I am slowly coming out of vacation mode and it’s not easy. Christmas and New Year’s need to happen on Thursday every year because it really makes taking time off very easy while still allowing time to do a little work here and there. My first press screening of 2015 is still yet to happen as there wasn’t a screening of Woman in Black 2 scheduled and I have yet to receive an invite to see Taken 3. The first film I’m scheduled to see is Paddington on Saturday, but there’s a little thing called a Seahawks game at the exact same time and I don’t think Paddington will be interfering with that.
With that, the first movie I actually watched in 2015 was Jacques Tati‘s Mr. Hulot’s Holiday as part of the Criterion Collection set I received for Christmas. It wasn’t, however, the first film I watched this week as Tati’s Jour de Fete became the last film of 2014 I watched. I’d seen Hulot’s Holiday before and it’s a wonderful little “laughing quietly to myself” kind of movie, quaint and charming, and this was my first time seeing Jour de Fete, which was similarly comical with one really great gag wherein Tati, playing a small town postman, is trying to deliver the mail on his bicycle “American style” and sticks a letter, more or less, in a horse’s ass. Not necessarily as subtle as most of his humor I’d say.
I’ve just started going through this Tati set by watching only those two films, but my god there are alternate versions and supplemental material galore. Last year it was Criterion’s Zatoichi collection that kept me busy most of the year and this year it looks like it will be the Tati set.
All that said, the final count for 2014 was 238 movies seen. You can find my complete Letterboxd list of the movies I watched in 2014 right here and I’ve already started my 2015 list. I was personally a little ashamed at only seeing 238 and would really like to make 2015 a year where I not only see at least 365, but review a lot of the movies I watch out of the normal 2015 releases as well as write more Best Movies entries. We all have to have goals right?
[amz asin=”B000FCKM7E” size=”small”]Otherwise, I also read a book I got for Christmas this week, “The Professor and the Madman” by Simon Winchester. It takes a look at the making of the Oxford English Dictionary, primarily focusing on James Murray who was tasked with the massive project and Dr. W. C. Minor who eventually became one of its most impressive contributors, as well as being an insane man living in an asylum. It was a really great and quick read, definitely recommended.
And that does it for me, your turn, have at it in the comments below and Happy New Year!
