Welcome to my 2025 film recap. Let's start off with the stats for this year:

I ended up watching 223 new films. Oh my… I watched a lot. I definitely exceeded my ten films per month that I wanted to do. One thing I will note is that in late April I quit my job and was unemployed for the rest of the year so that really helped in reaching my goal. I would like to start off with a list of films that I saw at the cinema.

Dog Man and The Day the Earth Blew Up were both very nice. I have not read any of the Dog Man books, but I do like Dav Pilkey and I loved the Captain Underpants film so I had to go see this. It was very cute and I loved the characters. I did not know that that was how Dog Man was created, what a hilarious origin story. With The Day the Earth Blew Up, you could really tell that the people who worked on it really love Looney Tunes and I just felt it was so well done. I absolutely LOVED Petunia, she is so cute and I thought her characterization was good. I really don't remember her from previous Looney Tunes works so she felt new to me.

I really liked Sinners. I enjoyed the way the vampires were depicted especially the way they can't enter a building without being invited in. The way they used that to have the characters conversing through the doorway and there being this suspense of when the vampires are finally going to be able to break through that barrier. I liked the mixing of themes of racism, music, spirituality through vampirism. I did feel that there were a bit too many ideas going on at once, I felt it could have been somewhat condensed a bit, I particularly did not enjoy the post credits scene. I kinda wish it ended with Sammie going back home to his father's church which was what the film opened with. That's really my only complaint. It really felt like a passion project for Coogler and I'm so glad that this is what he has decided to do which his Marvel money. I am very anti MCU, but I'm glad it's given him recognition and a better outlet to do what he wants. Also, Michael B. Jordan was soooo good in this film and he was so hot as a vampire. I can't believe that this was the first film Miles Caton had ever been in. He was so good as Sammie, I hope he continues acting. I love when production companies take chances with their films and hire unknowns. This reminds me a lot of Carlos Diehz who played Cardinal Benitez in Conclave, that was his first major film role and he was absolutely stunning in it.

Mickey 17 was so disappointing. It was incredibly boring for a Bong Joon-ho film. It just kept going on and on with nothing really happening. Mark Ruffalo was very distracting. Sometimes he would do this Trump affectation which really took me out of it. I understand drawing influence from Trump since he's a more modern example of the type of character that Ruffalo is portraying, but it just made me cringe. It feels that he was caught in that post Oscar win lull. I really hope his next film is a lot better than this. Also, they didn't even get to have the threesome with his girlfriend and his clone so what's the point of it all then?

The Phoenician Scheme was alright. I talk more about my general feelings on Anderson a bit further down so here will be only about the film. First thing we need to get out of the way before we can continue, Benicio del Toro is hot. Now let's get into the meat of it. I felt that the film started off really strong with that first scene and then it slowly tapers off after that. This is something that I mention further down where I talk about Anderson in general is the constant bombardment of information and dialogue. Can we get a slow scene for once? The film was a bit difficult to follow, I really could not keep track of all the characters and exactly what Zsa-Zsa is trying to do. I liked the development of Liesl's character and how her accumulation of gifts from her father gets her kicked out of the convent. I did like the scenes of Zsa-Zsa in heaven, I thought they looked beautiful and those were nice, brief breaks from the constant flow of information and dialogue. I didn't care much for the side characters. There were just too many people. When Benedict Cumberbatch appeared at the end he looked crazy. His makeup was rather distracting. The fight was nice, though. Also, I am surprised that it took so long for Michael Cera to appear in a Wes Anderson film, he really could have been utilized earlier. He's quirky enough for it.

Weapons was okay. I thought it just kept going on and on, they could have condensed it down a little bit. I feel that I am saying this about every film I've seen here... This is becoming too much of a problem in Hollywood these days, unfortunate. I didn't know anything about it beforehand beside being a horror film. I feel I say this often after seeing any horror film, but I wish there were more kills. I want many killings and for them to be in focus. I wanted to see that bashed in face when she visited that gay couple!!! Also I love that we had a gay couple in this. Yay, we can be victims of the killers, too! I did enjoy the ending when the kids tore apart Gladys, I thought it was really funny. I didn't even realize it written and directed by Zach Cregger. It's interesting when comedy guys end up making horror films. I did not see Barbarian (2022), but I did watch a review of it so I know what it is about, I might watch it eventually.

