Category Archives: progress reports

How am I doing? Including monthly updates.

December 2010

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Happy New Year!

In one minute, technically. But you didn’t read this in that minute, did you.


The final tally

So here we are, the final few new films I watched in 2010. This doesn’t replace my usual pair of closing summary posts, incidentally — they’ll be along as normal at some point in the next week or two.

And, as you’ll see in just a few lines, I sadly didn’t beat my previous record of 129 films. Hey ho — I made it to 100 (and comfortably over it), and after failing last year and barely scraping through the year before, I’m more than happy with that.

Those final few films, then:


#116 The Outrage (1964)
#117 The Wolfman: Unrated Version (2010)
#118 Surrogates (2009)
#118a Verity (2010)
#119 Rambo III (1988)
#120 Miracle on 34th Street (1947)
#121 A Good Woman (2004)
#122 Iron Eagle (1986)


A cancellation

You may have noticed last month that I hinted The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King would be the first film I watched this month, becoming #115d. “Where’d it go?” you may consequently have wondered.

Well, I did watch it, and it was set to become #115d, but once I sat down to write about all three Lord of the Ringses I found I didn’t have a great deal to say about them at this time, besides some vague introductions and/or conclusions to each article. I rather overestimated myself in adding all three to the roster for this year, I think, especially while I was toiling away on watching and reviewing to reach #130 (not to mention general real world stuff).

So those theatrical LotR reviews are gone, for now. Maybe they’ll turn up next time I watch them, though goodness knows when that might be.


Next time on the all-new 100 Films in a Year monthly update…

It all begins again as we head into 2011, for the fifth time.

500 films in 5 years? Hopefully.

130 next year? We’ll see…

2010’s summary posts will be republished in November.

November 2010

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Merry Christmas! Almost!

But before that, here’s the handful of films I watched in November…


Oh dear.

After doing so well for most of the year — including last month, where I made appropriate headway toward my new goal of 130 films — it’s rather slipped in November. Just four new films (and a couple of others I’ll review, but that don’t count in the slightest).

I blame TV. I’ve been watching repeat runs of Colditz and Due South, which between them add around 9 hours a week to my already significant TV viewing. 9 hours out of a whole week doesn’t sound much in isolation, but nonetheless those are the hours I usually use to watch films.

As we head into December, that leaves me with exactly 15 to get through to hit my new target. A not unachievable goal — I made it to 16 in May and August this year — but more of a push than I’d’ve hoped for. On the other hand, makes it a bit more exciting, eh?


#112 The Spiral Staircase (1947)
#113 Solaris (1972)
#114 Toy Story 3 (2010)
#115 Odd Man Out (1947)
#115a The Special Edition of Beauty and the Beast (1991/2002)
#115b The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
#115c The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)

(I’ll give you one guess what the first film of December is going to be.)


Next time on the all-new 100 Films in a Year monthly update…

It’s the final countdown! The big push! A couple of other clichés!

31 days ’til the end of the year. (At least) 15 more films to watch. It always looks so much easier on paper…

October 2010

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Boo!

Hehe.

Yeah…

As the Witching Hour passes, here, as usual, are the films I watched this month.


Beyond catching up

October last year was something of a tipping point, when I finally stopped falling behind and actually began catching up.

This year, I’m just forging ahead: as we know, I reached 100 at the end of September, and now I’m aiming to reach 130, thereby beating my previous best. Having watched 11 features this month, and with two months to go, I’m about on track… for now…


#100a Tales of the Black Freighter (2009)
#100b Angels & Demons: Extended Version (2009)
#101 Road to Rio (1947)
#102 The Emperor’s New Groove (2000)
#103 The Good German (2006)
#103a How Long is a Minute? (2000)
#104 Witchfinder General (1968)
#105 Grindhouse (2007)
#106 Meet Me in St. Louis (1944)
#107 Star Trek: Nemesis (2002)
#108 The Night Listener (2006)
#109 Born Free (1966)
#110 Rambo: First Blood Part II (1985)
#111 Living Free (1972)


Next time on the all-new 100 Films in a Year monthly update…

61 days of the year left, 19 films to go — how many will I manage in November? Does anyone but me really care?

To find out… same time, same place. As it were.

September 2010

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And lo, in the 9th month of the 10th year, I didst see 11 new films, and one of them was


Number One-Hundred

Excuse me while I do a little victory dance.

After last year’s failure (not sure if I’ve mentioned that?) it feels very, very nice to reach my goal with several months to spare. Indeed, I’m almost drawing equal with my most successful year, 2007, when I reached 100 in early September (and 104 in early October, hence why I’m not that far behind).

