Rumors of my movie blog's death...

So...yeah...I did it again.  I posted my top ten list for last year and then promptly took like eight months off from updating this blog.  Pretty much the same thing I did last year.  My only excuse is that...well...this is my blog.  I'll get to it when I get to it.  And, it just so happens that, lately, I've been wanting to get to it more than I have previously.

I realize that I've left you, dear reader, high and dry all year.  All of these movies have been coming out and I have neglected to bestow upon the internet's humble masses my thoughts and impressions, leaving you all aimless, without hope or direction.

Good thing only about five people read this blog.  Still, I feel sorry for you five.  For my part, I can only offer my sincerest (not really) apologies and promise (not really) to make it up to you.    

But, above all else, I want to urge not to dwell on the past.   Let us move forward.  As Gandhi once said, "I'm tired of apologizing for not updating my blog.  Get over it."    

I've once again returned triumphantly to the world of conveying my opinions via an outdated form of online communication.  This is cause for celebration and should be shouted from the proverbial rooftops...or whatever.

But, before we get to the moving on, the celebration, and the thankful monies sent to my PayPal account, let's talk about the past for a few more minutes.  Like I said, I've taken the better part of a year off.  Aren't you the least bit curious as to what I thought about the movies that came out in that time?  I know I am.

So far, this year has been pretty weak. I've seen exactly two movies that, had I been blogging, would have received four-star reviews.  I'll list them here without going into any detail as they are both very likely to end up on my top ten list this year.  I just wanted to make note of them because few people I know saw either one, even though, in real, non-blog life, I've been recommending them left and right.

Snowpiercer

Boyhood

There are a handful of movies that would have gotten three and half stars from me.  But, you've all seen those already (example: Guardians of the Galaxy).  No need to add further commentary on a year that, so far has mostly been defined by decent, but hardly transcendent big-budget fare.

So what's next for the blog, you ask?  Lots of stuff.

First of all, I saw a movie that many consider to be an Oscar contender the other night.  I'm going to review that right away.  I also plan on digging into the filmography of some great filmmakers and writing some retrospectives on their work.  And, I plan on finally making good on my promises to include more entries under the Random Movie Lists and My Secret Shames categories, all while trying to stay up to date on reviewing the latest movies out there.

In other words, I've set up a pretty ambitious agenda for this blog in the coming weeks and months.  Any bets on whether I make good on it?

My Secret Shames: Reservoir Dogs

I'll admit it, this is a strange movie for me not to have seen.  I'd long known that it was one of the most influential films of the 1990s.  It's been called the greatest independent film ever made and, of course, it was the movie that introduced the world to Quentin Tarantino.

But, it came out in 1992 when I was just 14 years old.  And, unless you were really plugged into industry buzz, you didn't really know that this movie existed until you saw Pulp Fiction, Tarantino's follow-up.  I didn't see that movie until 2000 or so, which meant that I basically missed the bus on seeing Reservoir Dogs in anything resembling a timely fashion.

So, in short, I never saw Reservoir Dogs because I was ignorant and never got around to it.  Sue me.

My Secret Shames: Vertigo

So, yes, up until a couple weeks ago, I had never seen Vertigo, Alfred Hitchcock's most acclaimed piece of work.  I don't have a good excuse, I just never got around to it.  Truth be told, I never had a nagging desire to see it.

That all changed a few weeks back when Sight and Sound magazine released their latest poll, which ranked Vertigo number one.  For those that don't know, Sight and Sound conducts a poll of film critics every ten years to rank the greatest movies of all time.  In the last five polls -- that is since 1952 -- the top spot had been taken by Citizen Kane.  However, this year, Kane was overtaken by Hitchcock.

Needless to say, this had me intrigued.  I immediately decided to make this movie the subject of my inaugural "My Secret Shames" post on this blog.  I know what you're thinking...that's an incredible honor.

How This Blog is Going to Work

Alright, now that we've gotten through the longer-than-anticipated process of revealing my Top Ten List for 2011, I want to lay out my more general plans for this blog going forward.  In general, I see most of my future blog posts falling into a handful of categories.  So, before I get started, I figured I'd lay out what those categories are.

In Theaters -- This should be fairly self explanatory.  When I see a movie in the theater, and if it's still showing in theaters when I get around to writing the review, said review will fall under this category.

Catching Up -- Now that I have both a wife AND a child, there are a number of movies that I don't get to see in the theater.  Reviews of movies that are relatively new to DVD, Blu Ray, or -- more likely in my case -- iTunes will be in this category.

Film Studies 101 -- Over the past week or so, I've decided that I want to have a greater, more academic knowledge of film history and theory.  I've actually looked up several syllabi to various Film Studies courses to see what readings are assigned in those courses and what movies they watch.  I plan to go through some of these readings and movies and reflect on them here.  That'll probably be boring for most of you...deal with it.

Adventures in Netflix -- While many people have dropped Netflix over the last year, I've held onto it, though only for streaming purposes.  I actually enjoy digging through it and finding little movie nuggets that I haven't heard of before or that I haven't thought about in a long time.  Posts about these movies will be categorized as "Adventures in Netflix."

My Secret Shames -- I am pretty big movie geek.  I see a lot of movies.  But, invariably, there are a number of classics and acclaimed films that I haven't gotten around to seeing.  Having not seen movies like Reservoir Dogs and A Clockwork Orange, I feel as though my street cred as a movie obsessive is sometimes in jeopardy.  So, my efforts to catch up and reflect on these movies will be recounted in this category.


On Second Thought -- Another thing I'd like to do occasionally is sit down and re-watch a movie I used to really love -- or even a movie I used to really hate -- but that I haven't seen in quite some time.  As with most people, movies tend to evolve in my mind.  There are quite a few that I wonder if I'd still feel the same about if I watched them again.

 Random Movie Lists -- And, of course, we can't leave out the occasional random movie list.  Every geek feels the compulsion to sit and rank his favorite pop culture items, and I'm no different.  So, every week or so, I'll pick a category and list my Top 5 or Top 10 in that category.  I welcome any and all suggestions for these categories.