Film Quiz

The ground it covers

Eighteen questions on the classics before 1990 — the films every list begins with. This is a classic movies quiz in the plain sense: the canon as it stood before the modern era, its directors, its release years, and the genres those films actually sit in. Nothing after 1990 appears; the point of a classics page is the shelf that no longer moves.

The checking that came first

This film quiz draws every answer from a table of classic films that was written twice. Two authors, working without sight of each other’s copy, each set down the same films with director, year, and genre. The tables were then compared cell against cell, and across the whole dataset — the classics table, the Best Picture record, the catalog of firsts — seventy-seven of seventy-seven keys matched. Where the copies could not be reconciled, the material was thrown out: one famous title read as a crime film to one author and a thriller to the other, so no question was built on it. We also declined to build a quote bank. Lines from these films are quoted everywhere; reproducing them by the page is quotation by the pound, and it stays off this site. Box-office questions are out too — records change hands, and a classics page should not date itself.

In play

Each question offers four options. Choose, and the verdict is immediate, with the correct answer shown whether you found it or not. A full review closes the round, and your best score is saved in this browser for next time. No account is asked for at any point.