Hitchcock | opening thoughts

I never thought much of Hitchcock until I took a class on him in college. Being a horror guy, I'd always thought of suspense as a dull, watered-down version of horror. It was just plain, realistic drama without a werewolf or vampire to be seen. The short, spring term class I took opened my eyes. In the hands of an expert, suspense could generate scenes as interesting to me as anything involving a maniac in a mask.

This is, by far, the largest of my chronocinethons (not counting MST3K, which wasn't a single person's output). I'll be watching 52 movies, alternate versions of 2 of those movies, a variety show, 2 World War II propaganda shorts and 20 television episodes. This comes out to 101 hours of Hitch, which is stored on 58 DVDs hailing from 5 different countries. Not an easy or inexpension set to complete, this was.

This is also one of the few (Leone probably being the only other) directors I'm doing here that would be film snob-approved. Which is a bit of pressure. A lot of really smart folks have written a lot of really smart stuff about Hitchcock over the years. What the hell am I going to write about after watching these films? I suppose I'll find out once I sit down to do it.

Watching some Hitchcock seems like a fun thing to do as the holidays approach. Who knows? If the timing is right, maybe I can convince family members to watch North by Northwest or Strangers on a Train with me.

Guest: Bond, James Bond (opening thoughts)

Happy Birthday. 45 years since the release of the first official entry in the James Bond film series. This calls for consecutive viewing, it does. The way I figure, if it’s good enough for TBS to marathon once a year, it has to be good enough for me, right? Right.

This will be useful, since I have trouble recalling the details of some of the earlier films in the series. Outside of my overall rating, events, characters and plot points bleed together, and I’m not entirely certain what happens in Octopussy; it's quite possible that I have never seen it.

Atonement of this inexcusable laziness consists of purchasing all four volumes of the James Bond series, as well as the separately packaged 21st film, viewing unofficial entries, and resolving not only to watch everything in order but to follow up every film with the corresponding extras on the discs (yes, that includes full-length commentary). I expect to be the nerdy Pai Mei of Bond films after this is all over. If not, I will at least stop getting Bond wrong.

Afterwards, I can tally my intellect with the Bond Scene-It DVD mini-game included in Volumes 1 and 2. It’s the only way I can reconcile the spending of so much money. Second most profitable franchise indeed.

Nobody does it better, eh? Well, we'll see about that.

Tarantino & Rodriguez (opening thoughts)

Free from my year on the SOL and my melted brain having recovered from writing 227 individual posts on that particular subject, I think I'm ready to tackle a "normal" chronocinethon. Or two. It makes sense to do both Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez's films simultaneously. They work together so often and influence each other's work so much, they're essentially cinematic brothers.

Maybe my choice of directors is a bit strange at this time. They both just came out of a high-profile flop a couple of months ago, sending their "stock" in Hollywood to an all-time low. Instead of plowing ahead into the much anticipated Sin City sequel, Rodriguez is now working on a remake that I have next-to-no interest in. Tarantino is seemingly getting nowhere with his next film, which he's been working on for years.

Eh, whatever. I like their films and my amigo C agreed they'd be fun to get into right now. Our next ten or more weekends will be filled with Mexican vampires, botched jewel heists, underage spies and women wielding both swords and witty banter.

The Star Trek 726-athon

I'm going to attempt to watch all 726 episodes of Star Trek in order. As I go, I will post my thoughts here.

Unlike my year-long Mystery Science Theater 3000 project, this marathon will be much more relaxed. I won't have a self-imposed time limit. I'll write as much or as little as I feel like about each episode. I don't think I'll bother with numerical ratings. There won't be any fancy pages collecting title screenshots. Instead, each post with simply have the "star trek" label attached at the bottom.

Why do this? It sounds like fun. I can't think of any other moving-picture universe with this much content (well, other than Doctor Who) and every single episode has been released on easy-to-watch DVD. I'm also curious. It'll be interesting to see the concept mutate over four decades. Will Roddenberry's death effect the show immediately, not at all, or diffusely throughout the years? How many time travel episodes will I have to wade through? Will anything be more ridiculous than "Spock's Brain"?

Starting out, my opinion on each of the series:

TOS, I like. It's colorful, silly and serious, progressive and backward, and there's some damned good stories in it.

Of TAS, I have only vague memories. Watching it as a child, I found it oddly reserved compared to my regular, hyperactive 1980s animation.

I was tuned-in for the premiere of TNG and immediately got into it. It modernized the morality established in TOS, put together a great set of characters and told some more damned good stories. It's recently been rerun on two different channels and I keep finding myself watching it when I flip by.