Frankenstein was alright. Sorry to Guillermo Del Toro, but I just did not care about all that backstory. This is a similar issue I had with his Pinocchio where he adds all this backstory that I felt really was not needed. I don't want an explanation for why Frankenstein is the way he is, I don't want an explanation for why Geppetto has decided to make a puppet, I just want them to do the thing. I really wished they shown more of Frankenstein gathering up body parts and putting them together. Del Toro is good with gore so I was hoping for more disgusting scenes and I wanted it to be more uncomfortable to watch. I did like the second half with the Creature's perspective. I absolutely love the part with the blind man and the way the Creature experiences kindness and warmth for the first time. It's a lot better in the book and it's beautifully done in the Bride of Frankenstein (1935), but it was done well in this film, too. I did like the Creature's pursuit of Frankenstein and their fight with each other. I haven't read the book in years and I don't remember that much from it so I can not say how similar it is to that.

Bugonia was a bit bland for a Lanthimos film, but the last ten minutes were good. I've only seen two other films of his, Poor Things (2023) and The Lobster (2015) so maybe this feels like a typical film of his, but I wanted it to be more weird. Whilst watching it, I was a bit unsure if Emma Stone's character was actually an alien or not. Is Plemons' character just crazy or is this real? Luckily she was an actual alien. One thing I want to point out is Aidan Delbis' performance in this film. I am soooo happy to see an actually autistic actor playing an autistic character. He felt so much like my friends and other autistic people I know and didn't feel like a stereotype. I did not know this was a remake of another film, I just went to see it because it's Lanthimos. I also was not aware of it being shot on 35mm film and it made me happy to see that it was in 4:3 aspect ratio and it stayed that way for the entire film. I did watch the original film, Save the Green Planet (2003), which I did enjoy a lot. They are very similar, but still quite different. The original has a detective plotline in it which the Lanthimos one did lack. I would recommend watching both.

Freakier Friday was not good. I did not rewatch Freaky Friday (2003) before going to see it, but I did watch it months after. I don't even know why I went to see this, I really don't care for Disney films and I don't care for teen films like this. I felt it was pretty boring. There was only one scene in particular that made me laugh which was when they went to see Jake and Harper who was in Anna's body was trying to flirt with him. It did have some old vs young humour that I particularly don't like, but the first film had that too. I tried to approach it from the mind of a modern day teenage girl and how she would think of it. It still wasn't very good. I also did pay attention to the audience and how they reacted. I did hear some laughs, but really not enough. There is one scene in particular that I want to comment on is when Lohan's character, Anna, is at her daughter's high school and she bumps into Manny Jacinto's character, Eric. She has her phone flash light on and he points it out to her and she's like "oh haha I don't know how these things work." That felt very unbelievable to me, I can not imagine Lohan's character being like that, she's not old enough to have this problem. Also, there was just a kid at the high school who was dressed as a mime.

My major issue with this film is that you really do not see enough of the two actresses who play the teen daughters. I understand that since they switch bodies you would see more of the mother and grandmother because the teen daughters are inside of them and they're the ones who mostly change over the course of the film and most of their development takes place whilst they're in the bodies of the older women and it's a reprise for Curtis and Lohan so we must see more of them. I don't know if I described that clear enough... it's a bit confusing. I just want the newer talent to have their time in the light. I also felt some of the character development could have been a lot better. I think they could have come to their conclusions in a different way. I did feel that Lily's character was a bit pushed off to the side. I think it would have worked better if it were just Lily, Harper, and Anna switching bodies. I really do not think Tess had that much important character development to make. This is one of those rare times where I am quite confident I could have written a better script for this. I would put this near the bottom of my nostalgia bait sequel rankings. One thing that I do commend the film for is that the love interest is actually attractive. I get so annoyed whenever I'm watching some romcom and the guy is not cute.

My next nostalgia bait sequel is This is Spinal Tap II. I did watch the original again before going to see this, I forgot I had it on tape so learning about the sequel inspired me to pop it out again. This film really could have been better. It did feel like all the other nostalgia bait sequels I've seen, but it actually had funny jokes in it unlike the other films. It had too many of the same tropes like the breaking up and getting back together, an audition montage, jokes with technology, a cryptocurrency joke, and too many celebrity cameos.

