Google Goes to the Movies
Google has just launched a search “shortcut” to help users access local movie showtimes (U.S. only), film info, and reviews. The service is available from any Google search box or via SMS.
To find local movie listings use the shortcut “movies” or “showtimes” followed by a Zip Code or location. For example:
Movie: 90210
Showtimes Seattle WA
Different Results Depending on How You Search
Movie:[location or zip code] returns a detailed page of only film listings while the search movie(s) or showtimes [location or zip code] returns a OneBox on a web serp.
You can also search for a specific film. Example:
Constantine 10036
It’s also possible to use the shortcut to find lists of film info.
Here are a few examples:
movie: Tom Hanks on island talking to volleyball
movie: rachel weisz
movie: car chase
In addition, users may find critics’ reviews by clicking on the “reviews” link or the star rating associated with each movie. Google finds reviews from the web and calculates an aggregated rating score from 0 to 5 stars. Users can search within these reviews and sort movies by rating, relevance or date. Google also generates a list of terms that were frequently mentioned in the critics’ reviews
You can find details about how to use the service via SMS here. Only showtimes are available via SMS.
Yahoo, Ask Jeeves, and AOL all offer movie shortcuts (reviews, showtimes, etc) in one form or another. For example, a search for many film titles in Ask Jeeves will return a Smart Search box with a plot synopsis and links to a trailers, reviews, etc. Local movie showtimes, reviews and just about anything relating to films is also available from Amazon’s IMDB. Btw, have you ever noticed IMDB’s very powerful advanced search tool? Wow!!!
Local movie showtimes have been available via cell phones and mobile devices for some time. Yahoo Mobile, 4info.net, and Synfonic are a few of the services that provide this service.