“What were those final 11 films?” I hear you cry in the desperate thirst for knowledge. Well, dear reader, I happen to have a handy list right here:


#90 Bhaji on the Beach (1993)
#91 The Band Wagon (1953)
#92 Force of Evil (1948)
#93 Brigadoon (1954)
#94 The History Boys (2006)
#95 Gigi (1958)
#96 Robin Hood: Director’s Cut (2010)
#97 Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie (1996)
#98 It Happened Here (1965)
#99 Hercules (1997)
#100 The Hurt Locker (2008)


So, what next?

My goal’s achieved — no more new films ’til January 2011!

Ha, not bloody likely. I may not push myself quite so hard now — I’ve got a pile of reviews to catch up on and the Battlestar Galactica box set calls to me again — but I also have another target in mind:

In 2007 I made it to 129 films, so naturally I’d love to get to 130.

It’s a pretty doable aim, too — I just have to keep my current rate up. I’ve averaged 11.1 films per month so far this year, which if continued would see me up to 133(.3) films this year. And in fact, if you took out my incongruously weak worst month (April, with 3 films), that average jumps a whole film to 12.1, which would mean 136(.3) films this year.

But that’s all theoretical and entirely unrelated to real life, of course. So we’ll see. If I don’t make 130 I won’t be too upset — just one more film and this will be my second-best year so far, and I reckon I can manage that much in three months! — but it gives me something else to aim at for now.


Next time on the all-new 100 Films in a Year monthly update…

The afterlife of 100 Films in a Year. As it were.

Which does not mean a month of death-themed films, no no no. But rather, how far will I reach in the first instalment of my three-part quest to reach…

130 Films in a Year!

August 2010

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August. 2010.

Watched films. Some counted.

These are they.


From behind to ahead

No, I’m not talking about anatomy. Look:

At this exact point last year, as we head into the year’s final third (already?! Where’d 2010 go?), I was 22 films behind The Target — i.e. the rate of film-watching that would get me to exactly 100 films by December 31st at a regular, consistent pace.

This year, I’m 23 films ahead.

I’m having a little party. By myself. Nibbles?

But this is no time to be complacent, oh no. There’s still 11 films to go. I may theoretically have time for 34, according to The Target, but who knows what might go wrong? I mean, I started last year three times further ahead than I needed to be and was behind before February.

Enough of that, what of August 2010? Well, to get 23 films ahead, I watched 17 this month (plus one short). That’s the most in a single month this year, just beating May’s 16, but third all-time to December 2008 — when I managed 18 to just scrape 100 that year — and August 2007 — when, somehow, I managed between 25 and 29 films (records for such ancient times are sadly not as thorough).

Hark at me, waffling on about my past times. You’d just like a list of films, wouldn’t you? Wouldn’t you? Well here’s one anyway.


#73 Dragonslayer (1981)
#74 Star Trek: First Contact (1996)
#75 Nanny McPhee (2005)
#76 Final Destination 2 (2003)
#77 Total Recall (1990)
#78 Late Spring, aka Banshun (1949)
#79 Sherlock Holmes Faces Death (1943)
#80 Ocean’s Eleven (1960)
#81 Star Trek: Insurrection (1998)
#82 Bride & Prejudice (2004)
#83 Final Destination 3 (2006)
#84 Matchstick Men (2003)
#85 The Damned United (2009)
#86 Snake Eyes (1998)
#87 Daylight (1996)
#88 Night at the Museum (2006)
#88a The Met Ball (2010)
#89 The Seeker: The Dark is Rising (2007)


Next time on the all-new 100 Films in a Year monthly update…

The year’s final act begins. Will I even come close to 2007, and reach 100 before the month’s out?

Only time — and probably Twitter — will tell…

July 2010

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The year was 2010. The month was July. These were the films I watched. Those that counted toward my 100, anyway.


Payne = Pain

I slightly glossed over my Max Payne review this month by rushing on to Is Anybody There?, because it had just been on TV and it seemed pertinent to post my perspective promptly as I’d punctually penned it for… um… once. Anyway, I’d hate for anyone to have missed my glowing single-star review of Payne, so here’s a link.


So, July

Back to business, then. July last year was when I didn’t watch a single film, so while I’ve not watched a great many this month (compared to the rest of the year so far), I’ve done a bang-up job compared to 2009.

