Reel in a Netflix movie with the ezMoviePick app

Published Dec. 4, 2009 at 12:00 a.m.
I am a huge movie fan and have been a customer of Netflix since they opened for business. I would say that I average over 200 movies a year delivered to me in red envelopes, so I was quite excited when ezMoviePick $0.99US [iTunes Link] was released. This app, which works with any iPhone or iPod touch running OS 3.0 or better, is a Netflix queue manager and movie selector rolled into one, so I had to check it out and see if if it could replace a few other Netflix apps like PhoneFlicks, that I have been using for some time, along with uncovering some worthy movies that I've missed.

Movie selection is at the heart of the app. It looks and works similarly to Urbanspoon taking the form of a slot machine. After entering your Netflix account information and choosing which formats of movies (DVD, Blu Ray, Watch Instantly) you are interested in, you tap a key or shake your device to set three wheels spinning. The wheels are for movie type, year of release and number of stars. The result -- after waiting a bit longer than I would have preferred -- is a nearly random selection. Any movies shown will be from the list of films that Netflix would recommend to you. You can tap on a resulting film it to get some information and have the opportunity to add any of your chosen formats to your queue.

The problem is that you can't lock a reel or two as you can with Urbanspoon, so there is no way to concentrate your searches based on any criteria. You get what you get. This is not an oversight in the building of the app though. The Netflix API, according to the developer, makes such a lock virtually impossible:

"Netflix does not offer an API that will let a third party do a request asking for : give me all movies in the category "Comedy" from the 90's, or all movies with at least 3 stars in the Thriller category. Thus because of that limitation, the application right now cannot provide a 'lock' feature."

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Reel in a Netflix movie with the ezMoviePick app originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 03 Dec 2009 19:00:00 EST...Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Reel in a Netflix movie with the ezMoviePick app originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 03 Dec 2009 19:00:00 EST...Please see our terms for use of feeds...

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