The jokes worked best when the entire band were together talking. I wish there were more scenes of that. The individual interviews were a bit bland except for a few parts especially when the director talks to Nigel. His cheese shop really reminded me of Alex James and his love for cheese. I also loved him accumulating more guitar pedals over time and how incredibly annoying they ended up being. There are really funny jokes in this film, but it really isn't the same as the first film. It doesn't feel like a parody of the aging rock star and it documenting their reunion, it feels like a scripted film. There is some editing in it that kind of takes you out of the mockumentary aspect of it especially with that annoying audition montage. Another issue with it is that it is way too high budget looking. The appeal of the first film is the low budget aspect of it, it looks a lot more like a cheap documentary. I understand that within the universe the director has probably made a name for himself over the years and can afford having a larger crew and better cameras, but it just wasn't that good.

Let's get into the few older films I went to see. The only one I had seen before was Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990). It's one of my favorite films from my childhood so I just had to go see it at the cinema. Raphael is my favorite turtle! I really like Sunset Boulevard (1950). I knew nothing about it at all beside it being old and I love old films so I went to see it. It was very beautifully shot and had very good pacing. Gloria Swanson was absolutely perfect in it. This year I had seen a few other films revolving around an aging actor who is past their prime and them having to work around that. It's a very interesting concept and I will talk about that later down the page.

Since I was going through all the Godzilla films and they brought back Shin Godzilla (2016) to theaters for a bit I had to go see it. There was an interesting political aspect of it that was quite intriguing. In other Godzilla films I am not that interested in what the humans are doing, but this was worth really paying attention to. Godzilla ends up killing the prime minister and some of his close comrades at some point so they had to hastily fill up that role with someone else. I really loved Godzilla's different forms, it went a lot more into his regeneration skills. One thing in particular I loved about this iteration of Godzilla was how incredibly powerful he was. This film felt like it went back to basics where there really is no way in controlling this creature or influencing it, he is just doing what he wants to do.

Re-Animator (1985) I was hesitant to see because it is so beloved by so many white trans men that I just don't want to fit the stereotype. The fandom also has a blatant misogyny issue (all fandoms have this issue though) so it just turned me off from the film. Megan did absolutely nothing wrong in the film and she acted a completely normal way one would act when her boyfriend's roommate turned her father into some sort of zombie. The film was quite good and it was nice and concise.

I have a friend who really likes Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) so I had to go see it. I had seen the 2003 remake before and that was complete ass. After having seen the original I understood the changes they made within the remake, but it was still really bad. I was surprised by how quick the kills were and how a lot of nothing goes on. I felt I had already seen the entire film through gif sets on Tumblr. I still liked it though. I did watch the second film months later at home, it was a lot more of what I wanted within a slasher. It had a very different atmosphere than the first and I really enjoyed the Sawyer family dynamic. I absolutely loved the little shimmy that Bubba does sometimes.

Next I would like to get into some directors, actors, and series that I watched. I finished off John Waters. I would say that Polyester (1981) definitely is his best. I think it's a perfect blend of his earlier work and his later work. It has all the weird dialogue and crazy situations with characters who have the oddest problems, but it doesn't have the music montages of his earlier work where something else could have easily been there instead. It's consistent with the story and doesn't have those lulls.

I purchased the Essential Fellini set from Criterion so I watched it this year. First film I saw of his years ago was La voce della luna (1990) since I got into Roberto Benigni so it's interesting seeing his last film first and then going back to the beginning since it takes awhile for him to get to what we would consider as "classic Fellini." As you go in order you can see where some of his tropes are slowly developing and I don't think you truly reach his peak until you get to maybe with 8 ½ (1963) but I would say that Giulietta degli spiriti (1965) is the definitive Fellini. His films look absolutely gorgeous. I was supposed to watch everything else that wasn't on this set afterwards, but I never did that... I will try to next year.

