A personal blogging streak that will probably never be broken

You may recall -- though it's far more likely that you don't -- that at the start of 2020, I was having such a prolific period on The Audient that I posted on 41 consecutive days, accounting for the last 27 days of January and the first 14 of February. I wrote about the end of that streak here. 

In retrospect, it's funny that this was just before our world turned upside down with COVID. Since one ended before the other was really beginning, they are totally separated in my mind, and it took looking it up just now to remember that both things happened at the start of 2020.

Forty-one consecutive days seemed like an impressive thing at the time, especially after some really lean periods in the year immediately leading up to it.

Nonsense.

At the start of 2025, I've felt a similar sense of having a lot to say, and not always the space I need to say it, considering that I have a rule of never posting more than once in the same day. As it did in 2020, this led to certain periods when I had four, five completed posts backed up and waiting for their turn, which I would often need to juggle just so, to allow the time-sensitive ones to go live ahead of the evergreen ones that might have been written earlier.

Only this time it didn't go for 41 straight days. It went for 65. 

That being the last 29 days of January, all 28 days of February (the first complete month in the history of this blog), and the first eight days of March.

Sometimes when you break a record, you blow past it. Earlier this week, after a fish and chips dinner on the beach, my younger son and I threw around a frisbee, seeing how many catches in a row we could get. We worked our way up through various low records, like 7, then 9, then 11, then 17. But we were stuck on 17 for a really long time, and we were not even getting close to beating it. Then when we started getting tired and ready to wind down for the night, we said we'd make one more attempt, which would qualify as our last attempt if we completed at least five passes in a row. That time, we got 43 consecutive catches before we dropped it again. 

This is a bit like that. 

Of course, it could have gone a lot longer, if I'd forced it. But the thing I thought was impressive about this streak in 2020, and again in 2025, is that I did not need to. I never wrote some stupid observation just because I wanted to get something up on one particular day. Oh, I wrote stupid observations, don't get me wrong -- they were just organic in nature, not forced. In other words, I never wrote a post for any other reason than that it tickled that same place in me that tickles Jerry Seinfeld every time he writes a "Did you ever notice ..." joke.

The streak ended on a weekend out of town to go a water park with my kids. We alternate between the two big ones in Victoria, and we missed last year entirely, so it had been three years since we'd been to Adventure Park in Geelong. That itself wasn't the reason the streak ended, because I had plenty of time to do computer things in the hotel room. But maybe not watching a movie on either Friday or Saturday night -- it's hard to watch a movie when you're sharing a room with two kids who are going to bed by 10:30 -- meant that I didn't have any new material occurring to me organically.

Actually, I am writing this post on the 66th day -- though of course it doesn't count as the 66th straight post, because I can only post a post like this after the 66th day passes. I did wait for long enough to ensure I didn't have something else to write about. Nope, this is it.

Because I think it will really feel stupid to write yet another post on this blog to mark the end of a consecutive day streak of blogging, I'm really hoping this 65-day streak holds. However, what evidence do I really have that it won't happen again? The end of one year, start of the next is always a fruitful time for me. I know I'm going to get excited and write a lot of things about movies, whether you want to read them or not. Who's to say I won't start another one at the end of this year and it will run, I don't know, 79 days?

I suppose if that does happen, I will have to write about it again -- and think of yet a third variation on this subject, because another rule I have is never to repeat a subject.

It's a bit of a relief now that it's over. But the fruitfulness will likely continue. In fact, as I am now finishing this post on the actual day I'm posting it, I thought of two more things to write about while watching Scott Cooper's Antlers last night. I'm not sure if either of them really rises to the level of post-worthy, though -- even with the minimal standards I apply to that. 

Tune in tomorrow, I guess, to see what I decided. After all, I still have the record number of posts written in a calendar year -- 264 in 2010 -- to shoot for. 

The challenge of rewriting

To this day, one of my greatest triumphs as a writer came back when I was in college, even if no one other than myself and my professor knew about it. Come to think of it, he would have no idea what I went through, only that he gave the final product an A.

