movie
Americannoun
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movies
plural
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a sequence of consecutive still images recorded in a series to be viewed on a screen in such rapid succession as to give the illusion of natural movement; motion picture.
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a story, event, or the like, presented in this form.
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movies,
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Usually the movies the movie industry.
The movies use MPA ratings to inform patrons about content that may not be suitable for certain audiences.
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all movies as a group, or a specific category of movies, considered as a genre.
gangster movies.
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the exhibition of movies.
an evening at the movies.
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Often the movies a movie theater.
Is there anything good playing at the movies on Main Street?
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noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of movie
First recorded in 1905–10; mov(ing picture) + -ie
Explanation
A movie is a film that you watch at a theater or at home on your TV, laptop, or tablet. Movie is short for "moving picture," which was pretty exciting in the late 1800s. You can rave about your favorite movie — whether it's "Citizen Kane" or "The Lion King" — and you can also talk about "the movies," or films in general and the industry that makes them. You might dream of working in the movies, for example. Before about 1912, movies were called "motion pictures." Movie is a shortened form of the phrase, which some people abbreviate into the more old-fashioned sounding "pictures."
Vocabulary lists containing movie
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
"I don't think that every movie needs to be loved universally," he says.
From BBC ● Oct. 16, 2026
The movie is slated to hit theaters on Feb. 18, 2028.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 16, 2026
Discovery, roping in a multibillion-dollar corpus of film-and-TV studios, streaming services, newsrooms, movie theaters, and book imprints under the aegis of one man, nepo baby David Ellison.
From Slate ● Oct. 16, 2026
BBC Newsbeat spoke to Street Fighter cast members Noah Centineo, Callina Liang and Andrew Koji to find out why they think the action movie can do the same.
From BBC ● Oct. 16, 2026
“I saw a movie that had this really cool winged leopard. It made me want to draw one like that.”
From "The Tenth Mistake of Hank Hooperman" by Gennifer Choldenko
Back in 1988, after a D.C. journalist obtained and published a list of movies rented by Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork, a scandalized Congress passed the Video Privacy Protection Act.
From Slate ● Oct. 17, 2026
Both of them have latterly turned to personal projects, working with their wives -- film editor Tricia Cooke and actress Frances McDormand -- on movies such as "Honey Don't" and "The Tragedy of Macbeth".
From Barron's ● Oct. 16, 2026
Among the more than 2,000 series and movies available, you’ll find plenty of options that are appropriate for kids like “Sailor Moon” and “One Piece.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 15, 2026
“New Roadster is beyond movies, beyond imagination, beyond human, yet still made by humans on Earth,” Tesla CEO Musk wrote in a post on X on Thursday.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 15, 2026
When I asked what movies he had been in, Calista said, “Well, not much yet. But he goes to lots of auditions.”
From Absolutely Almost by Lisa Graff
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