As I was going through my Fellini set I needed some sort of foil, something within English that I could easily plow through that isn't the artsy Fellini especially on days where I didn't really feel like paying attention so I decided upon Mel Brooks. I had already seen Blazing Saddles (1974), Young Frankenstein (1974), Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993), and Spaceballs (1987) with the last being the one I have seen the most since the DVD I have of it is from my childhood. Brooks is very good at parodies and within his films you can tell that he really adores and admires the work that he is parodying and actually knows the original work well. When watching my Frankenstein set I noticed many things from it that appear in Young Frankenstein which made the films much more fun to watch because now I know where certain characters and jokes stem from. Even with Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995), despite it not being that good, you can tell that he's read the book and seen the films.

My favorite out of his work would be Silent Movie (1976). I loved the three main characters of Brooks, Dom DeLuise, and Marty Feldman. I'm a big fan of visual gags and I loved all of the sound effects used. The best scene is the one with Liza Minelli at the food court where they are all dressed as knights and are trying so hard to sit down at the table with her but they keep falling over. I would recommend this one the most out of all of his films.

I want to talk about The Producers (1967) specifically. There is one major issue I have with the film is that it takes so long for them to finally start producing the show and you don't really see much production of it either. They agree to the con, they find the script and get the rights to it from the writer, they find the director, they find the lead actor, and then it goes straight to opening night. I thought you'd see more of them working on the play before it opens. I understand wanting to keep some of it secret so "Springtime for Hitler" can be a big surprise, but a lot of it felt so dragged out. The musical movie did not improve on this issue and only exacerbated it. I felt Nathan Lane was absolutely perfect as the lead and I felt that Will Ferrell was pretty good as the German writer, but Matthew Broderick was just awful. At least he's a decent singer. I liked the added gay jokes in the musical and I didn't mind the director standing in as Hitler, I thought that was an interesting change and did more for his character. The rest of the film I really did not like and I don't think if I saw a stage production of it I would enjoy it.

I was thinking about other potential directors I could finish off even if I don't particularly like them very much so I ended up with Wes Anderson since he had another film coming out. I stopped at The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014) so I hadn't much to watch. There is just something off with his films. I noticed this past Isle of Dogs (2018) where the coloring looks bad especially when they're outside. It's most apparent in Asteroid City (2023) where everything is bright but the shadows are still incredibly grey which just washes out the color completely. I see this problem within a lot of modern film where the shadows are NEVER black for some reason, are filmmakers afraid of contrast? I didn't watch any of his older films again to see if they have those issues but I don't remember them being like that.

Another issue I have with all of the films past Isle of Dogs is the constant dialogue. I know he loves a narrator, but can we please slow down a bit? I need some room to breathe and process what has been said. When I went to see The Phoenician Scheme I was surrounded by old people and I overheard one of them say that they couldn't keep up with all of the information. I didn't mind the constant dialogue in Henry Sugar (2024) since all of those stories are Roald Dahl writings so the narration fit well with it. I loved how he did The Swan in that, I think it was the best one out of those four stories. Last issue I have with his films is that there are just too many people. He continues to adopt actors and it feels like since he has added another actor to his litter he has to incorporate them into his next film somehow even if makes everything feel so cramped.

After all of that negativity, I feel I should say some positive things about his work. I do enjoy him working in black and white and playing around with aspect ratios, I do think he should make an entire film in black and white because those parts look really beautiful in his films. I also really liked the animated parts in The French Dispatch (2021). I was quite surprised by them and I feel he should do that more within his live action work. I did like the stop motion alien in Asteroid City too. One other thing is that a lot of his films don't seem to take place in modern day which I am thankful for because I really can not stand cell phones in film and I just can not stand seeing modern day technology in general. I think I am just so used to watching old films that certain things feel out of place to me when I watch something newer. Even if I don't like Wes Anderson that much I am still glad that there is someone within mainstream cinema who is doing something different than the rest that actually has thought put into it to counteract the constant soulless slop from these companies. I just wish we had more people who did the same thing. Is it too late for another person like Anderson to come about into the mainstream? Anderson has been able to continue making films like these because he has already cultivated a name for himself. Is this able to happen again now? We will just have to wait and see.

