Civilian 2011 Wrap-Up and Year-End Stats!

Back again!

Having addressed the horror genre in the previous entry (hey, the title of the blog is HORROR 101 after all), it seems only fair to give the civilian flicks their moment in the sun, seeing as how they composed nearly half the total Views this year. As before, all of the films listed were encountered for the first time from January 1 to December 31, 2011 (i.e. no repeat viewings were eligible), with my top picks denoted with an asterisk.


2011 TOTALS: 640 films, 419 1st time views, 355 horror, 59 cinema
(2010 Totals: 364, 253, 242, 45)
(2009 Totals: 472, 276, 289, 38)
(2008 Totals: 384, 278, 226, 39)
(2007 Totals: 409, 284, 260, 40)




TOP CIVILIAN 2011 RELEASES
Adventures of Tintin, The (2011)
Another Earth (2011)
Bridesmaids (2011)
Drive (2011)*
Harry Potter and the Deadly Hallows: Part 2 (2011)
Hugo (2011)
Margin Call (2011)*
Martha Marcy May Marlene (2011)
Midnight in Paris (2011)
Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol (2011)
Moneyball (2011)
Tree of Life, The (2011)*
War Horse (2011)








FAVORITE CIVILIAN DISCOVERIES OF 2011
Big Fan (2009)
Bloody Sunday (2002)
Catfish (2010)
Downfall (2004)
Enter the Void (2008)*
Fall, The (2006)
GasLand (2010)*
Great Texas Dynamite Chase, The (1976)
Head (1968)
Jackass 3D (2010)
Man on Wire (2008)
Police Story 2 (1988)
Stieg Larsson’s “Girl” Trilogy (2009)
Stranger Than Paradise (1984)
Zabriskie Point (1970)






CIVILIAN 2011 – HONORABLE MENTION
Contagion (2011)
Descendants, The (2011)
Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The (2011)
Machete Maidens Unleashed! (2010)
Paul (2011)
Rango (2011)
Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011)
Transformers: Dark Side of the Moon (2011)
X-Men: First Class (2011)









CIVILIAN DISCOVERIES – HONORABLE MENTION
Disappearance of Alice Creed, The (2009)
Gas, Food, Lodging (1992)
Half Nelson (2006)
Hamlet 2 (2008)
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007)
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2009)
Hustle & Flow (2005)
Messenger, The (2009)
Recount (2008)
Rush: Beyond the Lighted Stage (2010)
Spanking the Monkey (1994)
Town, The (2010)
Wal-Mart: The High Price of Low Cost (2005)






MIXED BAGS – CIVILIAN
Cave of Forgotten Dreams (2010)
Cowboys & Aliens (2011)
Cropsey (2009)
Ides of March, The (2011)
Krull (1983)
Lovely Bones, The (2009)
Machete (2010)
Muppets, The (2011)
Shame (2011)
Young Adult (2011)








NOT SO GOOD
4 for Texas (1963)
Gran Torino (2008)
I Love You, Beth Cooper (2009)





















WORST CIVILIAN VIEWS OF 2011
Black Dahlia, The (2006)
Dukes of Hazzard, The (2005)
Escape from L.A. (1996)
Whatever Works (2009)



















WHAT THE *&*%#^$%#% DID I JUST WATCH?
Black Belt Jones (1974)
Hard Ticket to Hawaii (1987)
Malibu High (1977)
Undefeatable (1993)
Water Power (1977)

















