Category Archives: progress reports

How am I doing? Including monthly updates.

The Screaming Monthly Review of October 2022

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Alright, Halloween’s over — but, later on, there are a few statistics about how far off-track I am in completing my 100 Films Challenge this year, and that gave me the heebie-jeebies, at least.



This month’s viewing towards my yearly challenge

#61 The Sign of Four: Sherlock Holmes’ Greatest Case (1932) — Series Progression #4
#62 The Two Faces of January (2014) — Rewatch #10
#63 Walk the Line (2005) — DVD #7
#64 The Thrill of It All (1963) — Wildcard #3
#65 Scream 3 (2000) — Series Progression #5
#66 Scre4m (2011) — Series Progression #6
#67 The Guilty (1947) — Genre #6
#68 The Mission (1986) — WDYMYHS #8
#69 Scream (2022) — New Film #10
#70 La Grande Illusion (1937) — Blindspot #8


  • I watched six feature films I’d never seen before in October.
  • All of them counted towards my 100 Films in a Year Challenge, along with four rewatches.

The rest of this week’s observations fall into a few different categories. First, some thoughts on the films themselves and the Challenge categories they qualify under…

  • I had drafted a rather long bit here about the first of those rewatches, because originally I counted a rewatch of Encanto — but I’d already counted Encanto earlier this year, the first time I saw it. Technically my rules state that “a film can only count once”, but what I really meant was “a viewing can only count once”. I rarely watch the same film twice within a year, so it didn’t cross my mind to anticipate that in my rules. Nonetheless, I was torn about whether counting the same film twice, albeit on different viewings, was ‘legal’. Then I happened to rewatch The Two Faces of January, which didn’t qualify under any other category, so I thought I may as well count that instead. Quandary solved! But I might need to rethink and be more specific for 2023.
  • The next rewatch is also a little contentious for me. The point of the DVD category was to make me watch more of my DVDs, and I watched someone else’s copy of Walk the Line (because I was at their house; meaning my copy still sits unplayed, 15+ years after I bought it). But, referring to the rules again, I didn’t make it hard-and-fast that it had to be my DVD that was watched (it’s just heavily intimated). If I was closer to my target, I might let this go uncounted; but with things looking tight, I feel like I have to exploit my own unintended loophole.
  • The Thrill of It All was also a DVD, also owned by someone else, but I dodged the issue this time by counting it as the Wildcard for the Decades category. That’s a funny one, because basically any film can count — it’s just got to have been released in, er, a decade. Daft, maybe, but them’s the rules. And so, as the first new film I watched (that didn’t qualify for another category) since I completed Decades last month, The Thrill of It All just happened to be in the right place at the right time to be a Decades wildcard.
  • This month’s Blindspot film was Jean Renoir’s anti-war prisoner-of-war classic, La Grande Illusion.
  • This month’s WDYMYHS film was The Mission. Arguably I should’ve left that until last, as it was a stand-in for another film, but eh, I fancied watching it, so I did.
  • I didn’t watch anything from last month’s “failures”.

Now, statistical stuff…

  • With just six new films watched, October ties with September for the weakest month of the year so far. But there were an uncommonly high number of rewatches, so in that respect it’s not so bad.
  • Indeed, thanks to those rewatches — and that all the new films I watched qualified for the challenge — this is actually the most successful month for 2022’s 100 Films Challenge since January!
  • I also watched three short films this month, which doesn’t get mentioned anywhere (until their reviews turn up, eventually), but is the most for a single month this year. So, despite how it looks at first glance, October wasn’t so bad after all.
  • That said, it doesn’t sit well statistically, lowering every average you care to mention: my average new films in October (from 13.2 to 12.7), the average new films for 2022 to date (from 9.4 to 9.1), and the rolling average of new films for the last 12 months (from 10.2 to 9.9).
  • It’s also the sixth month this year that’s failed to reach my minimum target of 10 new films, which makes 2022 the least successful year in this regard since 2013.
  • Such a poor run means that, with 83% of the year gone, I’ve only completed 70% of my 100 Films Challenge.
  • The only other occasions on which I’ve been in comparably poor shape heading into the final two months of the year were 2008 (when I ended October at #73) and 2009 (when I was at #66). In 2008, a last-minute push saw me just reach #100 after watching 11 films in six days. In 2009, if I’d pulled off the same feat again I could’ve made it… but I didn’t, and ended on #94.

There’s more about what all this means for the last two months of 2022’s 100 Films Challenge in the “Next Time” section at the end of this post.



The 89th Monthly Arbitrary Awards

Favourite Film of the Month
This month’s viewing included a highly-acclaimed anti-war classic and a Palme d’Or-winning multi-Oscar- and BAFTA-nominee — very worthy films no doubt, but often they’d be usurped by something more populist that I just enjoyed more. Scream (2022 version) comes closest, but not quite close enough. As for the other two, I think I give the edge to The Mission.

Least Favourite Film of the Month
I guess, on balance, this goes to B-league film noir The Guilty. I didn’t dislike it at all — it’s a perfectly respectable slightly-above-run-of-the-mill B-noir — but the other new films I watched were just that bit better, overall. (I was going to deliberately watch a bad film last night to stop this from happening, but I ran out of time.)

Best Scream of the Month
In typical me fashion, I started my rewatch of the Scream films back in June, aiming to space them out up until Halloween, but ended up not watching the second until the end of September and the rest this month. Oh well. But of the three I watched this month, which is the best? I say Scre4m. The 2022 one is good, but the 2011 film got to the “legacy sequel” thing first and did it near-perfectly. Still, whichever way you cut it, I think the good Scream films now outnumbered the bad (or, at least, lesser) ones, so that’s nice.

Best Early-Cinema Short Film of the Month
As I mentioned earlier, I watched a few short films this month, all from the early days of cinema — titles like The Sick Kitten, which is basically the world’s first cat video (it’s little more than a 30-second close-up of a kitten. I won’t be reviewing it). There was also Life of an American Fireman, which was once hailed as the first example of crosscutting (between action inside and outside a burning building), until it was discovered that was a re-edit decades later, and the original cut actually played the action in full twice. Oops. Of higher quality were two films by the great Georges Méliès: The Infernal Cauldron, in which some devilish business sees people thrown in a burning cauldron; and The One-Man Band, which uses trick photography to have multiple Méliès play in a band together. Maybe nowadays we can see the seams a bit in how it was done, but the filmmaker’s sense of fun and experimentation for the sake of it radiates off the screen.