I've been purchasing a lot of DVDs and with a Barnes and Noble in the same shopping center as the cinema I walk to I tend to go home with a few in hand. Universal has some DVD sets for each of their monsters so I picked up the Frankenstein one. I should probably purchase the whole monster set at some point because I am rather intrigued by some of the other monsters showcased within the Frankenstein set especially the Wolf Man. I did watch the original once and didn't care for it, but his characterization was rather interesting to me in the films he appears in on this set.

So let's get to Frankenstein. When I first got this set I kept watching The Bride of Frankenstein (1935) over and over again. It is so amazing and I loved what they did with the Monster in it. You can really feel his emotions and you can tell that there is just so much going on inside him that he can't properly express. The part where he meets the blind man and feels love and care for the first time is just so beautiful. I also really love the scene where the Monster meets Pretorius and learns that he wants to create a friend for him. The Monster is so hopeful, but everything goes awry in the end when the Bride rejects him. This film is just perfect and is definitely the best out of the whole set. I really liked the actress they had for Elizabeth in this one, I thought she was a lot better than the actress in the previous film. I was surprised by how consistent the films were with the next starting off where they ended before or having an explanation of what happened in between films. It's not exact, but if the Monster was encased in ice at the end of a film then in the next film they're thawing him out.

I purchased the Godzilla set from Criterion which is all of the Showa era films. I had seen a few of them before with one being King Kong vs Godzilla (1963) so it surprised me that there are only two serious films until they got to the silly stuff. I loved all of the miniatures and all of the fight scenes. The films do get rather repetitive and the stories themselves don't matter that much. I did notice that they reused a lot of actors so it was nice to see them play different parts. I would say out of that era that Godzilla vs Hedorah (1971) is the best. It has the goofy fight scenes that you'd see in the 60s and 70s films, but it has a political aspect to it that was only present within the first two Godzilla films. The antipollution message is quite apparent in the film and it makes Hedorah a more interesting monster than the previous monsters. He's incredibly powerful and really scary. Pollution is his main source of life so as more pollution is created he gets stronger. Some parts of the film are also pretty artsy which weren't there in the previous 60s films. Godzilla vs Megalon (1973) had a good fight scene at the end with Godzilla and Jet Jaguar fighting against Megalon and Gigan.

I watched all of the rest online. I really liked the Heisei era and I absolutely loved Miki Saegusa. She is such a good character and I am glad to see a female character in the forefront. If I were a little girl at the time I would have loved Miki and would loved to be her. She had some great outfits in these films. I liked this introduction of people who are able to connect with Godzilla in a psychic way and Miki helping out those who have this ability. I did like them introducing another miniature Godzilla, I thought Baby Godzilla was so cute, I also thought Minilla was cute.

The Millennium era had many funny moments in it. Godzilla: Final Wars (2004) was absolutely crazy. That American character was funny as fuck. I love seeing how they portray Americans in foreign films, always loud and always throwing out these stupid one-liners. With that film they introduce this mutant race that really made me think of X-Men. Some of the films within this era seemed to have influences from recent films like X-Men, the Matrix, and Jurassic Park. I hope I am not alone in seeing this. They are fun like some of the films during the Showa era, but I don't feel they really added anything interesting to the entire Godzilla series.

I already said before that I did like Shin Godzilla and Godzilla Minus One. I did not care for those three animated films from Netflix. I wasn't interested in any of the characters, I just want the monsters. Speaking of monsters, I did catch up with the Monsterverse which also made me watch the King Kong films from the 70s and 80s. The only film I had seen before within this series was the first Godzilla one. I really do not care for this films, but I like seeing Godzilla. I felt that the film from 2014 was the best one within the series and Kong: Skull Island was pretty decent. I like that they're not afraid to kill off characters. There were some nice deaths within the first Kong film.

So the year prior I got a copy of A Night at the Opera (1935) in which half of the disc did not work so I had to watch the rest of it online. I absolutely loved that film and didn't get back into the Marx Brothers until this year. I found a VHS copy of Love Happy (1950) (along with a copy of Copacabana (1947) which I probably won't talk about here) and it surprised me a bit. Groucho is barely in it and it's rather bland. Within watching these two films I saw the repetition of there being a scene of Chico on piano and a scene of Harpo on the harp.

