Peculiar Film Viewing Rituals

[swo17]

So there's this weird thing that I do where I keep a running tally of how many films/entire TV series I've seen, and then when I'm coming up on a nice big round number (I'm talking thousands here) I will take the opportunity to watch a special one that I've been saving away like a fine wine. So far I've reached the following milestones:

01000 Ordet (Carl Th. Dreyer, 1955) 4/6/07
02000 Céline et Julie vont en bateau (Jacques Rivette, 1974) 9/13/08
03000 La Chute de la maison Usher (Jean Epstein, 1928) 11/18/09
04000 Rocco e i suoi fratelli (Luchino Visconti, 1960) 3/28/10
05000 Marketa Lazarová (Frantisek Vlácil, 1967) 8/8/10
06000 Zazie dans le métro (Louis Malle, 1960) 7/9/11
07000 Фауст (Aleksandr Sokurov, 2011) 4/1/12
08000 Նռան գույնը (Sergei Parajanov, 1969) 11/30/12
09000 Сказка сказок (Yuri Norstein, 1979) 6/15/13
10000 L'Hypothèse du tableau volé (Raúl Ruiz, 1978) 12/29/13
11000 Mauvais sang (Leos Carax, 1986) 8/30/14
12000 Alone. Life Wastes Andy Hardy (Martin Arnold, 1998) 3/28/15
13000 Jurassic World (Colin Trevorrow, 2015) 7/27/16
14000 In the Shadow of the Sun (Derek Jarman, 1974) 6/26/18
15000 Bis ans Ende der Welt (Wim Wenders, 1991) 4/1/20
16000 The Decay of Fiction (Pat O'Neill, 2002) 11/3/20
17000 Get a Life (David Mirkin et al., 1990-92) 10/30/21
18000 Ulysses (Joseph Strick, 1967) 11/20/22
19000 SebastiAn: Embody (So Me, 2011) 6/21/23
20000 Angels in America (Mike Nichols, 2003) 1/12/24
21000 Baby It's You (John Sayles, 1983) 5/15/24
22000 Open Doom Crescendo (Terry Chiu, 2022) 11/20/24
23000 Squirrels to the Nuts (Peter Bogdanovich, 2014) 5/6/25
24000 Where to Land (Hal Hartley, 2025) 9/13/25

Given that only one thousandth of the films that I see are able to join this elite club, you might say that they serve to anchor my experience as a filmgoer, showing what I've considered to constitute a landmark over time as I've gotten deeper into movies. If nothing else, doing this gives me something foolish and arbitrary to get excited about every year or so.

So anyway, surely I am not the only freak here. Others, please do share your stories, or else banish this discussion to the nether regions of the forum.

EDIT: I have peculiarly updated this post to reflect subsequent milestones in my viewing, if only for my own personal records. Will anyone notice or care? Hopefully not! But if you are reading this, congratulations for having that kind of time on your hands.

[zedz]

No, you're the only freak. The rest of us are completely norrmalll.

How on earth do you know how many films you've seen, anyway? Have you been counting since you were two, or did you make a conscious decision to start counting one day? I picture you, kneeling before your dad, saying: "Father, from this day forth, I shall be (stands up, bares chest) a CINEPHILE!"

I must say, if I were counting films, I'd probably do something similar, or else go out of my way to ensure that a milestone film was not accidentally 'significant'.

[domino harvey]

This is a tangent but where else am I supposed to go here: Your system doesn't list first names for the director, which would drive me crazy. I could probably separate a Anthony Mann from a Daniel Mann but could I separate a Daniel Mann from a Delbert Mann on a quick glance?

[swo17]

How on earth do you know how many films you've seen, anyway?

In case it isn't obvious from starting threads like this one, I had a fairly sheltered childhood and didn't really start watching films seriously until I was 17. Since then I've tried to track everything I've seen by rating it on the IMDb, filling in gaps along the way for anything I can remember having seen growing up. Obviously, it's not a perfect way to count (there are many films not even listed on IMDb) but it's something, and no amount of forum scorn will dissuade me from continuing in this fashion.

[Perkins Cobb]

"Every year or two" -- so does that mean you're watching between 500 and 1,000 films per year?

[swo17]

It's hard to say. Something only counts in the tally the first time I watch it, and I rewatch a lot of things. Also, 1 minute films (which I've been watching a lot of lately for the pre-1920s project) count just as much as 13 hour films do.

Everyone, please feel free to divert your attention away from me now...

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Everyone, please feel free to divert your attention away from me now...

Would this help? This is only since I've been counting...