The Audience Award for Most-Viewed New Post of the Month
No posts particularly shone in October (y’all weren’t interested in my Scream coverage, huh?), with the victor being the monthly review of September. Previously it’s been a rarity for a monthly review to win here (this may be only the third time it’s happened), but that’s now two months in a row. On the one hand, weird. On the other, I do like my monthly reviews — to me, they’re the backbone of the blog, with their regularity and their neat little summaries of things. So, if y’all want to start treating them that way too, that’s cool by me.



Every review posted this month, including new titles and the Archive 5


As we head into the final two months of the year, the number of films I have left to watch for my 100 Films Challenge are, frankly, a lot higher than I’d like — they should average 8.3 per month, but for November and December it’ll need to be 15.0.

On the bright side, those numbers break down neatly across most of the remaining incomplete categories: each month should have three film noirs, three films that progress a series, two Blindspot films, two WDYMYHS films, one new film, and one rewatch; plus, there are five DVDs to split between them, and a single wildcard to go somewhere, which may well end up being a 13th DVD, or perhaps another film noir, or another series entry. I’m not sure things will pan out quite so neatly, but maybe they will — it’s something concrete to aim for in each category, after all.

More importantly, is that doable? My averages across 2022 so far suggest not. But I’ve pulled things out of the bag in December before now (see the last bullet point under “Viewing Notes”), so only time will tell…

The Funereal Monthly Review of September 2022

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I’m not, by nature, a royalist (although I’m not sure that I’d vote for their abolition, if it came to it — I’d rather the certainty of Charles III and William V than risk the whims of the UK public vote giving us something like President Boris), but I know history when I see it, and there’s no doubting that the death of the Queen — and all the ensuing pageantry — was history, on a scale we’ll probably never see again.

So that’s my excuse for this month’s relatively paltry film viewing: I watched a lot of news and TV coverage. Plus, a known quantity: the much-anticipated release of the long-hoped-for Return to Monkey Island, which I spent most of my free time on for the best part of a week. It was worth the wait. If I included non-film stuff in my “best of” lists and whatnot, it’d be a shoe-in.

Anyway, enough about other timefillers — let’s look at some films…



This month’s viewing towards my yearly challenge

#55 Clerks (1994) — DVD #6
#56 Persuasion (2022) — New Film #9
#57 He Walked by Night (1948) — Genre #5
#58 Paddington 2 (2017) — Rewatch #9
#59 Broken Blossoms (1919) — Decades #12
#60 Scream 2 (1997) — Series Progression #3


  • I watched six feature films I’d never seen before in September.
  • That’s my worst month of the year so far. In fact, it’s my worst month since December 2019. Oh dear.
  • That means my average for 2022 drops further below my goal of 10 — last month it hit 9.88, now it’s 9.44. The rolling average of the last 12 months just keeps its head above water, though, dropping from 10.67 to 10.17.
  • Four of the seven counted towards my 100 Films in a Year Challenge, along with two rewatches — one under my Rewatch category (natch), the other under Series Progression, as my Scream series rewatch finally moved forward.
  • Indeed, Scream 2 is the first Series Progression entry since April. I really thought I’d do better with that category. I’m gonna be progressing a lot of series in the last three months of the year if I want to reach #100…
  • In better news, Broken Blossoms completes the Decades portion of my challenge — the first category to be finished! It started off as the easiest to do (almost any film I watched counted; I completed 58% in January alone), but as it went on it became a bit harder. Turns out I don’t watch many films from the 1950s (that took until May), and even fewer from the 1910s — which I knew, and is the kind of reason the category exists.
  • Back on the downers now, because I managed no Blindspot or WDYMYHS films this month. Oops. As I was already one behind on each, that’s something else I need to up the number of in the year’s closing months.
  • In related news, Second Sight have confirmed that their 4K restoration of The Hitcher won’t be completed until next year. That means I need to choose a substitution for this year’s WDYMYHS. I’ve gone for that year’s Palme d’Or winner, which was also an Oscar and BAFTA Best Picture nominee, The Mission.
  • From last month’s “failures” I watched absolutely nothing.



The 88th Monthly Arbitrary Awards

Favourite Film of the Month
I finally saw it and, just like almost everyone else, I loved it. It’s a small field this month, I know, but Top Gun: Maverick is both an easy victor and likely to find a place somewhere on my “best of year” list come December (well, January; it’d be a miracle if I got my list together in December).

Least Favourite Film of the Month
I enjoyed it more than I expected, but Persuasion was still the weakest link amongst this month’s viewing.

The Audience Award for Most-Viewed New Post of the Month
My review of Love on a Leash made a resurgence in the chart this month. (It looks like it actually started last month, but was overshadowed by Prey doing so well.) No idea why that’s happened. As for what this award is actually about — i.e. new posts — the winner is a rarity: the monthly review of August. The last time that happened was May last year — and it might’ve been the first time, too (back then I couldn’t be bothered to dig through 71 previous awards, and I can’t be doing with that now, either).



Every review posted this month, including new titles and the Archive 5


Halloween — one night of the year that, if some people were to be believed, goes on an entire month (at least). Regular readers will know I don’t celebrate it too heavily, but this year I am intending to offer a series of “Guide To” posts covering the Scream series.

The Predatory Monthly Review of August 2022

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Last month I said I was going to refocus my free time on films in August.

Yeeeaaah, about that…



This month’s viewing towards my yearly challenge

#49 Prey (2022) — New Film #8
#50 Tintin and the Lake of Sharks (1972) — DVD #5
#51 Batman: Dead End (2003) — Rewatch #8
#52 Repeat Performance (1947) — Genre #4
#53 Mona Lisa (1986) — WDYMYHS #7
#54 Mirror (1975) — Blindspot #7


  • I watched eight feature films I’d never seen before in August.
  • Another month where I failed to reach my minimum target of 10 new films — and that means my monthly average for the year falls below 10 as well, to 9.88. The rolling average for the last 12 months just about keeps its head above water, though, on 10.67.
  • Five of those films counted towards my 100 Films in a Year Challenge, along with one rewatch — which, this month, was a short film.
  • Wait — a short film? Yes, I’ve counted a short as part of my 100 Films Challenge. Should I be allowing shorts to qualify? Well, why not – I never specified that they were excluded. Plus, it’s in the Rewatch category, so it doesn’t count towards my previously-unseen film tally anyway. (To be honest, I probably wouldn’t have counted it if it only qualified under something like New Films. Maybe that’s a double standard, but then I make the rules — literally.)
  • If it really bothers you for some reason, then know that I also rewatched Love & Friendship this month, so you can count that instead.
  • Also of note: I passed the halfway point. Bit late getting there, considering we’re two-thirds of the way through the year, but milestones are milestones. (If I were still doing my old-style challenge: I’m currently at #79, which is considerably behind other recent years, but still ahead of schedule.)
  • This month’s Blindspot film was Andrei Tarkovsky’s poetic evocation of memory and mid-20th-century Soviet history, Mirror. (Also, I’m still one behind on these.)
  • This month’s WDYMYHS film was Neil Jordan’s neo-noir filtered through a British gangland love story, Mona Lisa. (I’m still one behind on these, also.)
  • From last month’s “failures” I watched Repeat Performance.



