Power Features: Filtering & Sorting Mastery

After a day of rest, we came back with the big guns.

Not All Movies Are Created Equal

You like action movies. Great. But do you really want to see every B-grade direct-to-streaming action flick with a 3.2 rating?

Probably not.

Enter: Minimum Rating Filter

Slider from 1.0 to 10.0 (in 0.5 increments). Set it to 7.0? You'll only see movies with TMDB ratings of 7.0 or higher. Simple. Effective. No more wading through garbage.

But wait, there's more.

Time Travel (Sort Of)

Maybe you're in a retro mood. Classic 80s action. Or perhaps you only want recent releases from the last two years.

Enter: Release Year Range Filter

Dual slider spanning 1888 (the first film in TMDB's database) to the current year. Want movies from 1985-1995? Slide. Want only 2020+? Slide.

Combined with the rating filter? Now we're talking surgical precision:

• "Give me sci-fi from 1977-1983 with rating 7.5+"
• "Show me horror from 2018-2025 rated 6.0+"
• "Any comedy from the 90s with rating 8.0+"

The possibilities are endless.

Sort It Out

Finding movies is one thing. Finding them in the right order is another.

8 sort options:

1. Populariteit (hoog-laag) - Most popular first (default)
2. Populariteit (laag-hoog) - Hidden gems
3. Rating (hoog-laag) - Best rated first
4. Rating (laag-hoog) - Guilty pleasures
5. Verschijningsdatum (nieuw-oud) - Latest releases
6. Verschijningsdatum (oud-nieuw) - Classics first
7. Titel (A-Z) - Alphabetical
8. Titel (Z-A) - Reverse alphabetical
9. 🎲 Willekeurig - Random (but smart)

That last one deserves explanation.

Seeded Shuffle Magic

When you select "🎲 Willekeurig", the app doesn't just randomly shuffle movies. If it did, every member in the session would see a different order. Chaos.

Instead, it uses deterministic shuffling with the session ID as seed.

Same session = same shuffle = everyone sees the same movies in the same order.

The technical term is "mulberry32 PRNG with Fisher-Yates shuffle". The practical result? Random, but synchronized.

Where to Watch (Without Clicking)

You swipe through movies. You find one you like. Question: "Where can I watch this?"

Previously: No idea. You'd have to check TMDB, Google it, or just hope for the best.

Now: Streaming provider badges

Every movie card shows circular logos of where it's available in the Netherlands:

• Netflix
• Disney+
• Amazon Prime Video
• Apple TV
• SkyShowtime
• Videoland
• And 8 more

The badges are lazy loaded (fetched per-card as needed, not for the entire list) and cached (no duplicate API calls). Efficient. Fast. Informative.

Match screen shows the same provider badges. No surprises when you finally agree on a movie - you already know where to watch it.

Backward Compatible

Here's the best part: all these features are optional.

Old sessions still work. The new database fields (minRating, minYear, maxYear, sortBy) are nullable. If they don't exist, the app uses default behavior.

No migrations needed. No breaking changes. Existing sessions keep running.

But new sessions? Welcome to the big leagues.

Five for the Price of One

In one commit, we shipped:

1. Minimum rating filter (1.0-10.0)
2. Release year range filter (1888 - current year)
3. Sort options (8 choices + seeded random)
4. Streaming provider badges (lazy loaded + cached)
5. Session-level configuration (all members see the same filtered/sorted results)

This is what power users dream of. Granular control. Precise filtering. No compromises.

MovieQuest just leveled up.

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This is part of the MovieQuest development series. Previous: Polish: The UX Details That Matter