By Tegan Bowden, Second Year, English and History
This article is satire. It is intended for entertainment, and any resemblance to factual events is purely coincidental.
In a method to seek ‘proper’ cinefiles, the University of Bristol has introduced strict Letterboxd requirements in order to apply for film courses. This has resulted in mixed reactions from staff and students, as classes have become too 'filmbro' and pretentious.
Beware! There is a new variant of the ‘Bristol Boy’ walking amongst us. And no, this dangerous species is not the influx of Jacob Elordi lookalikes you find perched up on the benches of Victoria Square. Those particular creatures reveal their nature by accessorising themselves with luminous green matchas in one hand and their unbookmarked copies of ‘The Bell Jar’ clutched in the other. And by now, we as students have learnt to recognise and avoid these method actors like its second nature.
However, this new genre of Bristol students known as the ‘filmbros’ identify themselves in a different, but no less jarring manner. They may look like the rest of us, but once they open their mouths the whole charade of normalcy disappears. Within seconds they’ll ask you what your favourite film is, and if you respond with anything that was made in the last decade or passes the Bechdel Test they will offer you a condescending sneer before punishing you with a 10 minute (if you’re lucky) monologue on an obscure, foreign short film probably filmed on an Iphone six. They will promise that this ‘piece of cinema’ will change your life and ‘totally shift your world view.’ They will then proceed to offer out their Letterboxd profiles as if it's the new Hinge, except in this case you swipe left or right based on the content of a person’s Letterbox Top Four. This is strikingly similar to the new profiling system created by the University of Bristol this year to filter through Film Studies course admissions.
With the new scheme rolling out, the consequences are beginning to present themselves in scenes that are more horrifying than any Hitchcock classic. Seminars have quickly turned violent after the classic ‘Who is your favourite director?’ icebreaker sparks controversies like never before. Tarantino truthers certainly have the loudest argument, but the eerie stares of those who exclusively watch pre-world-war black and white films is equally as terrifying. Perhaps the most uncanny, however, is the foreign film fanatics who pronounce ‘La Haine’ in an accent that sounds more like an alien language than French.
Following the first assignment, members of Staff have reported that the word ‘niche’ has been used an average of five times per paragraph this year, setting a new record at Bristol for the most used word. One member of staff seemed especially frustrated with a student whose essay revolved around a film they refused to give the name of, arguing that they had to gatekeep it for fear that it would become too ‘mainstream.’ It was eventually uncovered that the sympathetic essay on ‘male loneliness’ was written in response to Scorsese’s Taxi Driver. Hopefully the film will still retain some of its mystique after this article is published…
Complaints have also risen internally, with film students - who observed one of their peers exclaim ‘Wow, he is literally me!’ upon watching a TikTok clip of American Psycho’s Patrick Bateman - calling for the University of Bristol to take some form of action against the current welfare threat. In response, the University of Bristol has put out a statement that next year’s admissions will have a new system to filter out the self-proclaimed ‘niche lords’ haunting our current campus. This new system will include the automatic dismissal of any applications including Fight Club, The Dark Knight or The Wolf of Wall Street in their Top Four. Additionally, any applicant willingly paying for Letterboxd Patron in order to use more aesthetic posters will face immediate dismissal.
Megan Mclean
The university hopes these new restrictions will reduce the number of filmbros attending the University of Bristol next year, but how the rest of us will survive this coming Halloween remains to be seen. It’s hard to imagine how many Joker costumes will grace the club scene this year, but we at Epigram recommend reciting the names of female directors to deter these filmbros if you happen to come into contact. Good luck!
Featured image: Unsplash /Osarugue Igbinoba
Will you become one of Bristol's niche film bros?