The 87th Monthly Arbitrary Awards

Favourite Film of the Month
Three quite different films vie for the trophy this month, which is like a microcosm of the problem I always have ranking films: how do you truly compare a period-set sci-fi actioner, a lightly-fantastical film noir melodrama, and a gritty ’80s gangster love story? Such different films, such different aims — all very successful at what they’re doing, but none doing the same thing, or doing it in the same way, so how do you say which is ‘better’ or ‘best’? But ties are cheating, so I’m going to say Repeat Performance, because it’s the most generally overlooked of the trio.

Least Favourite Film of the Month
Here’s a toughie: do I go for the acclaimed world cinema classic that I didn’t get on with, or the ‘classic’ musical that’s often looked down upon nowadays for its outdated social values, which I didn’t like anyway because the songs aren’t great and the plot’s a bit weird? Well, in spite of that, of the two, I’d rather watch Carousel again, so Mirror takes it.

Best New Direction for a Franchise of the Month
I’m not the first person to say this, but if the Predator movies just want to copy the Prey formula, I reckon that would be good for a few more movies. Just drop a Predator into any time and place in history with a warrior culture. Predator vs samurai? Yes please! Predator vs vikings? Sounds fun! Predator vs medieval knights? Yes, yes, yes — gimme ’em all!

Most Underwhelming Film That Made Me Want to Watch the Original of the Month
Did yo know that Rodgers and Hammerstein’s very Rodgers-and-Hammerstein-y musical Carousel is based on a play, Liliom? I didn’t (until it said it quite prominently in the opening credits). I assumed this was one of those situations where “based on” meant “lightly inspired by”, but it sounds like it’s actually quite faithful — albeit with added lengthy song-and-dance numbers. The original was so popular that it was filmed twice before: in 1930 in the US by Frank Borzage, and in 1934 in France by no less than Fritz Lang. Even though I didn’t care for the musical version, I’m intrigued enough that both of those have gone on my watchlist.

The Audience Award for Most-Viewed New Post of the Month
Long-time readers will surely remember that reviews of new-to-streaming titles often do well for hits, and so it was again this month, with Hulu / Disney+ Original Prey easily winning this category. Indeed, it was my second most-viewed post for the month overall, which is the first time this year that a new post has placed higher than 9th on the monthly chart.



Every review posted this month, including new titles and the Archive 5


Avast, me hearties! The long-awaited treasure of Return to Monkey Island is finally released on 19th September — aka Talk Like a Pirate Day. Arr!

Okay, so that’s not a film, but me devoting a load of time to playing it is going to explain why my film viewing will be lower than it should be next month. (At least there’ll be a concrete reason for once…)

The Melting Monthly Review of July 2022

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Hello, dear readers! No, this month’s heatwave didn’t melt me away to nothing (though it tried its damnedest), but this is a rare sighting of a post on this blog nowadays. I hadn’t intended to be so quiet this month (well, I never do), but, you know, life. Nothing serious, just a mixture of work and personal commitments.

It’s been the same story with my film viewing, which once again fell short of my ongoing aim of watching at least ten new films a month. And as for my 100 Films Challenge, well, that’s way behind where it should be. To reach #100 in December at a steady pace, I should be at #58 by the end of July. As you’ll soon see, I’m not even close.

What I did spend a fair amount of time on this month was catching up with TV — things like Disney+ series Obi-Wan Kenobi, which I seemed to enjoy more than most, and Apple TV+ spy thriller Slow Horses, which is as good as the reviews say — so I intend to refocus on films in August. We’ll see how that pans out.



This month’s viewing towards my yearly challenge

#44 Ambulance (2022) — New Film #7
#45 Johnny Gunman (1957) — Genre #3
#46 A Better Tomorrow (1986) — WDYMYHS #6
#47 Mifune: The Last Samurai (2015) — DVD #4
#48 Calamity Jane (1953) — Rewatch #7


  • I watched eight feature films I’d never seen before in July.
  • Four of them counted towards my 100 Films in a Year Challenge, along with one rewatch.
  • Those are the kinds of numbers there’s not much to say about: they’re nothing special, but they’re not spectacularly bad, either.
  • That said, I’ve slipped further behind in my 100 Films Challenge — as I noted at the start, I should be at #58 by now. I now need to watch, on average, more than 10 qualifying films each month for the rest of the year to complete the challenge.
  • This month’s WDYMYHS film was John Woo’s classic action-thriller that defined the ‘heroic bloodshed’ subgenre, A Better Tomorrow.
  • I remain a film behind in my WDYMYHS challenge, and now the same is true of Blindspot too, as I didn’t watch one of those this month. At least there’s still five months left for me to catch up.
  • From last month’s “failures” I watched Ambulance.



The 86th Monthly Arbitrary Awards

Favourite Film of the Month
When Michael Bay is on form, there’s no action director quite like him — and, for my money, Ambulance is Michael Bay very much on form.

Least Favourite Film of the Month
Nothing absolutely terrible this month, which leads me to name Johnny Gunman for this category. It suffers for being a low-budget independent film in an era when low-budget independent films weren’t really yet a thing — it’s solid enough for the forgiving viewer, but does suffer from some weak acting and novice-like filmmaking choices. I didn’t dislike it, but, in the context of the rest of this month’s viewing, it doesn’t quite measure up.

Bickering Old People of the Month
45 Years depicts a couple’s sudden relationship difficulties after four-and-a-half decades of marriage with such scathing realism that I have to give this to The Bucket List for being fun bickering. But I think we all know which is the better film, really. Only one of them is in the Criterion Collection, after all.

