Movie Log - 2016

All the Movies I Watched in 2016

On Location: photo by Cliff Hutson

I watched eighty-eight movies in 2016. This works out to about 1.7 per week; I am unclear to me if that is a little or a lot. The list, in chronological order is as follows:

1. Life Itself
2. Scatter My Ashes at Bergdorf's
3. Bill Cunningham New York
4. Iris
5. RocknRolla
6. Pride and Glory
7. Maltese Falcon
8. Fargo
9. Visual Acoustics: The Modernism of Julius Shulman
10. The White Diamond
11. Romancing the Stone
12. Strangers on a Train (British version)
13. The Wrecking Crew
14. The September Issue
15. Exit Through the Gift Shop
16. Inside Llewyn Davis
17. Between Heaven and Hell
18. Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax
19. Dog Day Afternoon
20. Deep Impact
21. Armageddon
22. Burlesque
23. Dog Soldiers
24. Body of Lies
25. Conagher
26. The Red Violin
27. Inception
28. Blazing Saddles
29. Fame (1980)
30. Coffee and Cigarettes
31. Stranger Than Paradise
32. Down by Law
33. The Italian Job (1969)
34. My Dinner with Andre
35. Adventures in Babysitting (1987)
36. Black Angel (1946)
37. Flashdance
38. Trees Lounge
39. High Anxiety
40. A Chorus Line
41. Jaws
42. The Postman
43. They Were Expendable
44. Mr. Majestyk
45. They Died With Their Boots On
46. Finding Vivian Maier
47. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
48. Spotlight  
49. Cabaret
50. Young Frankenstein
51. Twister
52. The Producers (1968)
53. Adaptation
54. Blade Runner (The Final Cut)
55. Tangerine
56. Trumbo
57. Take Out
58. Fed Up
59. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers: Runnin’ Down a Dream
60. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2009)
61. The Girl Who Played with Fire
62. Anchors Aweigh
63. The Fifth Element
64. Battle: Los Angeles
65. Take Me Out to the Ball Game
66. Pal Joey
67. On the Town
68. Cat People (1942)
69. Waiting for Guffman
70. Best in Show
71. A Mighty Wind
72. This is Spinal Tap
73. I Walked with a Zombie
74. The Body Snatcher
75. The Curse of the Cat People
76. The Shawshank Redemption
77. Art House
78. Lo and Behold
79. Tiny: A Story About Living Small
80. Hell or High Water
81. Wall E
82. The Dark Knight
83. Open Range
84. Die Hard
85. Sour Grapes
86. SOMM: Into the Bottle
87. Minimalism
88. The Hunter (2011)

On DVD: photo by Cliff Hutson

The vast majority of these were seen on DVD; many of which are in my personal collection and the remainder from Netflix. The ones that I own I tend to watch time and again. Some of these viewings could be considered to be ritualistic. I like to revisit "Jaws" at the beginning of the Summer season, which (for me) is anytime between Memorial Day and the Forth of July.  "Casablanca" I watch every Bastille Day. It is not that the movie is really connected to that date, but the pivotal scene of the singing of La Marseillaise evokes that for me. My birthday always calls for watching "Twister", as it reminds me of my fiftieth birthday. I have had quite a few great days in my life. But, the celebration of that event was one one the best;  seeing the movie with my wife, daughter, and grandchildren; and then eating at Russell's. It is a great film, and, in an alternate universe, I can easily envision myself as a member of Jo's team.

Others I frequently turn to are the works, of the Coen brothers, Hitchcock, Mel Brooks, and Christopher Guest. 

Missing from the list this year, for reasons I can not recall, are "Silverado" and "Trading Places". The former is easily among my top ten favorite movies of all time, if not the top five. The second I usually  watch in late December.

The best of the recent movies I saw was, by far and away, "Hell or High Water". I like this movie so much that if I see any best of 2016 list does not include it I say say 'screw it', that person does not know what that are talking about.

Thanks to the thoughtful generosity of my children, who gave me a flat screen TV and an Apple TV device for my seventieth birthday, the last ten movies of 2016 were seen using modern technology. I enjoy this so much that I have a challenge for myself of watching 104 movies in 2017. That is probably achievable once I get past past binge watching TV shows such as "Person of Interest", "The Blacklist", and "House of Cards"; which are all new to me.

