RESOLUTIONS: TO BE LESS LAZY, BUT THAT MAY NOT MEAN WHAT YOU THINK

I don’t make resolutions, actually. I formulate goals. Granted, most of my goals tend to be so broad that they become unattainable goals, which really makes them synonymous with resolutions. But that’s not really here nor there now, is it?

Last year, I watched 189 movies. That number doesn’t indicate “new” movies or films seen in the theater. Rather, that is a total number of movies I watched in theaters, on DVD or via cable during 2004. Actually, I find that total quite disappointing. Why was I so lazy? That’s barely one movie every two days. Even more upsetting is 45 of them, I watched in December, meaning that a quarter of my film viewing took place during roughly 1/12 of the year.

Why such a lousy and low number? I blame the election first. No, not Kerry losing; just the entire process itself. I found myself glued to news that wasn’t even saying anything far more than I otherwise might have been. But the problem isn’t just with movies: I barely saw any theater in 2004. I also finished too few of the books I started, and started even fewer of the ones I intended. It’s those damn magazine subscriptions, and all the TV. Now don’t get me wrong: I don’t see myself giving up the tube anytime soon (especially since I still can’t afford a plasma — sorry, bad TV tech geek joke!), but I can probably afford to watch fewer “guilty pleasures” and to give new shows less of a chance than I have in the past.

Oh, the unattainable goals? Right. Getting to that. You see, my recurring unattainable goal is to see every movie receiving a theatrical release in any given year. Now of course, unless I become a full-time critic (not really a goal, attainable or unattainable), chances are that will never happen. In fact, even if I was reviewing movies constantly, I still wouldn’t get to everything. What I can try, though, is to average watching a movie a day. It really shouldn’t be that hard for me to do that “on average.” I don’t have any silly rules about only seeing films in public settings or only watching movies I haven’t seen. It can be anything. And look, here we are on Jan. 4, and technically, I’m right on schedule. Saturday I rewatched the original The Manchurian Candidate, Sunday I saw Million Dollar Baby (more on that in another post), and yesterday I saw two documentaries, In the Realms of the Unreal and Born Into Brothels. (And you should rush to Film Forum while the latter is still playing.) Considering that I’m still playing catch-up in preparation of my year-end list (anticipted to reach the worldinterwidewebnet next Monday or Tuesday), I should be ahead of the game at least for another week or so. Woo hoo!

In addition to the film thing, I resolve to see at least one play and read at least one book a month. Now that really shouldn’t be so hard, should it? I should be able to shatter those expectations by the summer, no? No. Hmmm. Well, we’ll see, won’t we.

One thing that should be changing within the next two months is that I will most likely be leaving my job. I say “most likely” because until I actually do it, I’m having a hard time completely convincing myself that I will be giving up the relatively cushy, safe, secure and undemanding position working for a major media corporation in exchange for longer hours at less pay — at least through mid-May because after that (unless something else permanent comes along), I’ll be your friendly neighborhood freelancer.

But that’s also a story for another time, and as long as it doesn’t get in the way of my “important” resolutions above, it doesn’t even really matter.