Best Weather of the Month
A scathingly realistic drama about a couple having sudden relationship difficulties after four-and-a-half decades of marriage, in part because their emotional communication is inadequate, set in grey, misty, wintry countryside? 45 Years is British through and through, not least that weather. Oh, it looked so beautiful, especially watching it on a hot summer day — personally, I long for our winter to come again.

The Audience Award for Most-Viewed New Post of the Month
After a couple of months where this category has been dominated by my ‘failures’ posts, they dipped to second place in July. Instead, the victor was something of a surprise, but a pleasant one: my review of undeservedly forgotten 1930s melodrama Bank Holiday.



Every review posted this month, including new titles and the Archive 5


More films, hopefully.

The Halfway Monthly Review of June 2022

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Another month gone, and suddenly we’re halfway through 2022. Whaaaat?!

To mark the occasion, the Viewing Notes section is a little longer than usual, taking a look at how the rest of the year might shape up — or might need to shape up, considering my new 100 Films Challenge is currently running behind schedule…



This month’s viewing towards my yearly challenge

#36 Top Gun 3D (1986) — Rewatch #6
#37 Scream (1996) — Wildcard #2
#38 Escape in the Fog (1945) — Genre #1
#39 Pretty in Pink (1986) — WDYMYHS #5
#40 Paris, Texas (1984) — Blindspot #6
#41 The Flying Deuces (1939) — DVD #3
#42 Apollo 10½: A Space Age Childhood (2022) — New Film #6
#43 My Name Is Julia Ross (1945) — Genre #2


  • I watched 12 feature films I’d never seen before in June.
  • Six of them counted towards my 100 Films in a Year Challenge, along with two rewatches.
  • Wait, two rewatches? Yep, because I’ve deployed my second wildcard of the year to count Scream as a second rewatch for June. That means I can’t count two rewatches in a single month again this year; but, as it marks the beginning of a rewatch of the Scream series, it does open up the rest of those films to counting under Series Progression. Nifty.
  • Genre was the only category I hadn’t started when June began. Escape in the Fog changed that, meaning all 11 categories are officially underway — and all still ‘in play’, with none completed — as I reach the halfway point.
  • This month’s Blindspot film was Wim Wenders’ Paris, Texas, starring Harry Dean Stanton as a dad trying to bond with his kid.
  • This month’s WDYMYHS film was the John Hughes-penned Pretty in Pink, co-starring Harry Dean Stanton as a dad who’s really good with his kid. I remain one behind here, but there’s still plenty of time to catch that up.
  • From last month’s “failures” I only watched The Contender.
  • I also watched a short film this month — my first this year! I often feel like I should watch more shorts, especially as I own hundreds on disc (a handful of dedicated collections, and then loads included as special features here and there). Maybe I should make it some sort of official goal. 100 Short Films in a Year? Sounds doable — but in addition to what I already aim for? Maybe not.

As I was saying, now that we’re halfway through the year, here’s how things are shaping up overall…

  • I should be at #49 now (not #50, thanks to the first six months of the year being slightly shorter than the second six). Although I’m short of that, at least I’m not a whole month’s worth short (the target for the end of May is #41), so that’s something. Nonetheless, I need to push a bit harder for the rest of the year: the monthly average to reach 100 in 12 months exactly is 8.3 films per month, but for the rest of the year I need it to be 9.5.
  • As a point of comparison, so far this year I’ve averaged 7.2 Challenge films per month, so it’s a bit of a step up.
  • But I’ve averaged 10.5 films per month overall, so if I just make more of them Challenge-compliant going forward then I should be fine.
  • Were I still doing my old-style 100 Films Challenge (just watching any new-to-me 100 films in a year), I’d currently be at #63 — which would be my poorest performance at this point since 2014.
  • All of which sounds fine and dandy, until you remember this: I typically watch fewer films in the back half of the year.
  • That’s not just a casual observation: I have numbers on this. For example, I can tell you that, out of 15 years of running this blog, I did actually watch more films in the back half of the year five times. And on a further three occasions, the second half was within 10% of the first half’s tally. So, it’s not as if the two halves are often wildly different. Which is funny, when you think about it, considering my overall annual tallies can be so very different — historically, anywhere from 94 to 264 films in a year.
  • Anyway, what do the stats foretell for this year? Based on my all-time average first-half-to-second-half ratio, I would watch 122 films this year. Narrowing that to just the last five years, I would make it to 108. And if we look at just years where I’d made comparable progress by the end of June — which happen to be 2010 to 2014, when I’d reached between #55 to #64 by this point — they too reckon I’d make it to 122.
  • Which is all well and good for my old target, but what about the New 100 Films Challenge? Well, so far my ratio of new films to films that count is roughly 1.47:1. If that holds, then watching 122 new films would mean I watch only 83 that count towards my Challenge. So, as I said earlier, I need to up the number of compliant films. Or, of course, just watch more films.
  • As to that final point, the last time I watched more films in the second half of the year than the first was in 2015, driven by pushing myself to make it to #200. But such a goal isn’t always necessary: in 2014, I did an even greater percentage of my viewing in the back half, but only to make it to #136. And goals aren’t a guarantee of anything: in 2016, I watched more in the first half of the year than I had in 2015, but so much less in the second half that I only made it to #195.

All of which goes to prove one thing: when it comes to my film watching, statistics may be fun, but they’re useless at predicting the future.



The 85th Monthly Arbitrary Awards

Favourite Film of the Month
Quite a few more-than-solid films this month, but the one that comes closest to jumping out at me is also one I’ve been meaning to see ever since it came out, 12 years ago now. That would be political thriller The Ghost Writer (originally released as The Ghost here in the UK, but now under its international title on Netflix). Why does it sometimes take me so damn long to get round to things I was actually quite keen to watch? Goodness only knows. And it’s things like this — where, as I expected, I enjoy them a lot — that prove I shouldn’t let such delays happen.

Least Favourite Film of the Month
Apologies to any Laurel and Hardy fans reading this, but my first real experience of their work didn’t really make me laugh, and a comedy that doesn’t make you laugh isn’t much of a success, so The Flying Deuces takes this (dis)honour.

Most Timely Viewing of the Month
Here in the UK, we got a bonus Bank Holiday if June, to celebrate Queenie’s Platinum Jubilee… and, on the first of them, I watched the fairly-obscure (I’d certainly never heard of it before) 1938 film Bank Holiday. The film and modern real-life event aren’t really connected in any way (no Jubilee going on in the film), but hey-ho.