This also means I’ve done a pretty good job clearing my review backlog too — it feels like there’s been 20-something films on there for far too long, but it’s right down to only a couple now. Of course, this just means I need to get on with watching more stuff…

Anyway, this month I did watch:


#65 Get Smart (2008)
#66 Guess Who (2005)
#66a 1945-1998 (2003)
#67 Pale Rider (1985)
#68 Is Anybody There? (2008)
#69 Inception (2010)
#70 Ministry of Fear (1944)
#71 Panic in the Streets (1950)
#72 Terminator Salvation: Director’s Cut (2009)


Next time on the all-new 100 Films in a Year monthly update…

August! Summer! Blockbuster season! Time to avoid the cinema thanks to the constant presence of irritating kids who don’t know how to watch a movie.

We’ll see how many I bother with, then, and how many wait ’til Christmas-time Blu-ray releases…

June 2010

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Being the films I watched in the month of June, in the year of 2010, that count toward my goal of seeing 100 films this year.

I might change that intro next month.


Halfway

The start of July is, perhaps obviously, halfway through the year. In terms of film-viewing, then, I should have reached 50, obviously. (Actually, dividing it up equally (or as equally as one can) across 365 days, I should reach 50 tomorrow.) As attentive regular readers will be aware, I actually reached 50 last month.

It’s nice to be well ahead of schedule after last year’s failure (I promise to stop going on about that when this year’s final total is in), though obviously I can’t get complacent — as July begins I’ve still got 36 films to go. That’s significantly better than the 51 it ‘should’ be, but July 2009 was also when I didn’t watch a single film.

Will that happen again? Probably not. But I have slowed down. And I lay the blame squarely at the door of Battlestar Galactica, which I finally started getting into this month. It’s as excellent and addictive as everyone has spent the last few years telling me, and rushing through it in two or three or four episode clumps is eating into my regular film-viewing time. Back when I bought the Blu-ray, someone somewhere on the web that I can’t find now predicted it would take over my viewing and wreck getting to 100 in 2009. Well, that did for itself (I think I may’ve mentioned that?), and, me being me, I haven’t got round to watching BSG ’til now… but fingers crossed it doesn’t manage to destroy 2010. I’m 16 ahead for one thing — and I have a plan…

Anyway, here are the seven films I did find time for this month:


#58 Public Enemies (2009)
#59 Final Destination (2000)
#60 2012 (2009)
#61 The International (2009)
#62 True Lies (1994)
#63 Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner (1967)
#64 Mulan (1998)


Pretty piccies

This month’s Thought Of The Day (or, y’know, whatever) is on pictures. I’ve been including them in reviews since March now and, as Colin commented at the time, “it always adds a little something to a piece”. But I wanted to take a chance to query if anyone had any thoughts on them. Are there typically too many, for example? Or too few? Too big? Not big enough? Badly placed on the page? Or anything else that may occur.

An insignificant wondering, perhaps, but they’re meant to make the blog nicer/easier to read, so if there’s something off about them I’m open to suggestions and pointers. Not that I’ll necessarily change anything, but it’s nice to know what people think.


Goodbye to the auteur

Actually, I’m not about to offer up a treatise on why auteur theory is/isn’t valid any more/ever. No, I’ve just got rid of the “Directors” list of categories/keywords this month. They were pretty useless, really; a random selection of directors with varying degrees of coverage (some didn’t even have any films reviewed here) that just clogged up the sidebar by being long. I’m considering a new page to list directors who have two/three/a-higher-starting-number films reviewed here, but I don’t want to stuff the menu bar with unnecessary links either.


Next time on the all-new 100 Films in a Year monthly update…

July! The month when, last year, I failed to watch a single new film, leaving me 19 behind target by the start of August.

I’ve gotta do better than that, right?

Right?

May 2010

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Being the films I watched in the month of May, in the year of 2010, that count toward my goal of seeing 100 films this year.

I imagine you worked most of that out for yourself.


What this isn’t

I’ve decided to start putting these little lists up every month as a way of keeping the blog current and offering myself a chance to reflect on How Things Are Going. Having switched to longer reviews in the blog’s second year, and ultimately abandoned posting them in order too, I feel I’ve lost this side of things a little. And without it, the whole exercise becomes just a random selection of films.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that (he says quickly, not wishing to offend any blogs of this nature), but most of the regularly updated blogs here on FilmJournal have a focus — be it Eastern, Western, retro, current, or what have you — and it’s made me miss my USP a little. Well, now I just sound like I’m trying to sell myself. This isn’t The Apprentice.

