Backstage: Behind the Deep Dive Curtain
When you see a film we've indexed into the Deep Dive Cinema (DDC) archive, you might not realize the powerful platform behind it. Before DDC could exist, there first had to be a massive collection. However, curating an archive enriched with detailed metadata for each film could have taken years.
The Origin of Mr. Reels
Out of this challenge, I created Mr. Reels: a Java desktop application powered by Apache Solr. This tool automatically builds a rich profile for any film by drawing on resources from across the entire internet. My motivation stemmed from a dissatisfaction with the basic search functionality at even the gold standard film sites (looking at you, IMDB), which lacked the capacity for deep, complex searches by titles, tones, genres, and beyond.
In short: Before DDC could exist, I had to build Mr. Reels.
The Challenge
With nearly 3,000 films in my collectionâincluding many rare, out-of-print, cult classicsâit would have been nearly impossible to index them all with rich, enhanced metadata by hand. I needed a programmatic way to pull together authoritative data for every filmâand to do so with confidence in its accuracy.
- Initial idea: Barcode scanning
- Reality: More hassle than help
The breakthrough came with building a workflow processing pipelineâa system that harnesses data from film sites, search engines, and AI to generate the rich film profiles you see on Deep Dive Cinema today.
Whatâs Next
Big updates are on the roadmap:
- More movies added regularly
- Ever-evolving search architecture for even deeper exploration
- New sections on actors, films, genres, and other exciting features in upcoming releases
Happy Searching!