In many ways, the mainstream taste is the least interesting to write about. It falls between the other two tastes on most dimensions and is the taste that most closely resembles the master list. Video guides and other books aimed at a mass audience often reflect a mainstream taste.
The top-100 mainstream films include more films from the 1980s and 1990s than the top-100 highbrow films do, but not as many as the top-100 popular films do. On the other hand, the top-100 mainstream films include more films made before 1950 than the top-100 popular films do, but not as many as the top-100 highbrow films do.
For nearly every single genre, the top-100 mainstream films include as many or more films than do one of the other top-100 lists but as many or fewer films than the other top-100 list. The top-100 mainstream films also include fewer films in languages other than English than either of the two other tastes.
The top-100 mainstream films include only three films spoken in a language other than English, two of which are spaghetti westerns that are usually dubbed. Often, non-English language films are viewed as being just one genre rather than representing the work of speakers of every language spoken on this planet other than English.