I purchased this Marx Brothers DVD set at Barnes and Noble (Universal discs were half off at the time) and then learned I should get the Blu-Ray version of it because it has an uncut version of Animal Crackers (1930) on it (I did buy it, don't worry). This set is of their first five films and they were so different from the two films of theirs I've seen before it. They all seem a bit more creepy especially with Harpo constantly chasing a woman. I absolutely loved all of these films though. It's difficult to say which is my favorite out of those five, a lot of the time I view someone's work as a complete set and I can't really pick something as my favorite even though I've been doing that for all of the other people I've been talking about on this page... but if you ever talk to me about the Muppet movies or Jacques Tati or Roberto Benigni I just view all of it as a whole instead of individual items. When I saw A Night at the Opera I thought Groucho was rather annoying but he's grown on me. I know when I was talking about Wes Anderson I was complaining about all of the dialogue, but it works well here since it's only Groucho constantly talking and it helps that he is actually funny. I also didn't get Chico at first because he's just Italian but whilst going through this set I understood his character better. He's the bridge between Groucho and Harpo and his being not a native English speaker (although it is implied in some films that he is faking being Italian) leans into all of this word play with his misunderstanding of what was said to him. Chico does to Groucho what Groucho does to others, he's the only one that can trip him up.

I did buy the DVD set of the MGM films. They aren't as good as the Paramount pictures, but I still enjoyed all of them. I learned there that this DVD release of A Night of the Opera just does not work because it stopped at the same moment as the previous disc I had. I did purchase a Bluray copy of it and I also got a Bluray copy of Love Happy since apparently the tape version is shorter. I will develop a page for the Marx Brothers eventually since I have been writing down my thoughts and opinions on all the films. I will link it here once it has been created.

I watched a few Sidney Poitier films. I first watched Uptown Saturday Night (1974), Let's Do It Again (1975), and A Piece of the Action (1977) since they were recommended to me on YouTube. I did know him as an old Hollywood actor (or I guess more like later old Hollywood) so it was interesting to see him first here before I saw any of the actual films that he's most known for. The first two were good, I really liked seeing Richard Pryor in the first one, but the third one I really did not care for that much. I can't stand films where it's someone trying to help a group of inner city kids, I just don't care. I'm always on the side of the kids even if being on their side hurts them even more.

All of the other films I saw were Blackboard Jungle (1955), A Man is Ten Feet Tall (1955), Edge of the City (1957), The Defiant Ones (1958), A Raisin in the Sun (1961), Paris Blues (1961), Pressure Point (1962), Lilies of the Field (1963), A Patch of Blue (1965), To Sir, With Love (1967), In the Heat of the Night (1967), Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967), For Love of Ivy (1968), They Call Me Mister Tibbs! (1970), The Organization (1971), and Sneakers (1992). I might watch more later, but the rest just do not seem interesting at all. I did read two of Poitier's books, This Life (1980) and Measure of a Man (2000). I also read another book about him called Sidney Poitier: Man, Actor, Icon (2004) written by Aram Goudsouzian. I read the Measure of a Man first and it wasn't really what I was looking for, I don't think you really need to read that one if you're interested in Poitier. I did enjoy This Life and it's amazing how much confidence this man has. I was hoping for him to talk more about his films, but autobiographies really aren't for that. I wish more actors and others in film would create something that reflects upon their life's work. I really want to hear their opinions on the films they've worked on especially when it's decades later.

The best film within all of these is A Raisin in the Sun. I liked the family dynamic, all of these characters felt realistic and you could really sympathize with all of them. I really liked the sister, she reminded me of many people I've met over the years and I could really relate to her ever changing hobbies that she doesn't really commit to. I also loved that it mostly took place in one area. I know that they were worried about it looking too much like a stage production so they had a two other settings besides the apartment, but I wish it only the apartment that we see. Within this film I just felt like Poitier had an actually dynamic character with flaws and problems, you don't see this within his other films where he has to act as a representative of the black race within the sea of white people. I really wish he was able to do more things like this within his career, but racism prevailed.