MOST WATCHED DIRECTORS OF 2010
Cronenberg, David (17)
Jackson, Peter: (8)
Honda, Ishiro: (7)
De Palma, Brian (5)
Eastwood, Clint (5)
Fukuda, Jun (5)
Hancock, John D. (5)
Carpenter, John (4)
Chan, Jackie (4)
Clark, Bob (4)
Cohen, Larry (4)
Craven, Wes (4)
Fuest, Robert (4)
Gordon, Stuart (4)
Nolan, Christopher (4)
Okawara, Takao (4)
Spielberg, Steven (4)
Aldrich, Robert (3)
Allen, Woody (3)
Boll, Uwe (3)
Buchanan, Larry (3)
Butcher Brothers (3)
Corman, Roger (3)
Fincher, David (3)
Fukusaku, Kinji (3)
Guillerman, John (3)
Herzog, Werner (3)
Kanefsky, Rolfe (3)
MacDonald, Kevin (3)
Meyer, Russ (3)
Tezuka, Masaaki (3)
Wingard, Adam (3)
Wright, Edgar (3)
Yates, David (3)
Yuasa, Noriaki (3)





MOST WATCHED ACTORS OF 2010:
Tiffany Shepis (14)
Vincent Price (10)
Burt Reynolds (8)
Tom Cruise (8)
Charlton Heston (7)
Viggo Mortensen (7)
Jackie Chan (6)
Jeffrey Combs (5)










OTHER 2010 VIEWING STATS:
• 27 Godzilla movies in the month of February
• Watched Stieg Larsson’s “Girl” Trilogy back to back to back
• Watched The Lord of the Rings Trilogy back to back to back
• Watched the entire Nightmare on Elm Street series…again
• 17 documentaries
• 28 countries represented
• Saw films with titles starting with every letter of the alphabet

TV:
• Season 1 of Ugly Americans (14 episodes)
• Season 1 of Alfred Hitchcock Presents (39 episodes)
• Season 1 of Deadwood (12 episodes)
• Season 1 of Archer (10 episodes)
• Season 1 of The Walking Dead (6 episodes)
• Seasons 1 & 2 of The League of Gentlemen (6 episodes)




Last January, I announced my plans to see a weekly similarly-titled double features over the course of the year. While I didn’t manage to pull it off every week, we did come up with some interesting pairings.

SEEING DOUBLE: (* not a remake/sequel)
And Soon the Darkness (1970, 2010)
April Fool’s Day (1986, 2008)
Devil, The/Devil (1972, 2010)*
Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2009, 2011)
House of Wax (1953, 2005)*
Interview, The/Interview (1998, 2007)*
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956, 1978)
Island of Dr. Moreau, The (1977, 1996)
King Kong (1976, 2005)
Messenger, The (1999, 2009)*
Night of the Demon/Night of the Demons (1980, 2009)*
Predator/Predators (1987, 2010)
Revolver (1973, 2005)*
Romeo & Juliet (1968, 1996)
Shivers/Shiver (1975, 2008)*
Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The (1973, 2003)
To Be or Not to Be (1942, 1983)
True Grit (1969, 2010)



DOUBLE VIEWS OF 2010:
Haunted World of El Superbeasto, The (2009)
Henry V (1989)
Let’s Scare Jessica to Death (1971)
Stake Land (2010)
TrollHunter (2010)



VIEWINGS BY MONTH:
January – 46
February – 59 (Godzillathon)
March – 36
April – 53
May – 33
June – 42
July – 30
August – 52
September – 32
October – 115 (Scare-A-Thon)
November – 67
December – 75



TOP VIEWING YEAR: 2010 (70!)
As has been the case for the past four years running, the previous year takes the title. Not surprising, either catching films missed in the cinema or seeing “2010” films not released to video/theaters until 2011. But outside of the 2000s (which were huge this year, 130 from 2006-2009 alone), it was nice to see 1981 pulling in with 14 (probably the highest rank for the 80s since the 80s), and 1971-1973 pulling a three-year streak of 13.

Longest streak of seeing at least one film from each year: 1953-2011
(This is the weakest I’ve been on older films in a while. Also notable, this is the 4th time in five years that my streak has conked out in the early 50s. Next year, I should start early and move forward…)

EARLIEST FILM WATCHED:
Vampyr (1932)


VIEWS BREAKDOWN BY DECADE
1930s - 1
1940s - 3
1950s - 22
1960s - 50
1970s - 107
1980s - 86
1990s - 55
2000s - 187
2010s - 129