I’m not wholesale returning to 2007-style though — this is a little summary in advance (or, sometimes, after) my full-length review, not replacing it with paragraph-sized soundbite summaries again. Hopefully this is A Good Thing and no one would rather I was scaling back (though, I suppose, if you’re spending time reading a blog you don’t actually like, why are you here? I have plenty of blogs I like that I don’t read regularly enough, never mind ones I don’t. But I digress.)


May. Finally.

Ah, May. Spring. Or Summer. Or neither, in the UK. I don’t know. I still stay inside watching TV and movies, so what does it matter?

After a lacklustre April (just three films) things have picked up considerably — indeed, this May sees me definitively pass the halfway point. This leaves me about a week and a half ahead of where I’d reached in The Mythical First Year, which ended on 129 films, so that bodes well for the future. Though, in all honesty, I can’t help feeling a little disappointed: in March I’d stormed to around 13 films ahead of my place in 2007, while now I’m lurking only one or two ahead — a poor week and I’d be behind again. But after the last two years — where, as you may remember, I only just made it and then failed — being 16 ahead of target is undoubtedly A Good Thing.

Anyway, here are the 16 (numerical-coincidence-tastic) films I actually watched this month:


#42 Burn After Reading (2008)
#43 Inkheart (2008)
#44 First Blood (1982)
#45 Sherlock Holmes (2010)
#46 Righteous Kill (2008)
#47 The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (2008)
#48 Taken (2008)
#49 Sherlock Holmes (2009)
#50 Sword of Sherwood Forest (1960)
#51 Tu£sday (2008)
#52 Insomnia (1997)
#53 Coraline (2009)
#54 Knowing (2009)
#55 Ivanhoe (1952)
#56 National Treasure: Book of Secrets (2007)
#57 Max Payne (2008)


Quick word on comments

While I’m editorialising, I thought I’d have a quick word on comments. And that word is, “sorry”. With the addition of “, maybe”.

I don’t normally go through the spam-filtered comments because there’s a lot of them and they’re unwaveringly spam. Except they’re not, because one of the comments on National Treasure 2 had wound up in there. I happened to spy it by some stroke of fortune and saved it. And I like comments so it would’ve been a shame to lose it.

So, sorry if you’ve ever commented on this blog and it hasn’t shown up. I didn’t delete it, Cub’s Honour, it just got lost in the spam somehow.

There, that’s cleared my conscience.


Next time on the all-new 100 Films in a Year monthly update…

It’s June! Halfway through the year ‘n’ all that. Just how far will I have got? Will I beat May’s record-breaking 16 films? Who knows? Not me!

See you in 31 days.

Apart from all the reviews I post in that time.

And on Twitter.

And…

A ¼ through 2010

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I’ve probably overdone this ‘gag’ already (either that or it’s on course to be A Grand Tradition), but I’m going to allow myself a bit of self congratulation on this occasion.

After only just scraping to 100 films in 2008, and falling notably short last year, it’s good to find things finally going well: as the title may’ve led you to guess (considering we’re about 31 days away from genuinely being a quarter of the way through the year), I’ve already made it to 25 new films seen this year. Hurrah!

Number-wise, I should’ve made it to just 16 by now (“should’ve” meaning “if I wanted to hit 100 on New Year’s Eve moving at a regular rate”). Last year I’d reached a pathetic 7 at this point — 9 short, where this year I’m currently 9 ahead. It’s like some kind of symmetry. In 2008 I was still short at 12, while in the first year — which ultimately totalled 129 — I’d made it 21. Hopefully, this bodes well.

(To put it in a different context, in other years I reached 25 in mid March 2007, early May 2008 and mid May 2009.)

Pat on the back over, it’s back to actually watching films. 25 in two months — 150 by the end of December? Well, we’ll see..

Another year over, or: Third time unlucky

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“Another year over,” sang John Lennon, “and what have you done?” (Well, if you re-arrange the lyrics he did.) Failed to reach 100 films, that’s what.

Well… There’s a first time for everything. It had to happen sooner or later. There are many more fish in the sea– wait, what? Anyone got more accurate clichés to add?

As at least one person kindly pointed out on Twitter, reaching 94 films isn’t a poor effort really. And there’s still plenty of reviews from 2009 left to write and post — just look at that lengthy coming soon page! And I shall, as ever, be posting my highs and lows of my viewing year, plus the complete list and a bunch of largely pointless statistics, just as soon as I get a chance to put all that together.

So, a new decade begins. Fingers crossed for at least 1,000 new films…

2009’s summary posts will be republished in November.