Happy New Year Post

Happy New Year's everybody! Guess we're glad to see 2020 go. But a word of warning: remember 2016 when "everyone" (Prince, Bowie, Carrie Fisher, ...) was dying? How much better was 2017? 

Considering we spent most of the year on some sort of COVID-19 lockdown, you'd think I'd have more to say about the movies we watched. I wrote more blog posts this year than any year previously, but not because I saw a lot more movies. I had to work from home, so I was not lying around watching movies every night. My company forced us to burn a lot of vacation time, so we did watch a few more than usual, but those mostly came from my own collection or from streaming - and I don't blog those.

As for themes, I'm not sure there was one. We watched three grown-up game-night-type movies: Ready or Not, Tag, and Game Night. Since we are not big gamers, I don't know why. These were very different movies, that's about all I can say about them as a group.

For superhero movies, usually a staple, we started and ended with X-Men: X-Men: Dark Phoenix to The New Mutants. These were critical bombs, but I liked them. I think I know why - I already had an emotional investment in these characters from the comics. I think that is a valid way to enjoy a movie, but maybe not how to make an artistic statement. Other than that, there was Spider-Man: Far from Home. There may have been some indie superhero movies in there, but nothing big. Waiting for next year.

We watched a lot of horror (for Ms. S), mostly on the mild side (for me). A couple of haunted house movies where the protagonists turned out to be the ghosts, a lot of zombie movies (comic and otherwise), and just some random movies that looked good. Not many stand out. Leigh Whannel's Invisible Man did stand out. I think it had the best combination of story and looks out of all the horror we saw, even including Parasite. I also liked Fantasy Island, although I wouldn't recommend for anyone else's year end list.

Between Emma. and Little Women, I got a pleasant dose of costume family drama. I might even put Little Women as my #1 of the year. 

But, as every year, my #1 movie is Bringing Up Baby. We didn't watch it this year, but I'm sure that wouldn't change my mind. Sometimes I think I should chose a Marx Bros. movie, but there are too many to choose from, which dilutes the voting. We watched Duck Soup and Horse Feathers along with some Three Stooges for New Year's Eve, as is traditional.

As for cocktails, I may have to withdraw from that part of this blog. I've just gotten too boring, always with the margaritas. For New Year's I tried a few things: I had high hopes for a passionfruit-Maraschino champagne cocktail. The bright citrus of the passionfruit was supposed to be brought out by the dark, sweet Luxardo Maraschino. But instead, it tasted kind of muddy. I had better luck with sour cherry syrup (from a jar of cherries for a pie) and Maraschino with bubbly. The dark red color is to be interpreted in the Asian way (celebration, luck), not the Western way (blood, danger). 

As for where this blog, and our movie watching, is heading, I don't know. Sometimes, I think about giving it up - I have ~0 readers and blogs aren't much of a thing anymore. Also, the old 3-discs a week routine is giving way to more streaming (most of which I don't blog). So maybe I'll resolve to blog more streaming content. Or maybe not - I've got a formula, and maybe I'll stick to it.

In conclusion, regardless of what I said in the opening, I expect 2021 to be a lot better than 2020. Not just because of a sane president and widespread vaccination. It will be a better year, because we will make it better. That's my resolution.