A Self-Education in Film: Prologue

I know, it's been too long. Four weeks ago, I spent a bit of time expressing my opinion on why Jay Leno's a huge hypocrite. Now, we're days away from his inevitable return, the Olympics are winding down, the sixth and final season of Lost is five hours long, and things have, in general, changed. As they do. In the meantime, and probably thanks to the complete lack of original programming on TV while the Olympics rage on, I've begun to once again excite myself at the prospect of watching more movies. Of course, it helps that I got a chance this past weekend to check out the latest film from Martin Scorsese, Shutter Island. I won't spend more than a sentence or two on that film; suffice to say, it is easily my favorite film the iconic director has made since, at least, The Aviator, and farther back, I'd wager.

I also managed to once again get the taste of watching Criterion Collection movies that I haven't seen. I wish--oh, how I fervently wish it--that I could say I've seen more than my fair share, more than half, more than 75 percent of the Criterion output, but that would be a bald-faced lie. In reading a fair number of blogs over the past week, including usual haunts such as Glenn Kenny's Some Came Running (http://somecamerunning.typepad.com) and Jeffrey Wells' Hollywood Elsewhere (http://www.hollywoodelsewhere.com), I realized that it's all well and good to sit around and read about film, current or otherwise. What good is it to read without context, though?

And so, a project. Or, perhaps, an experiment in my stamina. How long can I keep up at educating myself in film? I call myself a film buff, but in looking on it, I have not seen many, many films, and not just from filmmakers I'm aware of. I've seen Transformers, but I have not seen Seven Samurai (a major crime about to be reversed, as I'm currently looking at my copy from the local library). I've seen Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs, but I have not seen a Hiyao Miyazaki film. I've not seen anything by Godard, Melville, and barely anything by Powell and Pressburger. I want to better myself. I need to, if I want to consider myself anything close to a buff. Amongst my closest friends and family, I'm the king of movies. Among pretty much anyone else on the Internet, I fear, I'm about as low on the totem pole as a guy can get.

No moping or pity, though. This isn't exactly some crazy idea here; I'm just going to chronicle my way through watching films, foreign or otherwise. Some of these entries will find their way to Box Office Prophets as classic reviews. Most will stay here. I've got two entries lined up, right after this prologue. Both are from foreign-born directors, whose works I've never seen. Neither are as well-known as Steven Spielberg, though both are arguably as important to the language of film. Enjoy it, as I hope to. Comments are welcomed, so don't be shy. We're all in this together.