Twitter hashtags aren’t always topical or news-related. And lately, they really haven’t been, with hashtags like #7games and #7FavFilms coming to the fore and inviting Twitter users across the world to share their favorite media from decades past. But you know what’s even more fun than finding out your friends’ favorite movies? Looking at data! Of course!
Mashable reached out to Fizziology, a social media research firm, and requested that they extract all of the results from the #7favfilms hashtag and calculate the most popular movies chosen by the Twitter users that participated. The firm combed through all of the tweets sent between 5 AM and 7 PM ET yesterday, which was the day that the hashtag skyrocketed into trending topics; #7favfilms got tweeted almost 100,000 times during that time period.
Here are the 15 films that got mentioned the most, complete with the tally of how many Twitter users included each one in their own personal lineup:
1. The Dark Knight: 5,056
2. Pulp Fiction: 4,966
3. Shawshank Redemption: 4,910
4. Empire Strikes Back: 4,772
5. The Godfather* (all films): 4,604
6. Goodfellas: 3,877
7. Alien* (all films): 3,730
8. Fight Club: 3,574
9. Harry Potter* (all films): 2,757
10. Jaws*: 2,622
11. Forrest Gump*: 2,530
12. Jurassic Park*: 2,356
13. Blade Runner: 1,862
14. The Big Lebowski: 1,860
15. Rocky* (all films): 1,807
The top three movies are pretty close, with The Dark Knight beating out Pulp Fiction by only 90 votes, and Shawshank Redemption only 56 more votes behind Pulp Fiction. I’m surprised to see Alien so low on the list, because for me, Alien and Aliens would beat out every other movie on this list–but that’s what I get for not getting around to participating in this hashtag yesterday! (I did do the #7games one, and it was really hard to choose only seven. Choosing only seven movies would be hard, too …)
I think this list ends up saying a lot about the users who participated in the hashtag, and the types of movies that they consider to be cultural touchstones. A lot of these movies are about the nature of masculinity, male friendship, fatherhood, and the broader idea of what it means to be human … but, with the exception of Alien (and maybe also Jurassic Park), the idea of “being human” involves centering a dude hero.
That’s predictable, of course, so I’m not saying I’m shocked by the pattern or anything. (Breaking news: Hollywood still telling stories about dudes!) It’s just interesting to see the full list and think about how many “Everyman” heroes are involved in the lineup, as opposed to more of an “Everywoman” like Ellen Ripley. I would also argue that Jurassic Park‘s Ellie Sattler and Harry Potter‘s Hermione aren’t necessarily “Everywomen,” either–more like “the smart one” who appears as part of an ensemble cast, as opposed to the protagonist. Which, again, that’s not necessarily bad or good–just a pattern I’m noticing based on this particular list, which is more a reflection of Twitter users’ tastes than the world at large.
I have a feeling that our lists here at TMS would be pretty different. I just said that selecting seven movies would be a real challenge for me, but I made myself do it anyway for the sake of argument: Alien, Aliens, Ex Machina, Amelie, X-2, Enchanted, and The Little Mermaid (I’ve already written about why I like that last one). Honorable mention goes to Terminator 2. Okay, your turn!
(via Mashable, image via Tumblr)
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