Little White Lies Movie Reviews
When you want the scoop on the latest movie news and reviews, check out Little White Lies.
Concise Reviews and Breaking Features
Little White Lies utilizes Reviews and Features sections to break down the latest in movie culture, industry news, and critical reviews. The online version of the magazine is clean, with lots of white space and black text, making it easy for movie-lovers to find the stories and reviews they’re looking for. Their features provide a blend of behind-the-scenes interviews on fraught productions with opinion pieces on new directions for film. Each review includes a 1-5 scale rating system for three categories at the top of its page, giving readers a quick glance at a movie’s “anticipation,” “enjoyment,” and “in retrospective” scores.
Target Audience
From 2023 Oscar contenders like Tar to TikTok movie sensations like M3gan, Little White Lies offers a wide scale of reviews on the most interesting up-and-coming and recently released films. It’s short but sharp and insightful reviews and features are accessible to all, bringing together casual movie goers in search of a quick review with industry followers dying to know the drama behind Francis Ford Coppola’s latest production. Unique Magazines describes Little White Lies to be “keeping their focus on the passion that is shared by movie creators and enthusiasts alike.”
The site’s highly reviewed films receive a “Little White Lies Recommends” stamp in their upper righthand corner.
Editorial Style
Swapping daily or even weekly content for a bi-monthly magazine, Little White Lies focuses on the most interesting and conversation starting films in the industry. Being a UK magazine, they offer reviews on domestic and international (mainly U.S.) films. Article lengths are short and easy to skim (often 5-6 short paragraphs).
Standing Apart
Not the only movie magazine in the game, Little White Lies stands apart from larger publications like The Ringer by creating sharp content with accessible design. Articles keep the numerical scores of films at their top, linking to other “Suggested for you” Little White Lies articles with the same director or actor in the content you’re reading at the bottom. Ads are minimal and not distracting, with one usually appearing at the top of the home page. While other magazines or major newspaper movie reviews often link to its media company’s podcasts, YouTube videos, or other social media, Little White Lies avoids prominently displaying sharing and external linking options that could boost views to its page. The magazine has a YouTube page with many videos discussing movies; it also has a health social media presence (97.6k Twitter followers). But neither social media or podcast options exist within articles, their presence only detectable on the site by small links at the bottom of articles, and while the site shares movie trailers, it doesn’t focus on linking to its own video content.
Online Formatting
Reviews are formatted with a cover photo above text (sometimes an additional photo or YouTube video of a movie’s trailer will exist at the end of the review). There are not subcategories to navigate like “Action” or “Drama” reviews or features, but articles are tagged with directors and actors they discuss. The clean and easy to use format limits opportunity for user interaction (no comment or blog space, and a small box for signing up for a newsletter subscription at the bottom of each page). Already a follower of more conversation-based movie-media platforms, I am a fan of Little White Lies style because I know I can come to their site to find concise and interesting reviews on movies currently permeating our culture curated by the magazine’s high-quality writers and editors. Little White Lies is a site to visit for quick information and ideas; their reviews are good, and their readers go to them because they admire their taste.
Building on Success
By keeping the praised style of the magazine and adding more video or podcast content within articles, Little White Lies could grow as a media provider following a format like The Ringer. Driving conversations on Twitter or TikTok with articles that drive debate (new film vs. remake or streaming vs. seeing movies in theaters) and making collections of reviews like “movies on trains” could increase Little White Lie’s global audience.
Business Model
Little White Lies is a bi-weekly subscription-based magazine. It offers tiered membership services, with access to different content depending on what level the user decides to subscribe to. One-year subscription rates vary by region. Ads appear to support the online magazine, with one ad usually appearing at the top of the home page. These revenue streams will likely continue for the magazine, as they are among the most common and consistent money makers in online and print media today. According to similarweb, Little White Lies receives 394.1K website views each year.