As a final salvo in my fifth birthday celebration (yes, normal service resumes next week), here’s something I was kindly awarded by Colin of Riding the High Country… back in December. Couldn’t find quite the right outlet for it. Or, to be more honest, couldn’t think of the answer to one of the questions. You’ll spot my solution.

But now is most appropriate, because what better time for such a self-reflective award than when I’m already looking back at five years of my own blog? Hurrah! Thank you, Colin.

1) Tell everyone something that no one else knows about.

100 Films is certainly my most successful blog, in terms of both longevity and readership, but over the years I’ve set up loads of others for various reasons. To give you some idea of how good I am at sticking at them, there are nine blogs currently associated with my Blogger account and here’s how long each lasted, arranged from shortest to longest:

0 posts
1 post
1 post
1 post
29 posts
40 posts
91 posts
3,749 posts

OK, one other I stuck at.

2) Link to one of my posts that I personally think best fits the following categories:

Most Beautiful Piece
I suppose there’s an element of interpretation involved when applying this category to a film review blog. I toyed with a few where I got clever with the pictures (try the filenames on that last one), but decided that was too literal and I should look at the writing. So I say Is Anybody There?, because I think I did a decent job of tapping in to and explaining the film’s own beauty.

Most Helpful Piece
I don’t know if I’m ever particularly helpful, but my review of Inception is ludicrously long and detailed and was described as “great” — that must have something useful in it, right?

Most Popular Piece
I looked to my hit stats for this, but the top few are bolstered by regular spam hits (based on where my spam comments go) so I thought I best discount them. Instead I’m going to say my reviews of The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight: The IMAX Experience, a connected pair that sat pretty atop my list of most-viewed posts until the spam started flooding in. (Neither are in the top 10 any more, but, as I said, I don’t trust that.)

Most Controversial Piece
I wouldn’t say I’m all that controversial… though I did put the widely reviled Alien Resurrection in a top ten, so… But it’s not my love for that I’ve chosen, but instead Sucker Punch. It was slagged off by everyone, but I was impressed enough to defend it for over 1,900 words.

Most Surprisingly Successful Piece
Looking back, this one surprises me even now: Wallander: The Revenge, the theatrically-released second season premiere of the Krister Henriksson Wallander series. It got three comments — that’s a lot for me anyway, especially on something like that — and is the second most-viewed post. But that might be spam.

Most Underrated Piece
All of them! No, I jest. There are a few lengthy in-depth ones I could choose, but maybe I’d go with Trainspotting — I was very pleased with the concept behind that one.

Most Pride-worthy Piece
I could say the fact that I’ve written lengthy reviews of all seven Saw films, but that would be seven posts not one. Looking back, I surprised myself with how many of my reviews I’m actually quite proud of, so I’m going to really cheat and say two, for different reasons: Ministry of Fear, because I liked the idea of how much I go on about the cake and I think I nailed it (unlike some of my other attempts at humour), and Watchmen, because it’s rare one gets to write a well-informed review on a blog all about first viewings, and I think that (and its companion Director’s Cut review) are exactly that.

I feel like I should now go on to highlight seven that fail in these regards (especially as I’ve basically cheated and linked to 23 posts across those seven categories), and I’m sure I could, but maybe that wouldn’t be in the spirit.

3) Pass this award on to seven other bloggers.

This is where I once again realise I don’t read enough blogs. It rather defeats the object to leave this one out (it’s called a “link” award, after all), but I fear I shall have to return to it at a later date. But I will — I’m making a list, and checking it twice.

(That I’m actually Santa would’ve been good for that first fact, eh.)

That’s it!

Time to stop patting myself on the back and get back to regular business. And so, I shall.

100 Films in a Year was five years old yesterday, and to mark the occasion I’m having five days of top fives from the past five years. On Monday I bemoaned the five worst films I’ve seen as part of this project, while yesterday I slammed the five most overrated. It’s all nice from here on though, starting with…

Easy Virtue
I’ve called up Easy Virtue before (recently) as underrated, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t worth doing again. I really don’t see why it came in for such a drubbing (see my review for more details) — I thought it was witty and funny, with a distinctly mischievous streak, all wrapped around a surprisingly dramatic core.

Gambit
Gambit‘s underratedness is beginning to be called into question — “thank you”s for Drew McWeeny‘s recommendation are still popping up on my twitter feed — but only so many people will see that, so I’m doing my bit. Watch it, but don’t give in to temptation and read about it first — the opening deserves to be seen unspoiled.

