How I Became a Film Snob, part 2: On the Creation of Movie Lists
On Sunday I described my first steps into the exciting world of film snobbery. But when did I start making lists of all the movies I had seen?
At some point in the autumn of 1998 I realized that I had seen so many movies that year that I couldn't remember them all. Fortunately, I've collected ticket stubs since at least junior high so I was able to go through my bag of ticket stubs and reconstruct the list going all the way back to Memorial Day of 1998. I'm know I went to movies in 1998 before that, but CWRUFilm doesn't have ticket stubs and I've never really bothered to go back further. I could, at least partially, but it's one of the projects that will probably never happen and that's fine.
Once I'd done the list for 1998 movies, it seemed natural to keep doing it. I quickly branched out to lists of concerts, plays, sporting events and museums. Originally I just wrote down the movie title, but then I added in the theater so I could tell the$1 movies from the other movies I'd seen. In 2005 I started listing the date as well. Then in 2007 I added books to the mix, and that's where things stand now.
At the time it seemed pretty unusual. My friends were amused by it; they'd never heard of such a thing. It wasn't until many years later that I read one of the great Dr Z's sports columns on CNNSI. Dr. Z had a tendency to ramble off in different directions in his mailbags, and one day he talked about he and a colleague had big books where they wrote down not only the name of the movies they saw, but the directors and actors too. In those pre-internet days, it was the easiest way they had to keep track of things, and sportswriters are big fans of stats anyway. So I was not alone in my oddness, and over the years I found many friends who did something similar.
In any event, the net result is that from Memorial Day of 1998 to today I have added 717 movies to my list. That's 55 movies a year, although some (fewer than 10) were seen twice so it's a little less than that. The first movie on the list is Deep Impact. As of this writing, the last movie is Ran. In between are 715 pieces of cinema history. There are blockbusters, independent films, intimate art films, Academy Award winners, foreign films, animated films, children's films, documentaries, mockumentaries, martial arts movies, comic book movies, musicals and lords knows what else on the list.
So I've been wondering - how well do I actually remember these 700+ movies? Are they just names on the list, or do they trigger strong memories? If I can remember the movie, what do I think of it now, looking back on it? I've decided to find out. It is my intent to start with the first item on my list and to review each of these films in order. Maybe I'll recall some old gems. Maybe I'll encounter the limits of my memory. Maybe I'll just find some terrible movies. We shall see. The tag for this project is 13yl, which stands for 13 Years Later. If I never see another movie that's the material for 13 years of posts at one per week. Hey, a man needs to have goals, right?
Leading Off: Deep Impact
On Deck: U.S. Marshals
In the Hole: The X-Files: Fight the Future
At some point in the autumn of 1998 I realized that I had seen so many movies that year that I couldn't remember them all. Fortunately, I've collected ticket stubs since at least junior high so I was able to go through my bag of ticket stubs and reconstruct the list going all the way back to Memorial Day of 1998. I'm know I went to movies in 1998 before that, but CWRUFilm doesn't have ticket stubs and I've never really bothered to go back further. I could, at least partially, but it's one of the projects that will probably never happen and that's fine.
Once I'd done the list for 1998 movies, it seemed natural to keep doing it. I quickly branched out to lists of concerts, plays, sporting events and museums. Originally I just wrote down the movie title, but then I added in the theater so I could tell the$1 movies from the other movies I'd seen. In 2005 I started listing the date as well. Then in 2007 I added books to the mix, and that's where things stand now.
At the time it seemed pretty unusual. My friends were amused by it; they'd never heard of such a thing. It wasn't until many years later that I read one of the great Dr Z's sports columns on CNNSI. Dr. Z had a tendency to ramble off in different directions in his mailbags, and one day he talked about he and a colleague had big books where they wrote down not only the name of the movies they saw, but the directors and actors too. In those pre-internet days, it was the easiest way they had to keep track of things, and sportswriters are big fans of stats anyway. So I was not alone in my oddness, and over the years I found many friends who did something similar.
In any event, the net result is that from Memorial Day of 1998 to today I have added 717 movies to my list. That's 55 movies a year, although some (fewer than 10) were seen twice so it's a little less than that. The first movie on the list is Deep Impact. As of this writing, the last movie is Ran. In between are 715 pieces of cinema history. There are blockbusters, independent films, intimate art films, Academy Award winners, foreign films, animated films, children's films, documentaries, mockumentaries, martial arts movies, comic book movies, musicals and lords knows what else on the list.
So I've been wondering - how well do I actually remember these 700+ movies? Are they just names on the list, or do they trigger strong memories? If I can remember the movie, what do I think of it now, looking back on it? I've decided to find out. It is my intent to start with the first item on my list and to review each of these films in order. Maybe I'll recall some old gems. Maybe I'll encounter the limits of my memory. Maybe I'll just find some terrible movies. We shall see. The tag for this project is 13yl, which stands for 13 Years Later. If I never see another movie that's the material for 13 years of posts at one per week. Hey, a man needs to have goals, right?
Leading Off: Deep Impact
On Deck: U.S. Marshals
In the Hole: The X-Files: Fight the Future