Best Accent of the Month
Accents in films are a funny business. Sometimes, people don’t even bother: witness My Name Is Julia Ross, a Hollywood production set entirely in London and Cornwall, where half the cast don’t even bother to attempt English accents. Sometimes, you wonder if people needed to: take The Ghost Writer, where it feels like everyone’s doing one accent or another, be it Scots and Americans doing English, or Brits doing American. And then there’s films that are a wonder unto themselves, like House of Gucci, where the entirely-English-speaking cast are doing ‘Italian’ as if they’re in a Dolmio advert. “I cooka da pasta” indeed.

The Audience Award for Most-Viewed New Post of the Month
For the second month in a row, my monthly failures roundup — namely, May’s Failures — has topped the chart. I say “topped”: it was the highest new post, but 29th overall. I guess my new reviews just haven’t been that interesting. (My ‘mistake’ has been stopping TV reviews: 24 of the 28 posts above May’s Failures were old TV columns.)



Every review posted this month, including new titles and the Archive 5


Y’know, I still haven’t been to the cinema yet this year. I keep meaning to see Top Gun: Maverick, but things keep getting in the way. But, as of today, my local cinema have put it back on to their biggest screen for the weekend, so maybe I’ll finally pull my finger out and get there in the next couple of days.

As for the rest of the month… oh, who knows!

The Jubilatious Monthly Review of May 2022

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Of course, May had nothing to do with the jubilee (other than some precursor events), and the actual long weekend doesn’t start until tomorrow, so this post title is… not the best. But we’ll probably have forgotten it ever happened in 30 days’ time, so I’m not holding back the reference ’til June’s review.

Anyway, let’s put largely irrelevant naming issues aside and get on with last month’s viewing…



This month’s viewing towards my yearly challenge

#31 The Monolith Monsters (1957) — Decades #11
#32 Hannah and Her Sisters (1986) — WDYMYHS #4
#33 Chip ’n Dale: Rescue Rangers (2022) — New Film #5
#34 On the Town (1949) — Rewatch #5
#35 To Be or Not to Be (1942) — Blindspot #5


  • I watched seven feature films I’d never seen before in May.
  • Four of them counted towards my 100 Films in a Year Challenge, along with one rewatch.
  • Those are less than ideal numbers — I should be at #41 by now, really. Next month marks the halfway point of the year, of course, but I’m really going to have to step things up to get to #50 by then.
  • One of the films I watched this month that didn’t count was Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. It’s part of an ongoing series I’m watching — the MCU — so why doesn’t it count for Series Progression? Well, my personal rule when I count ‘series I’m in the middle of watching’ is that they’re series that have already finished, or where I’m catching up. Series where the next instalment isn’t even out yet can’t count because it doesn’t ‘exist’ yet. Sometimes, however, a new release can count, as with Encanto for Disney Classics last month, because I’m still watching older films as part of my catchup, so new releases get added to the end of the list. Does that make sense? Is it fair?
  • This month’s Blindspot film was Ernst Lubitsch’s anti-Nazi satire To Be or Not to Be.
  • This month’s WDYMYHS film was Woody Allen’s comedy-drama Hannah and Her Sisters. Regular readers may remember I needed to watch two WDYMYHS films this month to catch up. Well, I didn’t, so that goal is now bumped to next month.
  • From last month’s “failures” I watched The Monolith Monsters (from Eureka’s Three Monster Tales of Sci-Fi Terror set).



The 84th Monthly Arbitrary Awards

Favourite Film of the Month
Nothing truly exceptional this month, as is perhaps given away by the fact I’m going to choose an MCU film as my favourite. Obviously Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings ticks the usual MCU boxes, but it mixes in a healthy dose of martial arts action-fantasy filmmaking — another (sub)genre I enjoy — making for an all-round entertaining MCU debut for the eponymous hero. It’s not the kind of film that’s going to convert nonbelievers, but it’s good fun.

Least Favourite Film of the Month
This is easily This Means War, the action-adventure/rom-com mashup starring Chris Pine and Tom Hardy as BFF CIA agents who both fall for Reese Witherspoon. It’s kinda adequate as a movie desperate to appeal to both male and female viewers, but kinda fails both by trying to be two different things at once and nailing neither.

Monster That Isn’t Really a Monster of the Month
I guess The Monolith Monsters was so titled to cash in on the popularity of monster movies in the ’50s, but the titular terror isn’t really a monster at all — it’s an extraterrestrial geological phenomena. On the bright side, at least that’s something a bit different.

Most Aspirational Lifestyle (for Some People) of the Month
In my review of tick, tick… BOOM! this month, I wrote that it would appeal to some people who dream of living that lifestyle. The same could absolutely be said of Frances Ha, which is about twentysomethings failing at life… but coolly, in black & white, in New York City. Well, if you only dream of failure, at least you’re less likely to be disappointed by reality, right?

The Audience Award for Most-Viewed New Post of the Month
A series of posts I started this year has been growing in popularity month on month… Well, I say that: I’m not sure its actual numbers have been going up, so much as the rest of the viewing chart has been falling away around it. Anyway, for the first time, this month’s most-viewed new post is a ‘failures’ post; namely, April’s Failures (of course). I guess people are more interested to read about what I didn’t watch than what I did. Weird.



Every review posted this month, including new titles and the Archive 5


…marks the halfway point of the year — yes, already! — so I might indulge in a few bonus statistics.

That’s the Second Biggest Monthly Review of April 2022 I’ve Ever Seen!

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If you’re unfamiliar with the work of the once-formidable computer game developer LucasArts, you might think the title of this month’s review is setting up an almost-but-not-quite record-breaking affair. Not so, dear reader.

As those au fait with the aforementioned studio’s venerable output are doubtless already aware, this month’s title is, rather, referencing a running gag from the Monkey Island games. That was prompted by the recent announcement that 2022 will see the release of a sixth game in the series. The Monkey Island games have been a big part of my life, ever since I played the original on our family’s first PC when I was about six years old, so I’m thrilled that we’re getting another. I’ve already begun replaying the preceding games in anticipation.

