A film-isophical post worthy of a better pun

I do not look like this.

I think I always wanted to be into film. It always struck me as the area in which geekiness, a quality I am more than capable of exuding, was most commonly accepted. Not just within the enthusiasts, but from outside. Film is engrained in the public consciousness, and experts are, therefore, looked to for approval. I never intended to become one, and still question whether it's fair for anyone to see me as such. However, just over one year ago I made a significant step forward with the purchase of the rather lovely red piece of plastic portrayed to the left. Since then, I have sat through 134 films with mixed success.

My favourite film, without a doubt, was The Muppets. An exuberant celebration of the human capacity to smile, it's a near-perfect example of how to properly execute a kids' film. "Jokes only the adults will get" is an overrated concept- laughs should be universal. The excuse "The kids enjoyed it" is not good enough, everyone should be swept along. I'm not looking for a Christopher Nolan plot, I'm looking for something that works.


While this would make for an easy segway into what films I didn't enjoy, I think one year should be cause for celebration, so I'll confine the 'worst of' to the inside of one pair of brackets (Movie 43, Battleship, Top Cat: The Movie, A Good Day To Die Hard, Seven Days in Havana). I tend to be able to quite easily categorise the films I hand positive ratings to. The Muppets is one of the few films to transend just about every category. Other films quite happy to cross the streams include Bond masterclass Skyfall, child-friendly zombie-fest Paranorman and charm-bucket Moonrise Kingdom. And now for a clumsily added sentence in which I explain that I'm now going to split it off under headings. Yay for headings.

Admiration
When I can tell a film is excellently made, it goes under this category. Often, these don't engage me in quite the way I'd like, yet I have no choice but to score them highly as they're such well-built things. Zero Dark Thirty is the best film of 2013 so far, but it doesn't live with me in the same way Wreck-It Ralph and Robot & Frank do. A lack of engagement does not equal boredom. Zero Dark Thirty is a brilliantly-paced film, real bare-knuckle cinema. It's just I'm a sentimental old fool, and so because I had no reason to cry, I didn't fall for it in quite the same way.

Love
Liberal Arts. Good god, I loved Liberal Arts. It's lovely. It's charming. It's everything I want even if nobody else does. Seeking a Friend For the End of the World got a lukewarm reception amongst the wider critical fraternity. It got shedloads of tears from me. Twice. Beasts of the Southern Wild was amazing in so many respects. I fell for that. Sentiment I think. Well-executed sentiment is the key to this category. Which, actually, isn't an easy thing to do. The Dakota Fanning dying cancer girl film which I've temparerily forgotten the name of -Now Is Good, that was it. Now Is Good- is your perfect example. A little girl with a terminal illness? Lots of heart, courage, love and all that cheesey nonsense? Normally, you'd count me in. However, something seemed to be in the way. It just didn't happen in the same way it did for Seeking a Friend. Draw me in. Make me love you, film. I'll be very, very kind to you.

Excitement
They trailered The Avengers to death. And every single time I saw Iron Man turn the corner, ready to "bring the party to you", I winced. It wasn't going to work. It couldn't possibly work. Yet it did. It worked really well. I really enjoyed it. I got excited. It's like the overlap in the film-admiration venn diagram of the two categories already covered. Skyfall, The Dark Knight Rises, The Hunger Games... The blockbusters that come good. End of Watch stands out as the artier contribution in this esteemed company.

Oh, well done
If I think a movie is exceptional in its field; if it needs plaudits. Pitch Perfect is about the best sing-song film I've ever seen. Looper is a very well put-together time travel movie. End of Watch also hops in here, one of the best cop films you'll come across and almost certainly the best found-footage film. Sometimes I want to champion a movie. This is also found in the 'Love' catgeory. In fact, 'love' is mostly films I want to champion. I want to be Liberal Art's champion. I want to take it and present it to kings who look down their nose at it at first but by the end are writing fan mail to Elizabeth Olsen and changing the bigamy laws, just in case she's interested. That's what I want.

So bad it's good
Self explanatory. Abe Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. Expendables 2. Category is also somewhat loose and so includes things that are good because they AREN'T bad. Storage 24. The Sapphires. None are massive favourites, but all get an upbeat tone of voice from me when it comes to discussing them.

Films are more than welcome to slide between categories. I also don't feel I've correctly pinned down how I enjoy a film. There are surely more ways. There are always more ways. There must be more ways. Never mind. It's irrelevant. That's why I enjoyed some films. Pfft. There's not going to be any more to this than that. I didn't plan article at all. Is it an article? Oh never mind. Living up to the blog's title here. Which is what you want, really.