Meanwhile, in Rivendell . . .

Hey, as long as I get my yearly recap post published during the first quarter of the new year, it still counts, right?  (Even if I squeeze it in at the eleventh hour.  Ahem.) Present tardiness aside, I do usually try to post at least one "top ten" list at the beginning of each calendar year, reflecting on the best of the new-to-me media I consumed the last year.  In 2024, however, it would appear that most of said new-to-me media was . . . unfortunately mid.  Thus, where I would usually select ten favorites in each category, I'm limiting myself to five this time around and just compiling everything into the one post.  But we're also expanding the categories to include music, so I think we'll have plenty of material to cover. 😉 "The hour is late and bed beckons," so without further ado, let's get into it. ⸻ ❧  Best Books #5.   Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton "... details the story of a man who falls in love with his wife's cousin and the trage...

Happy New Year, friends!   2023 was really the year of Studio Ghibli, for me.  Not one, not two, but three Ghibli films made it onto my top ten list!  Exciting times. Most of the new-to-me movies I watched this year were pretty average; only a few blew me out of the water.  That said, this list was harder to narrow down than I thought it would be.  As usual, I'm not 100% satisfied with the finished product.  But such is life, and as it's already two weeks later than I'd have liked to publish this post, here we are. ⸻ #10.   Bill  (2015)  ● NR A young and ambitious Will Shakespeare leaves Stratford-upon-Avon for the bustling city of London, hoping for a haven of artistic possibility in which to pursue his newest dream of being an author.  Much to his surprise, he soon finds himself embroiled in a plot to kill Elizabeth I. Intentionally anachronistic dialogue and mannerisms set in historical contexts will never not tickle my fanc...

Happy turn-of-the-year to you all!  I don't really make New Year's resolutions, but one of my hopes for 2023 is that I will get back into the habit of blogging regularly.  Or, at least, of blogging more regularly than once every three to five months. *ahem*  I certainly can't guarantee that, either to myself or to any of you sweet souls still following this blog, but I can hope it and try to make it happen.  We'll see. At the very least, I can keep up this semi-tradition.  After due deliberation, I've selected the ten best films I watched for the first time in 2022.  ("Best," in this context, meaning "my personal favorite," of course.)  I've also ranked them, but the top five rankings are all pretty arbitrary because I really can't decide where each film should be placed.   Let's dive in! ⸻ #10.   Game Night (2018) A couple's weekly game night with their friends takes a wild turn when a fake murder mystery becomes indistinguishabl...

I usually find myself conflicted when I write these year-end posts.  (Don't we all, right?)  The problem with making top ten lists, for me, is that I often experience a sense of dissonance, torn between what I see as two different 'types' of candidates.  There are the stories that I think deserve a spot on their own merit, for their own technical excellence; and then there are the stories that I want to include because I personally enjoy  them so much, even if they aren't of the highest caliber. This year, I'm happy to report, that's not as much of a struggle!  2021 wasn't a great year for new-to-me movies, to be honest, but the silver lining there is that most of the films that  did stand out to me did so because they were both exceptionally well-made (in my opinion) and intensely satisfactory on a personal level.   Of course, there were exceptions:  films that were so good that I can't not  spotlight them, even if they weren't that "fu...