Pronounced: JAY-haw-kuhr, noun
Notes: I almost had the definition correct
Yesterday’s word
The word cineast is “a devotee of motion pictures; moviemaker”
First usage
Our word came into English in the 1920s
Background / Comments
After seeing the definition, I should have recognized cine- from ‘cinema’ and been able to guess the meaning. Our word comes from French, and some of the alternate spellings reflect that origin – it is also spelled cineaste and cinéaste. It comes from the French word ciné (another word for cinema) combined with -aste (one who is or works in), and originally meant “a filmmaker or movie director”. People began to use the word to refer to film buffs, and that is the most common usage these days.
Richard's Vocabulary Word-of-the-Day 