I absolutely loved him in Paris Blues and I wish he was more of a romantic lead. It has been awhile since I really felt the love between two leads in a romance. I am curious to know how the film would have been if they kept in the original idea of having an interracial romance. Some of that idea was left in the final script since it seemed that Paul Newman's character was interested in Diahann Carroll's character at first, but of course we need to put the two characters of the same races together instead. The score for the film was really good. Of course they went with a jazz score since the film is about jazz, but I feel this is a great example of how more films should use jazz musicians. One thing about the film is that I felt it was a bit hard to believe Newman and Poitier as established jazz musicians especially when Louis Armstrong comes in and they play with him. I don't know if either of these actors have any musical knowledge so maybe I shouldn't be too critical, but it never looked like Newman was actually blowing into his trombone (I typed this out before reading Poitier's autobiography and learnt that Newman actually learned to play his instrument and Poitier, with being incredibly tone-deaf, could not make a pleasant sound on the saxophone despite trying his best).

The discussion of racial issues between Poitier and Carroll's characters seemed off. I feel that Carroll's character would have better understood as to why Poitier's character stays in France and any time they have this conversation about race relations in the United States versus France they never seem to take into account the other person's opinion. They just seem very stagnant. Of course, Poitier's character changes his mind in the end since he wants to be with Carroll's character, but he's still hesitant about it. It's one of these things where it feels like a white person's understanding of race and the black experience. I haven't read the book so I don't know how the story develops there.

Speaking of white people writing about racial issues, I have to talk about Guess Who's Coming to Dinner. This film annoyed me a lot! I can't believe they were going through all that after having known each other for only ten days. One thing mentioned in Goudsouzian's book that I didn't even think about whilst watching it is that why would a grown man with the immense credentials that he has go for a young woman with barely any experience? Would he not look for someone more equal to him especially after his wife and son being killed in a plane accident? Beforehand I knew the film was about an interracial couple introducing each other to their parents, but all the other specifics make the film much worse. I feel this could have been way better even for a film from the 1960s. I dislike the fact that Tillie, the black maid of the white family, is the most vocal about her prejudices and that the black father is the only one who didn't give his approval of the marriage at the end. There are parts of it that I do like with the white family being liberal and having to actually face their ideals. This is what I liked about the priest being the one who points out how surprising it is for the white father to be hesitant about the marriage despite being so liberal. Sometimes the white liberal will only listen to another white liberal. There's so much more I could say about this film, but I will keep it to this.

Let me briefly talk about all the other films I mentioned. Blackboard Jungle was pretty good, it's interesting to read about the release of the film and how much backlash it caused. I felt like I had never seen such a diverse classroom in an older film before. All of the actors who played the teenagers were great. It still has the plot of teacher helping inner city kids that I don't really like, but this one isn't as annoying as most films within that genre. Edge of the City could have been better. I liked Poitier's character in it, it felt like the start of his nice guy helping the white lead trope that you see in all of his other films. Well, sometimes he isn't nice, but oftentimes he is helping the white lead. I did like The Defiant Ones, it was weirdly homoerotic and I did enjoy the plot. I was pleasantly surprised to see Lon Chaney Jr in it. Pressure Point had some interesting direction in it, I liked a bit of the story also.

Lilies of the Field, A Patch of Blue, and To Sir, with Love are so bland. They all felt like something that could be made today. They're all nice guy helps out some white people. Of course, all the actors were good in their respective roles, it's just that the writing could have been better. For Love of Ivy kind of felt like a response to the criticism that Poitier has been getting over the years. At least he gets be a romantic lead in it. In the Heat of the Night was great. The sequels not so much. It does have the issue of him helping out white people, but it's a lot better than the previous iterations of that. In the previous year I mentioned Anthony James being a standout actor within a series of films I watched so it was nice to see him here, he plays a creepy guy very well. I don't know why I watched Sneakers. I saw a picture of it online and was like "Poitier with Dan Aykroyd and Robert Redford? Huh?"

During the second half of the year I was watching a lot of films on YouTube and ended up watching all of Roger Corman's Edgar Allan Poe films. My favorite out of those eight films was The Masque of the Red Death (1964). They all had interesting set designs and costumes, but this one in particular really stuck out with its use of color. I watched a few other films starring Vincent Price outside of this set of films which were The Story of Mankind (1957), House on Haunted Hill (1959), The Bat (1959), The Comedy of Terrors (1963), Theatre of Blood (1973), and Madhouse (1974). I absolutely loved Theatre of Blood, it's one of my favorite new watches of the year. I have to watch more films that he's in. He has a lovely voice. I also need to watch more that Boris Karloff is in.

