Hey all. So, we're back again with this thing, and here's the part where I'd ramble on about it for about a paragraph or so before launching into the capsule reviews and calling it a month. This time, though, things are a little different. After thinking about it for a bit, I have decided that this will be the last entry in the Criterion Challenge, and that I won't be continuing it for the final two months of the year. There are some reasons for this, which I'll be upfront and tell you about. First and foremost is that I've lost my passion for it. At the start of the year, I had 52 interesting films and cherrypicked ones that sounded really exciting and intriguing to me. Now here I am in November, with 12 or so remaining, and the spark is gone. Combine that with the fact that I cornered myself into not just watching these films, but having to say something about them on here, and you get situations where I look at the clock and go "Do I really want to burn an afternoon throwing one of these on?". It's not fun and exciting cinematic horizon broadening for me any more. It feels like work, and I'm not even getting paid to do it.
More to the point... I got what I needed out of this. I got that horizon broadening, that sense of discovery and eclectic enlightenment. Some of the films I watched for this became new favorites of mine. Even if I didn't like them, I was pushing outside my wheelhouse and found something to write about them. They made me a better writer, and got me to expand and apply myself better. The Criterion Challenge may be counted as a failure, but in my eyes I set out what I wanted to do. I watched some new and interesting movies, got some new and interesting thoughts, and I can say I accomplished something. Instead of making busybody work for myself with movies I feel more obligated to watch than excited to watch, I can spend my last two months of Criterion subscription going onward with my own pace, watching whatever esoteric thing on the channel catches my interest without any arbitrary categories.
Still, I would feel remiss if I didn't end things on a high note, so I'll push myself through one last time to talk about the three films I managed to get to watch in October. If you've followed along with this journey since January, thanks for doing that! I hope you've seen a real growth and maturation as I explored the finer points of cinema. Let's do it one more time before the end, and we'll start with...