I've probably seen less than five episodes of DS9. The idea of Trek trapped on a space station never appealed to me. Many say this is the best of all the series and I'm interested in finding out if this is true.

VOY was horrible. Judging from the episodes I've seen, this is apparently where Trek jumped the space-shark. I've got a rant or two built-up already for some episodes. Hopefully, it's not as bad as I remember.

ENT was originally broadcast when Farscape was still on the air. In comparison, I found ENT to be stilted, tired and timid. The idea of moving into Trek's past, instead of pushing further into a hopeful future, rubbed me the wrong way. I never made it past the first season.

All of this adds up to 694 live-action shows, 22 cartoons and 10 movies. This should work out to between 500 and 600 hours of red-shirt-dyin', phasers-on-stunnin', anomaly-encounterin', transporter-accidentin' entertainment. If I make it.

MST3K (opening thoughts)

Tomorrow I begin A Year on the Satellite of Love. In the spirit of Kevin Murphy's book A Year at the Movies, I'm going to watch all of Mystery Science Theater 3000 in the space of twelve months. This will be 194 episodes, 1 movie and 6 specials. That adds up to about 307 hours of my life or 3.5% of my year. I'll need to watch 15 episodes every 4 weeks, which comes out to slightly more than one every other day.

Why start right now? If I keep to my schedule, I will get to 512 by Thanksgiving. "Mitchell" is a perfect episode to force my in-laws to watch with me on Turkey Day. It's also a great episode to celebrate the most high of MST holidays.

I don't remember the first episode of MST3K I ever saw. I didn't watch the Comedy Central episodes regularly. Instead, I'd just happen to catch the show playing late at night and would settle in for a couple hours of solid chuckles. I didn't really become a MiSTie until Rhino began releasing DVDs. Remembering my late night laughs, I grabbed their first two releases (506 and 513) and loved them. When the second wave of Rhino DVDs included the ultra-hilarious "Mitchell", I became hooked. I immediately sought out the movie DVD (buying what was likely the local Media Play's last copy ever) and I began taping and trading episodes from the Sci-Fi Channel.

After years of buying every Rhino release, trading, ordering DVD-Rs online, and downloading DAP releases, I'm about to have a complete set of episodes (Rhino's Volume 9 is in the mail and will end my long collecting journey). I'm looking forward to seeing the dozens and dozens of episodes I've never even laid eyes on.

I'm also interested in getting a sense of the longevity of the humor in MST3K. Based on the seven writers that IMDb has birth years for, the humor of MST3K was written by people born between 1956 and 1964. Boomers, in other words. As such, many of the cultural references they made on the show were created to make people of that generation laugh (themselves, in the writers' room). I fear that -- in addition to the torturous legal issues that will likely prevent the show from ever being rerun on TV -- this referential humor will make the series inaccessible to younger fans. I was born in 1977 and feel like I'm barely able to catch 75% of the cultural references. For people younger than that, it can only get worse. As I watch, I'll be curious track how much of the humor is referential (820: "Man, Sherry Lewis has got it going on!") and how much is pure comedy (820: "Reef Blastbody! Big McLargehuge! Smoke Manmuscle! Roll Fizzlebeef!"). Does MST3K have legs? Will it be funny in the future? Or, when I try to show episodes to my future kids in 2018, will they force me to turn it off? I hope to find out in one year's time.

Gordon-Yuzna (opening thoughts)

What is a chronocinethon? It's just a word I made up to describe when I watch all of someone's films in chronological order. It allows me to marvel at their growth over the years... or lack thereof.

This time, I'm doing a combined chronocinethon: Stuart Gordon and Brian Yuzna simultaneously. It makes sense to me to watch their movies mixed together, since they've worked with each other so often (and it allows me to watch all 3 Re-Animators).

(comment in the main Stuart Gordon post)
(comment in the main Brian Yuzna post)

Coscarelli (opening thoughts)

Chronocinethon? Made up word. It means I watch all of someone's films in chronological order. It allows me to marvel at their growth over the years... or lack thereof.

(comment in the main post)

Barker (opening thoughts)

What the hell's a "chronocinethon"? It's where I watch all of someone's films in chronological order. It allows me to marvel at their growth over the years... or lack thereof. Clive Barker has directed only a handful, but his films will be fun for a couple of weekends.

(comment in the main post)

Verhoeven (opening thoughts)

Santa Claus was generous this year, so I'm ready start my Verhoeven Chronocinethon. What this means is that I'm gonna be watching all of Paul Verhoeven's films in chronological order. As I go through them, I'll post mini-reviews here. It's a couple months of fun for me, anyway.

(comment in the main post)