None of which has anything to do with films, of course (except for the trivia that Steven Spielberg and ILM did nearly make a Monkey Island film once), other than that it’s taken away some of my film-viewing time. Consequently, the following has occurred…



This month’s viewing towards my yearly challenge

#26 Death on the Nile (2022) — New Film #4
#27 Munich: The Edge of War (2021) — Wildcard #1
#28 Encanto (2021) — Series Progression #2
#29 The Father (2020) — Rewatch #4
#30 High and Low (1963) — Blindspot #4


  • I watched 11 feature films I’d never seen before in April.
  • Just four of them counted towards my 100 Films in a Year Challenge, along with one rewatch.
  • That means I’ve fallen behind schedule for the first time this year — I should’ve reached #33 to be on track to hit #100 in December at a steady pace.
  • I’m not too worried, though. This month, for example, I watched seven films that didn’t count towards the challenge, so there’s plenty of leeway to watch more challenge-compliant films in the future.
  • Nonetheless, I deployed my first ‘wildcard’ in April, counting Munich: The Edge of War as a second 2022-released film watched this month. It’s a nice category to be able to use a wildcard in… but now that I’ve done it once, I can’t do it again. Them’s the rules.
  • In case you weren’t sure, the series Encanto progresses is the Disney Animated Canon (or Animated Classics, or whatever else you want to call it — the official name has varied over time). It’s not the ‘next’ entry I need to see in that series, but that’s okay, because it’s one of the few I’m making my way through in any old order.
  • This month’s Blindspot film saw the great Akira Kurosawa in a Hitchcockian mode for kidnap thriller cum social drama High and Low.
  • This month’s WDYMYHS film didn’t happen in the end, leaving me with one to catchup — next month, hopefully.
  • From last month’s “failures” I watched Death on the Nile and Fast & Furious 9.



The 83rd Monthly Arbitrary Awards

Favourite Film of the Month
Aside from the films listed above, my viewing this month included such acclaimed and/or popular recent releases as Spider-Man: No Way Home and Best Picture Oscar winner CODA. But, while they were good isn their own ways, probably the best film I saw was a classic: Akira Kurosawa’s High and Low.

Least Favourite Film of the Month
Nothing truly terrible this month, but Fast & Furious 9 finally burst that franchise’s bubble, for me. Those films have been ridiculous but fun for about half the series’ run now, but I thought F9 tipped the balance too far — it was more ridiculous than ever, but it was no longer fun.

Most Unfortunate Casting That Didn’t Happen of the Month
Withnail & I is one of those films I’ve been meaning to watch forever but never quite cared enough to make the effort to get round to, until this month. Then, entirely by coincidence, I later happened to see on Twitter this bit of trivia: apparently, early in the development of Sherlock, creator(s) Steven Moffat and/or Mark Gatiss mentioned to Paul McGann that they were considering casting him as Watson with Richard E. Grant as Holmes. Now, obviously they’re Withnail & I personas wouldn’t be right for those roles, but they’re both much more versatile actors than that. As great as I think Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman were, a film/series with Richard E. Grant as Sherlock Holmes and Paul McGann as Dr Watson is something I now feel we’ve been robbed of.

Most Pointless Extra-Textual Question of the Month
When the trailer for Death in the Nile came out, one line from it went semi-viral: “we have enough champagne to fill the Nile!” Of course, the character is being metaphorical: no one thinks they actually have that much champagne; she just means they have a lot. But, as I said, the line went viral, and therefor you can find multiple articles that tried to answer the question, how much champagne would it take to fill the Nile? The answer? It’s complicated. And, really, for such a fundamentally pointless question (no one’s going to try to do it for real), does any answer closer than that matter?

The Audience Award for Most-Viewed New Post of the Month
Just three posts compete for this honour, once again (hopefully May will be when I finally get back on top of that), and the winner is the one with actual reviews to read: 2022 Weeks 9–11.



Every review posted this month, including new titles and the Archive 5


I’m going to try to get both my challenge viewing and my general reviewing back on track. We’ll see how that goes…

The Slapping Monthly Review of March 2022

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In my last post, a little over three weeks ago, I wrote that it had been “a hectic time, both at work and in my personal life, these past few weeks.” Well, that didn’t really let up, hence the extended period of radio silence here. Hopefully that is now behind me, however, and both posting and film watching can return to the decent pace I’d established in the first two months of the year.

If it doesn’t, maybe I need a jolly good slap… or not, eh?

Alright, that’s what amounts to “topical satire” for now. Let’s get on with how March’s film viewing went…



This month’s viewing towards my yearly challenge

#21 Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (1988) — Decades #10
#22 West Side Story (1961) — Rewatch #3
#23 Cobra (1986) — WDYMYHS #3
#24 Django & Django (2021) — New Film #3
#25 A Man Escaped (1956) — Blindspot #3


  • I watched nine feature films I’d never seen before in March.
  • Four of them counted towards my 100 Films in a Year Challenge, along with one rewatch.
  • That means I end the month bang on target: we’re a quarter of the way through the year, and I’m a quarter of the way to #100.
  • My overall viewing is going less well, failing to reach ten new films in a month for the first time since November. (You can see all my latest viewing, both Challenge-related and not, on my Recently Watched page.)
  • That said, while it didn’t reach the magic double figures, it’s not that far short of 2022’s other months: the year’s monthly average only drops from 12 to 11.
  • That said, in the world of viewing averages, a whole film drop is moderately large. For comparison, the rolling average of the last 12 months dropped by 0.9 films (from 14.8 to 13.9), and the all-time average for March by just 0.46 (from 15.79 to 15.33).
  • For the third month in a row, my “2022 film” is a 2021 film that didn’t get a UK release until 2022. This should’ve been the month to buck that trend, with The Batman, but unfortunately I haven’t had a chance to get to the cinema.
  • This month’s Blindspot film was Robert Bresson’s World War 2 prison drama A Man Escaped — or, to fully translate its original French title, One Condemned to Death Escaped, or, The Wind Blows Where It Wants. Classy.
  • This month’s WDYMYHS film was ’80s Sly Stallone actioner Cobra. That doesn’t have an intelligent-sounding extended title. Or much intelligence on the whole, really. It’s kinda fun, though.
  • From last month’s “failures” I watched The King’s Man.



The 82nd Monthly Arbitrary Awards

Favourite Film of the Month
I watched both versions of West Side Story this month, and, heretical as it may sound, I think I thought Spielberg’s was better. (As a rewatch, the original isn’t eligible for this award anyway). Not only that, but Spielberg’s pure cinematic skill sees it stand out easily from the rest of the month’s viewing.

