IMDb
Category: Entertainment
Last Updated: December 8th, 2009
Current Version: 1.0.0
Size: 0.5 MB
Price: Free

IMDb likely makes just about anyone’s list of the absolute best websites on the Internet, but for an extremely long time there was a void for users of smart phones or other mobile devices. Not only were there no decent applications that could access it’s formidable database of everything related to TV and Movies, but there was no officially supported mobile website. That era, however, is now at an end.

With the release of an official IMDb app for the iPhone, you can now easily and quickly access virtually any information from your phone that you would be able to access from your computer. You can quickly and easily access movie show times at a theater near you, see what’s on TV, read about upcoming movies, see the latest box office results and there’s even a fun little page called “Born Today” which will tell you which people in their database share a birthday on whichever day it happens to be. The real gem of the app, however, is the search box at the top of the first screen that allows you to search IMDb. This is where most users will likely spend their time, looking up actors, directors, movies, shows, or any other information you could possibly want to know in regards to just about any movie or TV show ever created and everyone who worked on them. This is exactly what makes IMDb the Internet gem that it is. There is no way for me to count the number of times I have used IMDb while watching TV or a movie (not in the theater, of course) to read about the actors, see what else they’ve been in, or just learn some fun trivia about them. Having this app available makes that habit much easier to do. Anyone who has an iPhone and is a fan of movies should be installing this right now, if they haven’t already.

I’m not talking about excessive gore; the Internet and modern movies and TV have completely desensitized America to that. What I’m referring to is entire movies – or at least extended scenes – that are filmed by what I can only assume is a chimpanzee who has been heavily drinking. I suppose it all started with The Blair Witch Project, but more recently I made the mistake of seeing Cloverfield on the silver screen. The plot was great and I think it would have otherwise been a good movie, but I was so nauseous by the end that I’m fairly confident that had I stood up to leave early, I would have vomited on the person in front of me. What’s worse is that I’m equally as confident that had one person tossed their cookies in the theater, it would have set off a chain reaction and caused the theater to be quarantined. Which, it turns out, brings me to the first movie I’ve ever walked out of: Quarantine.

I’m normally not a fan of the horror genre, but this at least looked intriguing from the commercials, starred and actress who is great in Dexter, and my wife and our friend, Ms. Quarter, both wanted to see it. So we went and it started off interesting enough, but even though it was supposedly being filmed by a “local news” camera-man, it just continuously got more shaky and nauseating. About a half hour in, just as the actual action in the movie started, the three of us were already so dizzy that we just got up and left. Jessie even managed to talk the manager in to free passes.

Going to the movies is already expensive enough, not to mention the added cost of any kind of snacks or drinks, so the least the industry can do is warn you about crappy nauseating camerawork so I don’t have to waste my time and money on a movie I’ll just end up walking out of. Hollywood, I’m begging you, if you want any more of my money stop trying to make me spew buttered popcorn on your other paying customers.