service of curating a particular vibe.
What does a film (try to) communicate?
A film (typically) communicates a story, but I believe more in plot as a thematic delivery mechanism. A story helps keep things consistent; the easier things are to understand, the more you will be engaged with it. Characters don’t need to be developed, all questions cannot or won’t be answered, and that’s okay.
My Personal Taste
I don’t see narrative as the point of film, mostly as a means to an end. I find movies that have “too much plot” feel predictable and not as enjoyable. But just because I don’t like plot that much doesn’t mean that I like slow movies or where nothing happens.
If you are thinking of the movie as a poem, you wouldn’t get mad at a poem for not developing characters or having a coherent plot, but you would be a bit peeved if nothing of import is happening/being said. When I am really looking for something to scratch an itch, it’s for a sensory, intellectually stimulating experience.
For me, a movie is less about what story it tells and more about how it made me feel or what it made me think. A director of mine that I like, but hesitate to call one of my favorites is Yorgos Lanthimos and so I will contrast how I feel about some of his films in these terms of plot and thoughts vs feelings.
- Bugonia (2025) told a good story but it didn’t make me think too much. I did feel sympathy towards some of the characters so it made me feel something at least.
- Poor Things (2023) was stylistically beautiful but I was not interested in the themes that much or what he had to say about them.
- Killing of a Sacred Deer (2017) had a relatively simple plot and while I didn’t agree on the necessity of all the parts in the movie, I think it explored an interesting moral situation.
Some others things I look for in movies:
- Slice-of-life/anthologies
- Perfect Days (2023)
- Yi Yi (2000)
- Roy Andersson films
- Surreal and/or absurd
- Pizza Movie (2026)
- Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022)
- Roy Andersson films
- Explorations of love and connection.
- The Worst Person in the World (2021), The Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy (2021)
- It has to be done in an interesting way though. I don’t want a traditional love story. Lost in Translation (2003) tried to be non-traditional but I think it fell into it still, which is why it didn’t resonate as much with me.
- Dialogue-heavy/walk and talk movies
- The Novelist’s Film (2022), My Dinner with Andre (1981), The End of the Tour (2015), The Before Trilogy, Marjorie Prime (2017)
- A script like Drive (2011) doesn’t really do it for me because of how minimal/standard it is.