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Reading Log - 2016

December 2016

The books I finished reading in December 2016:

December 2016 Reading: photo by Cliff Hutson

A Year of Books

I read a total of fifty-four books in 2016. This puts me about 35% ahead of David Allen, who was the impetus for my starting to track my reading. My list, in chronological order:

Books Read - 2016

1. “Go, A Kidd’s Guide to Graphic Design," Chip Kidd
2. "Black Cherry Blues," James Lee Burke
3. "Shock Wave,” John Sandford
4. “The Agony and the Ecstasy,” Irving Stone
5. “Dark of the Moon,” John Sandford
6. “Heat Lighting,” John Sandford
7. “A Place of My Own: The Architecture of Daydreams,” Michael Pollan
8. “Rough Country,” John Sandford
9. “Fight Club,” Chuck Palahniuk
10. “Bad Blood,” John Sandford
11. “Mad River,” John Sandford
12. “Storm Front,” John Sandford
13. “Deadline,” John Sandford
14. “Faceless Killers,” Henning Mankell
15. “Caesar, Let the Dice Fly,” Colleen McCullough
16. “Red Gold,” Alan Furst
17. “The Rosie Effect,” Graeme Simsion
18. “After I’m Gone,” Laura Lippman
19. “On the Beach,” Nevil Shute
20. “Landfall,” Nevil Shute
21. ”Sayonara Slam,” Naomi Hirahara
22. “The Dragons of Eden,” Carl Sagan
23. “The Postman,” David Brin
24. "Breaking Cat News: Cats Reporting on the News that Matters to Cats,” Georgia Dunn
25. “The Little Sister,” Raymond Chandler
26. “Moscow Rules,” Daniel Silva
27. "A History of the End of the World,” Jonathan Kirsch
28. “An American Genocide,” Benjamin Madley
29. “The Sixth Extinction,” Elizabeth Kolbert
30. “Cooked,” Michael Pollan
31. “The Man in the High Castle,” Philip K. Dick
32. “Personal,” Lee Child
33. “Make Me,” Lee Child
34. “In a Sunburned Country,” Bill Bryson
35. “Hogs Wild,” Ian Frazier
36. “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?,” Philip K. Dick
37. “The Mother Tongue,” Bill Bryson
38. “A Short History of Nearly Everything,” Bill Bryson
39. “Pied Piper,” Nevil Shute
40. “The Harvest Gypsies,” John Steinbeck
41. “The Friends of Eddie Coyle,” George V. Higgins
42. “Ecotopia,” Ernest Callenbach
43. “The Devil’s Star,” Jo Nesbo
44. “Biophilia,” Edward O. Wilson
45. “Hold Tight,” Harlan Coben
46. “Reversible Errors,” Scott Turow
47. “Last Train to Istanbul,” Ayse Kulin
48. "Escape Clause," John Sandford
49. "The Wrong Side of Goodbye," Michael Connelly
50. “W is for Wasted,”Sue Grafton
51. “Heat Wave,” Richard Castle
52. “Orphan X,” Gregg Hurwitz
53. "Susie’s Seniors Dogs,” Erin Stanton
54. "Shop Cats of New York,” Tamar Arslanian

It is fair to say that I am glad that I read all of these, as I have reached a point in my life where I no longer finish a book that I start but then has no appeal for me. However,  not all of them were enjoyable. “An American Genocide”, for example, was very disturbing. But, it opened my eyes to a part of California  history of which I was unaware, and gave me a new perspective in which to frame the work I do in ethnobotany.

Sheer entertainment was found in the Virgil Flowers mysteries by John Sanford. I guess I put the entire series under my belt just this year. Bill Bryson offers both humor and information, so his books were a real treat. (His "A Walk in the Woods" is one of my all-time favorites.)

Picking the best book of this year's lot is a bit problematic, but the nod goes to "Pied Piper" by Nevil Shute. He is probably best known for "On the Beach", which is also on my list. However, I choose "Pied Piper" as I found the story more compelling; and I strongly identified with the protagonist. He and I are the same age, seventy years old. It seems that was considered to be much more ancient in the early days of World War II than it is today. (I like to think that 70 is the new 50, anyway.)

Also near the top was “The Rosie Effect” by Graeme Simsion  However, it was not as good as "The Rosie Project" which tied at number one for me last year.

I am starting 2017 with a pile of eleven books that I intend to get around to reading. The one that has been in it the longest is “Capital in the Twenty-First Century” by Thomas Piketty, which I acquired back in May 2014. This might be the year for it.

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