Alphabetical movie – The Great Race
For anyone out there looking for “classic” movies to show their kids, I give you The Great Race. The movie fulfills the important task of letting kids know they made films prior to Star Wars while also introducing them to important concepts like “Jack Lemmon” and “Tony Curtis.”
Let’s not forget about “Peter Falk.”
Alphabetical Movie – The Green Hornet
Geek though I may be, I’m somewhat limited in my knoweledge of classic geek culture. As a result, I approached the recent Green Hornet film unencumbered by anything more than a cursory foreknowledge of the original character.
As a result, I enjoyed the movie enough to purchase it off the bargain shelf from Target. I don’t think it measures up to the truly fantastic 2011 geek properties like Captain America but it makes me laugh.
I’m not, however, going to use this blog post about The Green Hornet to write about the movie. Instead, I’m going to use it to write about dissappointment and loss and living with the choices you make because, you see, this movie is at the center of a really crappy day in 2010. A crappy day that was entirely my own fault.
Alphabetical Movie – The Great Dictator
Those keeping track at home will note that I actually watched The Great Dictator after watching The Great Escape and alphabetically speaking, that is all wrong.
It is true. All I can say is that I had acquired The Great Dictator a few months ago and forgotten to put it on the list of upcoming films. Fortunately for me, my rigid Alphabetical movie project rules allow me to deal with such errors by simply watching the damn movie slightly out-of-order.
Alphabetical Movie – The Great Escape
With a renewed sense of purpose, I’m moving forward with the Alphabetical movie blog. Today, I’m writing about The Great Escape.
Hello darkness my old friend
I’m way behind on writing up Alphabetical movie blog posts. In fact, the last movie I wrote about was Dodgeball back in June. Yikes!
I’m now most of the way through the G’s so I’m just going to start with where I am and where I am is The Graduate.
Alphabetical Movie Project – The Rules
For archival and linking purposes, this post explains my Alphabetical Movie Project.
What the hell am I doing?
I am watching every movie I own in alphabetical order.
Why the hell am I doing this?
Because there are a bunch of movies that I own on DVD but I’ve never actually watched. Some (very few), I’ve never seen at all. Others I saw once in the movie theatre ten years ago. I figure I ought to get my money’s worth.
What if I’m in the B’s and I really feel like watching The Shawshank Redemption?
Then I will watch The Shawshank Redemption. The project continues basically when I say to myself “I feel like watching a movie.” If I just feel like watching a movie, I’ll watch the next movie in order. If I feel like watching Close Encounters of the Third Kind, I’ll just watch it.
So is it that simple?
Nah. Nothing like this ever is. I have a few clauses.
Clause #1 – The watched it recently clause
If I watched a movie recently (say within a month) and it comes up as the “next” film to watch, I have the option of skipping it. Or I could watch the commentary track. Whatever. I just watched it so I don’t have to force myself to watch it again.
Clause #2 – The Sequel Clause
In the event I’m watching a number of films in a series that do not automatically follow each other alphabetically (the Lord of the Rings trilogy f’rinstance), I will watch them in the proper order. If the order is not particularly important, I shall honor the Alphabetical list.
So, for instance, I will watch The Two Towers prior to The Return of the King in spite of the fact that ROTK precedes TTT alphabetically. However, I would have no problem watching Aliens prior to Alien as I think both films stand on their own.
That example sucks, of course, because the Alien films are already in alphabetical order.
A better example would be Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom vs. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. The stories stand well enough on their own that I don’t really care about watching them in the order they were released.
Clause #3 – The New movies clause
In the event I acquire a movie that I have already passed alphabetically, I will save that movie until I have watched every movie in the currently collection at which point I will start on the Alphabetical Move Project 2.0.
If I acquire a movie that I would not have reached yet, that just gets inserted into the list in the proper order.
Clause #4 – The What I’m watching clause
I’m only watching movies that were released theatrically or were intended to be released theatrically. I’m not watching TV series. I’m not watching documentaries that did not have a theatrical release. If the movie either showed in a theatre or was made with that intent, I’m going to watch it.
How long have I been doing this?
I started the project in October of 2009.
Are you shitting me?
No. I own a crapton of movies.
Why the Hell am I tweeting/posting to Facebook/Blogging while I watch these movies?
Because I want to.
One accepts that social media is never about what someone else wants to read. It is about what the poster wants to write. If you are interested, that is groovy. If you aren’t, you should deal with it and either stop following that person or ignore their posts. Either response is completely valid and should not be viewed as an impeachment on either party.
We all think everything we have to say is really damned interesting. Most of us are wrong.
But where we are correct is in the assumption that it is really interesting to us. I post this crap for me because it interests me.
Grail Diary 