The King of Comedy
There are many films Scorsese is praised for, and deservedly so, but having watched Taxi Driver, Goodfellas and more in the past five years, I think this is my favourite. A black comedy about a wannabe-famous comic whose obsession goes too far, apparently “Scorsese has called De Niro’s role… his favorite of their collaborations.” What better endorsement?

Speed Racer
Someone somewhere recently commented that if Speed Racer had been a CG ‘toon by Pixar it would be beloved, and they may be right. In fact it’s live action, but exists in the kind of heightened candy-colour cartoon world only the digital era has made possible. It’s fast, exciting, funny, not perfect, but visually astounding, and great.

Stranger on the Third Floor
This only seems to get mentioned as “the first film noir”, a nominal title established after the fact. It was tricky to see too — it’s available on UK DVD now, but I caught it on a rare TV airing, at which point it didn’t even have a BBFC certificate. It’s not the greatest noir, certainly, but I think it’s better than its lowly reputation would suggest.

This week’s featured images

You may have noticed a theme developing in this week’s Big Picture At The Top Of The Post (or, as WordPress calls them, “featured images”; or, as I normally call them, “banners” — whatever will do). I realised that the look of 100 Films has undergone five phases, which equates to one a year and makes it sound more turbulent than it really was, and decided that would be a neat way to top these five posts.

Monday was taken from the blog’s origins on deviantART. When I realised I was going to continue this project past the first year and make it a ‘proper’ blog (rather than just an on-going part of my dA journal), I got a Blogger site — the one seen on Tuesday. That was short-lived, because I found FilmJournal and that was better. The initial FJ look of 100 Films forms today’s picture, then.

I don’t think it will take much guesswork to deduce the final two: tomorrow is the most enduring version, its still-current style at FilmJournal; while Friday is taken from this new one.

I was quite pleased with this linking theme — so pleased I’ve decided to blatantly highlight it to make sure you all know how clever I am. Also, apparently, how fickle.

The individual posts I chose to feature in each banner are also in some way relevant (quite an obvious way, really). But I’ll leave that one up to anyone who cares to think about it.

To be continued…

Overrated, underrated, wombling free… Wait, what? Sorry. Um, tomorrow — the five films I thought were the best from my last five years of viewing.

100 Films in a Year is five years old today, and to mark the occasion I’m having five days of top fives from the past five years. Yesterday I bemoaned the five worst films I’ve seen as part of this project, and today it’s…

March of the Penguins
I think March of the Penguins gained such popularity in America because they don’t have the rich history of wildlife documentaries that the BBC has bestowed upon us Brits. This is a solid documentary, but it has a narrow focus and isn’t a patch on something narrated by David Attenborough. I don’t care for it.

Million Dollar Baby
Bad Best Picture winners are two-a-penny — as most film fans know, the Oscars aren’t the be-all-and-end-all of filmic taste that they’re widely perceived to be. Million Dollar Baby isn’t a bad film, but I don’t think it’s a very good one either. It’s also 161st on IMDb’s Top 250, a list I wouldn’t let it near if it was up to me.

No Country for Old Men & There Will Be Blood
I’ve lumped these together as the two titans of the 2008 awards season, which now sit on the IMDb Top 250 at #131 and #164 respectively. And I didn’t really get either of them. I don’t think they’re bad films, but I struggled to get what they were for (especially the latter), and I certainly didn’t like or enjoy either. You don’t have to like a film for it to be great, but these two… Maybe I need to take the time to re-evaluate them, but I’ve already seen No Country two or three times and I’m not sure I can face it again.

Point Break
This isn’t overrated in the traditional sense — it only has 6.9 on IMDb for example, far off troubling the Top 250 — but in recent years it’s garnered a significant cult following, praising it as a great action movie. I blame Hot Fuzz, and probably Swayze’s death, and maybe even Bigelow’s Oscar win. It’s mediocre at best.

Honourable Mention: Avatar
Despite being on the IMDb Top 250 when some of my other choices aren’t (#223 at time of writing), Avatar is down here because I think there’s plenty of dislike for it. There’s no doubt those who really praise it tend to overrate it, especially blind followers of Whatever The Oscars Say (even though it didn’t win), but there’s enough people who know it’s good-not-great, or even outright hate it, to balance that out.

You’re reading this post on my new blog!

Congratulations, you have the good taste to be reading this post on my snazzy new blog (though I do still love the old one). Doesn’t it look great even in this little thumbnail?

For more on why I’ve started this so-called simul-blog, please look here.

To be continued…

Tomorrow it’s the turn of the five most underrated films from my last five years of viewing.