1000 Dark City (1950)
2000 This Thing Called Love (1941)
3000 Pearl Of The South Pacific (1955)
4000 Heat And Dust (1983)
5000 Paradise Hawaiian Style (1966)
6000 Flash Gordon (1980)
7000 L'Avaro (1990)
8000 The Prototype (1983)
9000 Inspector Chocolate (1986)
10000 Africa Speaks...English (1933)
11000 Jupiter's Darling (1955)
12000 Just Ask My Children (2001)
13000 Tom Sawyer (1973)
14000 Windtalkers (2002)
15000 The Chinese Cat (1944)
16000 Spoilers of the North (1947)
17000 Railroad Smashup (1904)
18000 The Sniper (1952)
19000 Lone Wolf and Cub: Assassin on the Road to Hell (1989)
20000 The First 100 Years (1924)

[zedz]

It's twins!

Anyway, I'm hardly the one to pour scorn on weird film-viewing rituals, what with the giant sling and all those puppies.

[Perkins Cobb]

That's just mind-boggling, because as far as I can recall, in my 15-20 years as a movie buff, I've "only" seen about 6,200 films. I'm only recording features, and omitted anything I knew I'd seen as a kid but couldn't remember anything about, but still.

And that's with the pedal to the metal ... one year I had more time off from work than usual and saw over 550 movies, and by the end of that run I could tell I'd hit my threshold and needed to spend more time taking walks in the park or something. Not to mention the eyestrain. Rufus, if you've seen 8000 films since 2001, that means you're going at nearly twice my rate! That's some stamina.

Personally I'd need something like 28 more years to hit 20,000, and I'm pretty sure permanent burnout will set in well before that. If I even live so long.

[Camera Obscura]

20.000 films and counting? Good Lord! With my viewing pattern, I'll be an octogenarian to even come close. Oh, and I do count my films, if my IMDb voting history counts.

[karmajuice]

I record short films (separately, if they're under half an hour) but only started doing so last year. And I only record things which are clearly distinguished as films: I don't keep track of music videos, commercials, trailers, anything like that. One has to draw the line somewhere.

I've realized recently that keeping all of my films in a log has certain subconscious effects on my film knowledge. I knew the list-keeping would have benefits -- that's why I do it -- but I noticed how often I see the titles of the films I've watched recently. Every time I see something new, I have to open up the file and put in a new entry. As a result I see these titles almost everyday, often more than once a day. Seeing the title recalls a few details from the film, my impression of a scene, a reaction that I read, or some fact I discovered after seeing it. Sometimes that's all, but sometimes I'll start some tangential thinking based off of one of the titles. Anyway, by sheer exposure to their titles I think I'm remembering films more effectively.

PS: I am nowhere near 20,000. I've only been watching films seriously for about six years now, and I'm within the early thousands. I've only kept track since my second year of college (and even then only partial track) and have made no effort to document anything prior to that.

[godardslave]

I watch my favorite films completely naked.
I dream of swo17 counting his films and divert all my attention on to him.
In other breaking news, I have no idea how many films i have watched.

[Perkins Cobb]

If you did nothing at all except watch movies, assuming an average length of 100 minutes, you could still only see 5,260 films in a year. That's if you never slept. If you insisted on getting your daily eight hours, well, cut that down to 3,504. That'd mean it would take you 5.7 years to see 20,000 movies.

So to have seen over 8,000 in nine years ... that's actually getting into that ballpark! Visions of my long-stated ideal of a life in which I "do nothing but lie around watching movies all the time." (Stopping occasionally to shag Salma Hayek, of course.)

Okay, what were we talking about?

[knives]

This has become the most self indulgent thread yet. As an aside, Swo, since you said you saw about 2000 films from the past decade and you didn't list a 5000 mark does that mean half your veiwing experience is from the past decade?

[Brian C]

I don't know how many films I've seen, but I have kept a log of my trips to the cinema over the past few years:

2006: 145 films seen
2007: 137
2008: 198 (I moved to Chicago from Dallas this year)
2009: 169
2010: 56 and counting

That's new releases, special screenings, reperatory, etc.

[domino harvey]

This has become the most self indulgent thread yet.

Not until we start posting our individual star rankings of every film we see. Chris, pls delete the board when that happens

[swo17]

This has become the most self indulgent thread yet. As an aside, Swo, since you said you saw about 2000 films from the past decade and you didn't list a 5000 mark does that mean half your veiwing experience is from the past decade?

I've only seen about 1200 from the 2000s. But yes, I have some serious gaps to fill in the earlier years. I'm working on that now.

