Last time, I finally managed my first 10+ month of 2023. (For the uninitiated, that’s a month where I watched 10 or more films I’d never seen before. Yeah, small fry compared to those people who watch 300 or 500 or 1,000 films a year, but that’s their problem.) Considering I used to manage 10+ months on the regular (from 2014 to 2019, I went five whole years — 60 straight months — without dropping below that goal), I was hoping April would mark a turn in fortunes for 2023.

That was not to be the case. If anything, the opposite has come true. Life has been busy of late — I haven’t posted a review since February for a reason — but I’d managed to keep it from impacting too much on my actual viewing. May was when that bastion fell. I watched my first film of the month, a rewatch (see #34 below) on the 1st. I watched my first new film on the 8th. And then I didn’t watch another until the 25th. I did give over an entire week to Eurovision — normally I only watch the final, but, as it was in the UK this year, I also watched both the semis and a bunch of related documentaries that were on — but that still leaves three-and-a-bit other weeks. Well, like I said: Life.

You can read about my final tallies below, but I’ll just say this: in terms of new films watched, it was my worst month in over 14 years; and it ties (with two others) for my second worst month in the 16-and-a-half-year history of this blog, beaten only by the infamous zero of July 2009.

#34 The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King — Extended Edition (2003/2004) — Series Progression #6
#35 The Shiver of the Vampires (1971) — Failures #5
#36 The Thin Man (1934) — Rewatch #5
#37 After the Thin Man (1936) — Series Progression #7
#38 Another Thin Man (1939) — Series Progression #8

• I watched just two feature films I’d never seen before in May.
• I mentioned in my introduction that only two other months have ever had tallies so low. They were March 2008 and February 2009.
• Only one of those films counted towards my 100 Films in a Year Challenge, but I also managed four qualifying rewatches.
• That means I reach #38 on my Challenge (as you can see above). That’s slightly behind where I should ideally be at the end of May. I’ve ended every previous month this year on target; compared to that, being three films behind doesn’t look so good. But it’s also only three behind — that’s not too many to catch up across the remaining seven months of the year.
• It does terrible things to my averages, though: the average for 2023 to date drops from 9.0 to 7.6; the average for May drops from 15.8 to 14.9; and the rolling average for the last 12 months drops from 8.6 to 8.2. Okay, that last one isn’t so extreme, though it only goes to show my viewing has been low in general over the past year.
• No Blindspot or WDYMYHS films this month, which leaves me two behind on each category. Oh dear. I’m clinging on to the fact there’s still seven months in which to catch up…
• The one thing I did have success with this month was a rewatch of The Thin Man series, getting through half of them in one weekend. Not sure when I’ll finish the other three, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they turn up as part of my Challenge before 2023 is over.
• From last month’s “failures” I watched The Shiver of the Vampires.

Favourite Film of the Month
Just two films to choose from this month, and I rated them both 3.5 stars on Letterboxd. Oh dear. They were similar in other ways, too: both are about vampires; and I made an effort to watch them both to help me decide about future Blu-ray purchases. I’ll give the edge to Jean Rollin’s The Shiver of the Vampires, because it was enough to convince me to keep buying Indicator’s 4K issues of his work.

Least Favourite Film of the Month
By default, then, my least favourite film was the only other newbie I watched this month: Hong Kong action-comedy Mr. Vampire. Tonally very different to Shiver, but another vampire-related film I was so-so on that, ultimately, did about enough to convince me to spend more on a further release — in this case, Eureka’s box set of the sequels. That said, the set is out now and I haven’t actually ordered it yet, which was about the only factor deciding which way round the two film placed. Hardly seems fair.

The Audience Award for Most-Viewed New Post of the Month
Only two films, and only two posts in May, too. Not at all related, just a coincidence. And so, once again, this category is next to pointless. There wasn’t a tie, though, with April’s monthly review edging out the Failures by half-a-dozen hits. Neither were anywhere near troubling the top of the overall chart, mind.

More films watched, I hope. Getting back into the review groove would be nice too, but I’ll take things one step at a time.