Watched This Past Week

14th-20th March 2022

CODA (2021) – 9/10

King of New York (1990) – 7/10

Red Heat (1988) – 7/10

The Phantom of the Open (2022) – 7/10

Galaxy of Terror (1981) – 6/10

Shiva Baby (2020) – 8/10

X (2022) – 8/10

Fresh (2022) – 8/10

Turning Red (2022) – 7/10 (Rewatch)

The Night House (2021) – 7/10

Check out my ratings, reviews, lists and more at: letterboxd.com/crowmeister

Watched This Past Week

7th-13th March 2022

12 Strong (2018) – 7/10

Police Academy 2: Their First Assignment (1985) – 6/10

Quatermass and the Pit (1967) – 7/10

Non-Stop (2014) – 6/10 (Rewatch)

The Judge (2014) – 8/10

The Seven-Ups (1973) – 7/10

Network (1976) – 8/10

Night of the Demon (1980) – 7/10

The Duke (2022) – 6/10

Don Jon (2013) – 7/10

Turning Red (2022) – 7/10

The Power of the Dog (2021) – 8/10

Batman (1989) – 9/10 (Rewatch)

Check out my ratings, reviews, lists and more at: letterboxd.com/crowmeister

The Batman

9/10

Watched at the Odeon Luxe Leicester Square with Dolby Atmos

My first film review for my first visit to the Odeon Luxe Leicester Square – somewhere I’ve always wanted to go. This was an experience.

This film is fantastic.

I loved the detective crime/thriller storyline and the overall feel of the film.

Incredible acting, directing and camerawork with a soundtrack that packs a punch – something I could tell was great simply from the trailers.

Pattinson is an actor who has grown on me in recent years – from films such as Good Time and The Lighthouse – and I am 100% behind him as the new Batman.

It’s a long one but it’s so well paced that it flew by for me – maybe the reclining seat helped!

I have a few nitpicks and things I wasn’t 100% keen on, but all in all, I really loved this start to a new Batman trilogy.

My Watching and Collecting Habbits

Being a huge film fan, I like to indulge in as many films as possible, and one of these ways, is by collecting films on Blu-ray and DVD. I own over 3000 titles in total, with over 2700 of them being Blu-ray (including 4Ks). I have a big watch list, but I love having so many films available to watch whenever I want, many of which won’t be found on streaming services. Some films I have owned for years and years and still have never watched. Although some may take a while to get to, one day I will be in the exact frame of mind to watch each of them, and many of which could end up being new favourites, just laying dormant!

I am a fan of pretty much all genres, but my main passion is horror and I have two book cases of predominantly horror films, comprising of films dating back to the first half of the 20th century, and from all over the world.

My love of non-English language cinema doesn’t stop at horror films, and I’m particularly fond of South Korean and Japanese cinema. I love films from all time periods, going all the way back to the silent era, through the Holywood Golden Era and my favourite decades of the 70s, 80s and 90s, right up until the latest film released just last week.

I own the 2016 version of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die and frequently refer back to it. At the time of writing this, I have watched 350 of the 1235 ever featured, so I have quite a way to go!

Boutique labels are becoming more and more prevalent and important in this age where streaming dominates, and I love collecting them. My favourite boutique labels are: Arrow, BFI, Criterion, Curzon Artificial Eye, Eureka, Indicator, Second Sight, 88 Films, 101 Films. Expect a lot of future reviews about films from these labels!

Avid Film Fan will be a blog dedicated to film watching, collecting and reviewing. It will also feature rankings, based on franchises, directors, or anything else I can list!

Avid Film Fan: Introduction

I’ve loved film my entire life, and being born in the early 90s, I grew up on many classic 80s and 90s movies, and to this day, these are my two favourite decades of film. My favourite genres include horror, sci-fi and crime thrillers, with my some of my favourite films comprising of Back to the Future, Goodfellas, Pulp Fiction, Seven and The Shawshank Redemption. My favourite directors include Martin Scorsese, John Carpenter, Quentin Tarantino, Denis Villeneuve and Christopher Nolan. I enjoy many actors spreading numerous eras, with stand-outs being Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, Kurt Russell and Jake Gyllenhaal.

I was the perfect age for the releases of the Star Wars Prequels, Harry Potter and, in my opinion, the golden era of Pixar. In the early-to-mid 2000s, I would go to the cinema every year for my birthday. November was a great time for new releases back then, with the majority of the aforementioned Harry Potter and Pixar films, including Monster’s Inc, Finding Nemo, and The Incredibles, all being released at this time of year, which was perfect.

Of course my film viewing wasn’t confined to the cinema, I had countless favourites I watched at home regularly. These included Toy Story 1&2, A Bug’s Life, ET, Home Alone, Star Wars Original trilogy, Jurassic Park trilogy, Back to the Future trilogy, Indiana Jones trilogy, and all the Disney films, to name a few. The majority of these we had on VHS or, later on, DVD. Strangely, I generally liked sequels more when I was younger, these being Return of the Jedi, The Lost World, Back to the Future Part II and Temple of Doom, respectively.

When I then got my very own video player, I recorded so many films off TV that I didn’t already own, to keep. This eventually moved onto recording on DVD and brought with it the ability to edit! I distinctly remember recording The Santa Clause one evening on the run up to Christmas. I always wanted to get these recordings dead on, without any of the spiel before the film started. I sat there, finger poised, ready to hit “record” on the remote. As soon as the screen went black before that classic Disney logo, my finger dropped straight onto that button and from that moment on, I knew I always had that film available to watch whenever I wanted.

Once DVD became more mainstream, I started curating a small collection of my favourites, and these DVDs replaced the many-time-watched and re-wound VHS tapes of old. I used birthday and Christmas money and balanced buying these, with buying PS2 games – what a time!

When I got my first job at 16, I started buying even more, I wanted to soak up as much cinema as I possibly could. I also began to buy more mature films, after realising that if buying online, I could pick up 18s without my parents needing to buy it for me! I remember scouring Play.com for hours, deciding which films to buy, trying to get as much as I could with the money I had available. This is where I really started to get into collecting films and that’s the next chapter in my story…

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