Least Favourite Film of the Month
I actually quite enjoyed The Very Excellent Mr. Dundee — certainly more than most other people seem to have — but there’s also no doubt it was the weakest film I saw this month.

Film You’d Most Like to Hang Out In of the Month
Who wouldn’t want to spend time nattering with the grandes dames of British theatre and cinema in Nothing Like a Dame? Not only would you get fabulous anecdotes, but they seem like a right giggle.

Film You’d Least Like to Hang Out In of the Month
No one said life in a Nazi prison would be fun, and A Man Escaped certainly bears that out.

The Audience Award for Most-Viewed New Post of the Month
Just three posts to choose from, last month, and the victor of those was 2022 Weeks 7–8. Of the other two, my ‘failures’ proved more popular than my general monthly review for the second month running. Could just be the appeal of the title, I suppose.



Every review posted this month, including new titles and the Archive 5


The much-discussed Spider-Man: No Way Home finally hits disc next week, so I’ll see if it has any surprises left for me (I don’t think I’ve been totally spoiled, but it’s been impossible to avoid certain big stories). Also, hopefully I’ll also finally see The Batman, one way or another. And also some films that don’t involve men dressing up as critters to fight evil.

The Comparatively Calm Monthly Review of February 2022

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For a moment, set aside your fears of World War III and/or anticipation for The Batman (whichever is taking up more of your mental capacity right now; possibly both) and journey with me back, back, back to a time when military invasion was just a threat and Batman reactions were still embargoed — i.e. last month.



This month’s viewing towards my yearly challenge

#13 She’s Gotta Have It (1986) — WDYMYHS #2
#14 The Hobbit (1977) — Decades #8
#15 Jackass Number Two (2006) — Series Progression #1
#16 Shot in the Dark (1933) — Decades #9
#17 A Room with a View (1985) — Rewatches #2
#18 The Misfits (2021) — New Films #2
#19 Tintin and the Temple of the Sun (1969) — DVDs #2
#20 Los Olvidados (1950) — Blindspot #2


  • I watched 13 feature films I’d never seen before in February.
  • Seven of them counted towards my 100 Films in a Year Challenge, along with one rewatch.
  • As with last month’s ‘new film’, The Misfits is originally a 2021 release; but, best I can tell, its UK debut only came this month (as a direct-to-Prime Amazon Exclusive), so it counts as a 2022 release for the purposes of the Challenge.
  • Another oddity of my new rules kicked in this month. When I watched the first Jackass movie, it didn’t count for anything (the only place it could’ve qualified was Decades for the 2000s, but that had been taken); but then I watched the first sequel, and now that does count, as Series Progression. My scrupulous planning ahead for rare eventualities does pay off, see.
  • All the great films from the 1930s that I haven’t seen and could’ve watched to count towards my Decades tally, and instead I’ve filled the slot with a 52-minute “quota quickie” murder mystery. And, frankly, I don’t regret it in the slightest.
  • This month’s Blindspot film was Luis Buñuel’s ‘true story’ of children in poverty in mid-century Mexico, Los Olvidados, aka The Young and the Damned. That English-language title does kinda sum it up.
  • This month’s WDYMYHS film was Spike Lee’s pro debut, She’s Gotta Have It, which (as discussed last month) completes the films for which I was reliant on streaming. That’s one less thing to worry about.
  • Away from the Challenge, 13 beats January’s 11 to be 2022’s de facto best month in those stakes.
  • But it’s not a huge number, so falls short of most stats I keep an eye on: February’s all-time performance (the best is 27); the February average (previously 14.2, now 14.1); and the average of the last 12 months (previously 16.0, now 14.8).
  • My “failures” section may have been spun off onto its own dedicated post this year, but that hasn’t affected how many I actually watch: this month, I didn’t catch up with any of last month’s failures.



The 81st Monthly Arbitrary Awards

Favourite Film of the Month
Its nostalgia-driven style may have enraged some critics and cineastes, but (anecdotally, at least) it seems to have worked gangbusters for regular folk — and, for once, I’m counting myself among the latter. There were certainly ‘worthier’ films among this month’s viewing, but nothing so all-around entertaining as Ghostbusters: Afterlife.

Least Favourite Film of the Month
A few to choose from this month — it’s felt like an underwhelming start to the year, I must say, with the poor and (mostly) mediocre films outweighing the good stuff. Anyway, the nadir has to be The Brits Are Coming, known in the US (and therefore most places online) as The Con Is On. It promises a stylish crime caper with an all-star cast. It delivers an amateurish-feeling wannabe-comedy that makes you wonder how come this cast were that desperate for work.

Most Compromised Viewing Experience of the Month
Nowadays, we’re used to ultra-faithful HD presentations that do their utmost to present films in their original cuts and original aspect ratio with original colour grading and original audio, to faithfully replicate the filmmakers’ intended vision. But not everything has been granted such treatment, like my DVD copy of Tintin and the Temple of the Sun — or, as the revised title card would have it, courtesy of some Windows MovieMaker-level text animation, The Seven Crystal Balls & Prisoners of the Sun. At least the rest of the opening titles are intact, which apparently wasn’t the case on VHS. The tape also cut two musical numbers, though the DVD only restores one. Despite most of the film being dubbed into English — with no original French audio option offered — the song wasn’t dubbed; but nor is it subtitled, so goodness knows what it was about. It’s bookended by some weird digital edits, suggesting more footage was cut, or possibly lost. And talking of audio, serves me right for choosing the remixed 5.1 track, which occasionally misses random sound effects and music cues. All of that without mentioning the strange digital artefacts that pop up now and then. Far from ideal… but also, as far as I’m aware, the only English-friendly version available (I doubt they fixed any of these problems for the iTunes release).

Moment That’s a Great Visual But Impossible to Adequately Describe in Writing of the Month
There’s a bungee jump stunt in Jackass Number Two that isn’t one of their most elaborate or dangerous, and certainly is a long way from being their grossest, but nonetheless ends in a moment of hilarity that, literally, has to be seen. I could try to describe exactly what occurs in the split-second, but it would take many words to convey accurately and still wouldn’t do justice to seeing it happen in a fraction of a second. It’s not even their funniest or most audacious thing, it’s just… gravity. Nature always wins.

The Audience Award for Most-Viewed New Post of the Month
Despite my return to (relatively) regular posting this year, February is my lowest month for traffic since… well, since as far back as the WordPress stats page shows (October 2019). Oh well. And despite many of my posts containing multiple different films to pique readers’ interest(s), it was actually a single-film review that came out on top for new posts: Ghostbusters: Afterlife.