Allow me to name various films I watched throughout the year that aren't in any sets like the previous ones. I absolutely loved 12 Angry Men (1957). Beautifully written and anytime I watch another film with one of the actors in it I go "that's juror number whatever!" I watched Vertigo (1958) which ended up being my favorite Hitchcock film out of the ones I've seen so far. It was interesting watching that film after seeing High Anxiety (1977), I now understood some of the references. I also watched Rope (1948) for the first time which I really loved. I enjoyed the camera work of it. All of the other films of Hitchcock's I've seen so far are Rear Window (1954), The Birds (1963), and North By Northwest (1959).

Vampire Circus (1972) was a dream come true for me. I love vampires and I love the circus. I do wish it was a bit more sexual. Some other vampire films I watched were Blacula (1972) and Scream Blacula Scream (1973) with the latter surprisingly being scored by Bill Marx! The sequel I felt had more of the blaxploitation archetypes, the first one was more calm. I felt he had an interesting death in both of them. The Court Jester (1956) was very funny and I really enjoyed the sets and costumes. I really loved The Fuller Brush Girl (1950). I always loved Lucille Ball, but I had never seen anything she was in outside of I Love Lucy. Smiley Face (2007) I absolutely loved. I usually dislike stoner humour, but this one wasn't annoying like others are. I haven't seen any other film from Gregg Araki, but he has been on my list of directors to check out for years. I really enjoyed The Brady Bunch Movie (1995) despite never having seen an episode of the show. You don't need any previous knowledge to enjoy it. I still have to watch the sequel.

I read Watership Down for the first time so I watched the 1978 film afterwards. It wasn't as bloody and gruesome as I thought it was going to be. I was hoping for more action. The film condenses it down the most practical way one would think to condense the story. There weren't many animated films that I watched. I saw a few Ralph Bakshi films like American Pop (1981) and Cool World (1992). The only film of his that I had seen before was his 1978 adaptation of Lord of the Rings. It's a film from my childhood so I have seen it many times. I did like American Pop, it had the rotoscoping that I was most familiar with from Bakshi. Cool World had a very good blend of live action and animation, but the story was rather bland. I still liked it, though.

I know this is supposed to be about film, but the one TV show I watched was Peep Show. I never really watch television shows, but this one was forced upon me by my brother. I liked it a lot, thought it was very funny. I like that Mark and Jeremy are both incredibly awful people. Sometimes it's a bit frustrating that these men choose to act this way. I really loved Hans and I just wished that Sophie had a better life.

There is so much more that I watched, but I will end it for now. Let's go over my goals from the previous year and see if I reached them. I did finish off John Waters, Mel Brooks, and the Marx Brothers. I did not watch anything else from Buster Keaton and only watched three silent films. I have finished off all the discs I've purchased, I just have some television discs to watch. I barely touched my little note card with films written on it, I need to keep that on my mind whenever I sit down to watch something. I very much exceeded my ten films per month goal, I was very close to even doubling it.

For 2026 I am not so sure what I want to do. I still need to finish Fellini and I have been thinking about other directors to finish off. I have been thinking about finishing off Bakshi, getting into Araki, finishing off Bong Joon Ho since I had not seen anything of his before Snowpiercer, maybe I'll do more of Lynch, Cronenberg (I've only seen Videodrome from him), Jarmusch, and I don't know who else.

One thing that I know I want to do is watch all the solo films that each Marx brother is in. I have seen most of them, but I know there are a few with Groucho in them that I haven't touched yet. I also would like to watch some films that Susan Fleming is in, she was the wife of Harpo. I would also like to watch all the films that Nicoletta Braschi is in outside of her husband's work. The only one I have seen so far is Mystery Train (1989). I'm sure I will just end up watching old comedies with Cary Grant or whoever the fuck else like I usually do. I do want to watch more with Lucille Ball in it since she is one of the funniest people to ever exist. We shall see what happens. If you have any recommendations then please send them my way. They shall be automatically placed as main priority.