And yes, this thread is not turning out how I had envisioned. Doesn't anyone have like a certain film or director that they like to watch on special occasions? Or elaborate rules for a drinking game? Something embarrassing and film-related that really has no place on a public forum (cf. my first post)? Does zedz care to elaborate on that whole puppy sling thing? Anything really at this point...

[Brian C]

Hey, I think this is all great. But this thread is missing a little something ... as of yet, it hasn't really reached its potential for tacky one-upmanship.

And it does obviously belong in the "Navel Gazing" section, but that's not really my business, I suppose.

[domino harvey]

Doesn't anyone have like a certain film or director that they like to watch on special occasions?

Some do

[MyNameCriterionForum]

20,000 films? Have there been 20,000 films made? I mean, not counting Tyler Perry movies?

I'm at about 8000 titles. 99.99% of those in the 20 years since high school. Only seen maybe 150 in theater -- the rest on tape or disc. Of course, I'm not counting my repeat viewings of Triumph of the Will or Caddyshack, which would easily vault me past the 10,000 mark.

[LQ]

My getting a netflix account pretty much coincided with the point that I fell in love with film, so I've meticulously rated everything I've seen on netflix... but after reading this thread I may switch to imdb now; while not perfect it'll be a lot more comprehensive. I always get a slight pang when I watch something that doesn't have an entry on netflix.

Weird viewing rituals? Hmmm... well, maybe this counts: whenever I really fall for a movie hard, I insist upon sharing it with everyone in my life that'll give me the time of day. This leads to scenarios in which I watch say, 3 Women 20 times with 20 different people in the span of a couple months.

[domino harvey]

I've meticulously rated everything I've seen on netflix... but after reading this thread I may switch to imdb now; while not perfect it'll be a lot more comprehensive. I always get a slight pang when I watch something that doesn't have an entry on netflix.

Every once in a while I come across a title that I rated when I first got Netflix, before I really got into film, and I'll be like "Why the hell did I give three stars to American History X?" It's like I killed some dude and took over his body in the last five years, because some of these ratings just couldn't have come from me.

As far as repeat viewings goes, when I prepare to talk publicly about a film, either in lecture, conference, or a screening, I obsessively watch the film over and over until I know every cadence and prepare for every possible aspect of questioning that could arise. And then I only get surface audience questions like "I think To Catch a Thief would have been better with Ingrid Bergman." Please note that that isn't a question at all.

[karmajuice]

Doesn't anyone have like a certain film or director that they like to watch on special occasions?

I had this notion in my head that I'd watch Chungking Express every New Years Eve when I happened to watch it last year. Then I didn't have it with me this year, so technically it never even became a tradition. It would be suitable though.

I do not watch any filmmaker or film in any particular fashion. In fact, I'm downright pedantic about variety. I try not to watch films by the same director in a row, or even from the same time period or country. There are occasional exceptions, when I end up watching a double bill of some kind, or if two films have a peculiar sort of connection that merits viewing them together. Partly this is done just so my viewing doesn't feel redundant, but there's also this sense that I want to stretch out my enjoyment of a director. I like the idea that five years from now there might be a Lang film or even a Hitchcock (who I've seen most of) that I haven't seen yet, and I can get excited about watching it for the first time. I've managed to make the Masters of Cinema Keaton set last over a year, and I've only just gotten to The High Sign.
In other words, I deliberately avoid habits like that.

I used to eat sunflower seeds when I watched movies on my own, at home. My teeth have the constant urge to gnaw, and if it's not sunflower seeds it's my fingers, or the inside of my mouth. Recently I've given them up during movies, because my eating them distracts too much from the experience. Some inner-cheek nibbling may occur but at least my attention is focused.

And then I only get surface audience questions like "I think To Catch a Thief would have been better with Ingrid Bergman."

I don't want to draw too much attention to an arbitrary example, but. . .who on earth could think that?

[Perkins Cobb]

I do feel the urge to bunch a weekend's worth of films together by director or country or time period. Otherwise it's too jarring to segue from one to the other. Diary of a Country Priest and Hot Tub Time Machine work better individually rather than as a double bill, I think.

I don't know why this topic would be considered self-indulgent. I'm always fascinated by how people watch movies (both obsessive movie freaks and "normal" people) and often find it more interesting than the films themselves.

[domino harvey]

And then I only get surface audience questions like "I think To Catch a Thief would have been better with Ingrid Bergman."

I don't want to draw too much attention to an arbitrary example, but. . .who on earth could think that?

Based on his other comments in search of a question, his reasoning was based on which movie star he'd rather sleep with. To which I'd still agree with you but anyways...