Every review posted this month, including new titles and the Archive 5


Assuming we don’t all get nuked by a frustrated Russian, next month begins with The Batman, which got rave reviews when its embargo lifted yesterday, and ends with the Oscars, which can’t seem to do anything right this year. Hopefully, I’ll see them both.

The All-New Monthly Review of January 2022

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I’ve already lied to you, dear reader. I say that because much of this monthly review is going to seem familiar — “All-New” it is not. “Partially new”, that would be the truth: there are new graphics, and a revised focus in some sections, both to fit in with the blog’s new identity.

Despite that, I’ve stuck with the “all-new” moniker to reflect The All-New 100 Films in a Year Challenge, my progress with which is now the primary focus of these monthly updates… although you can still find links to all my reviews; and the Arbies survive, now in their 80th month, still drawing from everything I watched.

Well, we’ll see how it goes. On which note, on it goes…



This month’s viewing towards my yearly challenge

#1 Carry On Spying (1964) — Decades #1
#2 Gosford Park (2001) — Rewatches #1
#3 Penny Serenade (1941) — Decades #2
#4 The Navigator (1924) — Decades #3
#5 Flight of the Navigator (1986) — WDYMYHS #1
#6 In the Line of Fire (1993) — Decades #4
#7 Barbie as The Princess and the Pauper (2004) — Decades #5
#8 Free Guy (2021) — Decades #6
#9 Mass (2021) — New Films #1
#10 Meat Loaf: In Search of Paradise (2007) — DVDs #1
#11 Voyage of Time: An IMAX Documentary (2016) — Decades #7
#12 L’avventura (1960) — Blindspot #1


  • I watched 11 feature films I’d never seen before in January.
  • All of them counted towards my 100 Films in a Year Challenge, along with one rewatch.
  • As you may or may have inferred from that, this means I effectively have two counts running now: my 100 Films Challenge, and how many new films I’ve seen. The former may be the official thing going on nowadays, but a decade-and-a-half habit is hard to break, so on my ‘new film’ count goes. As I said up top, it’s the Challenge that’s the focus of these posts now, but I’ll still be including titbits about my overall new film viewing. And come the end of the year, it’s the overall new viewing that will continue to fuel things like my Top 10 and the statistics post.
  • So, to the Challenge. As the year gets underway, most — in fact, everything — I watch counts. I don’t expect that to be the case as we go forward.
  • For example: I’m not surprised to see the Decades category filling up fastest, because it’s so easy to complete. Slots are filled by any film that (a) isn’t better off counted towards another category, and (b) isn’t from a decade already ticked off — and, as the year begins, none are ticked off (obv). With 7 out of 12, Decades is already 58% complete. As for the remainder, the 1910s might require a special effort (I don’t watch many films that old without explicitly setting out to), but I imagine the others will take care of themselves in short order.
  • Just in case it needs stating for anyone: yes, Mass is “a 2021 movie” thanks to its festival screenings (the US and Canadian releases were also last year), but it didn’t come out in the UK until 20th January, which makes it a 2022 (i.e. new) movie for me.
  • This month’s Blindspot film was L’avventura, which I’ve been putting off including on the list (or watching in any other way) for years. I haven’t particularly enjoyed other classics of mid-20th-century Italian cinema, like Bicycle Thieves or 8½, so I feared this would be the same. And that’s part of the motivation for watching it first: ripping off the plaster. Well, it was a somewhat pleasant surprise. More when I review it soon.
  • This month’s WDYMYHS film was Flight of the Navigator, which I watched on Prime Video. The danger of putting titles from streamers on a “movies I must watch this year” list is that at some point, possibly without warning, they could disappear from that streamer. But that also makes them an easy choice for where to start. This year there are only two across all 24 films from Blindspot and WDYMYHS, and they’re both on the latter list — I imagine the other will be next month’s pick.
  • I didn’t watch anything from last month’s “failures”. And as for this month’s failures: I’ve finally decided to spin the feature off into its own post. Look for that in the next day or two.



The 80th Monthly Arbitrary Awards

Favourite Film of the Month
Although my viewing numbers this month were more than solid (getting to 100 films in a year at a steady pace — something the new challenge is partially intended to enforce — requires an average of 8.3 films a month), the level of quality was more middling. One film did stand out, though: Mass, a chamber piece that puts you through the emotional wringer, powered by a quartet of awards-worthy performances.

Least Favourite Film of the Month
Conversely, the month’s middling quality means it’s also hard to pick a worst film. By a nose, I’m going to say Voyage of Time, because I didn’t get as much out of it as I might’ve hoped. Plus, MUBI’s pathetic attempt at streaming in 4K (a feature they’d specifically pushed in the film’s advertising) got on my wick.

Best Navigator of the Month
The navigator in The Navigator is actually the name of the boat; and even if it weren’t, Buster Keaton is pretty poor at navigating it. The navigator in Flight of the Navigator is the kid who bonds with the spaceship, and while he’s ostensibly in charge, I think the spacecraft actually does most of the work. But in Barbie as The Princess and the Pauper, Barbie manages to ride into the forest and go straight to the exact hidden cabin where her doppelgänger is being held captive. Impressive navigation, Barbie.

Biggest Mystery of the Month
Whodunnit in Gosford Park? What happened to Anna in L’avventura? How did David lose eight years in Flight of the Navigator? Can they catch the assassin in In the Line of Fire? What are the villains up to in Carry On Spying? Can Meat Loaf put on a gig that makes him happy in In Search of Paradise? No, the biggest mystery of the month is: what the feck is Brad Pitt on about in the Voyage of Time narration?!

The Audience Award for Most-Viewed New Post of the Month
No break-out successes this month — the victor is down in 30th place overall, behind a slew of archive TV columns — but it was a close-run thing nonetheless, with two posts tied for second place, just two hits behind the winner. Said winner was, somewhat appropriately, The Best of 2021. And now it’s the best of (January) 2022, too. Hurrah.



Every review posted this month, including new titles and the Archive 5


It’s 100 Films’ 15th birthday (just two months after launching! Is this what being a time traveller feels like?)

I had been thinking I’d mark the occasion with a revised version of 100 Favourites, as that’s five years old, but those things take literally years to put together (well, the first one did), and while I had been considering it for years, it’s been overtaken by the relaunch. Maybe in 2023.

Other than that, erm, things continue much the same…