I was writing a paper for a class that combined film theory and literary theory, and I got off on completely the wrong track with it. It was one of two major papers for the term and I could not afford to screw it up.

After I'd written more than half of it -- probably at least 2,000 words -- I decided I needed to scrap my approach and start off with a new one. It was a radical move and it worked like gangbusters. Yep, I got that A. 

This stands out in my memory not because I got the A. I did get my fair share of those. Rather, it's because of how rarely I've done something like that. We writers -- many of us, anyway -- usually adhere to the sunk cost fallacy, which is that if we've already dedicated significant time and effort to something, we are very unlikely to change horses midstream. There comes a certain point where you are pot committed, to use another economic metaphor, and however it's going to be received, you have to continue along the course you've started. 

As a critic, I almost never rewrite anything. In fact, I am far more likely not to write the review at all if I think it's not going well -- something that's an easier choice since I am my own editor, and (usually) there is little consequence to aborting halfway through. I think of the review I tried to write for my favorite comedy (so far) of 2024, Jerry Seinfeld's Unfrosted, and how after about two paragraphs, I was not saying what I wanted to say. I think I did intend to ultimately shape it up into something publishable -- after all, two paragraphs is more like 400 words than 2,000 -- but time got away from me, as time does, and before long I'd missed my window.

When I am reviewing something I watched via a screener I got from a publicist, though, there is not the option to abandon it unpublished -- not if you intend to keep getting screeners from that publicist. This was the case with The Dead Don't Hurt, as you may remember from Monday's post, which also discussed how there was a major aspect of the film's structure that I did not understand while watching it. (I blame the distracted viewing of the Christmas season, especially as we are also preparing for a three-week trip to the States.)

As also discussed, I did watch the movie again, across Monday night and Tuesday afternoon, hoping to see just how much of a dunce I was to have missed this core aspect of the script, and hoping that I would just amend an author's note to the review I'd already written. 

After that viewing, in which the film climbed a half-star in my assessment -- and it might have been a full star if I still didn't sort of blame the film for not making this device clear enough to me -- I decided I liked it enough more that I owed it more than an author's note attached to a flawed review.

So I did indeed rewrite it, and that left me with the following question:

How do I actually do this?

I knew there were some observations in that review that I was still proud of, and the plot synopsis was mostly sturdy. But the connective tissue had a backhanded compliment, or even sometimes outright critical, aspect to it, and so I'd likely have to reword even within the passages that I thought were still relevant. 

So what I did was copy the whole thing into a new Word document, and just see where I went. 

I decided to incorporate the content of the proposed author's note into a new opening paragraph. I don't usually like to use the first person in my reviews -- I probably only include the word "I" in one of every ten reviews, and sometimes I might go six months without doing so -- but I thought this was a situation that called for it. Because not getting this essential thing about The Dead Don't Hurt was, in fact, relevant to the movie I had watched and reviewed the first time, and I thought my audience deserved to know about it, if only to prevent them from having to watch it twice to get all they could out of it. (Because if they didn't get all they could out of it, they'd never bother to watch it again.)

The confessional first part went simply, as writing in that mode comes pretty easily to me, given how much practice I get on this blog. It also allowed me to take the piss out of myself a little bit, which was warranted.

Then I transitioned into a modified version of my opening thoughts from my first review on the overall feel of the film. The plot synopsis survived mostly intact, though I chose to change certain things that might now be considered spoilers, given what I'd already said about the film's non-linear narrative. (That was the thing I didn't get. I know, I'm a dummy.)

The rest of the review needed to lose my references to certain things feeling abrupt, because that was no longer relevant -- or I no longer saw it as a weakness, anyway, now that I had an explanation. And that allowed me to replace that material with some thoughts on Viggo Mortensen's performance, which stood out to me a lot more on the second viewing, while still staying within 200 words of my original word count. 

The piece closed with comments that were exclusively positive, rather than the negative note of the previous one, even though both of the ratings had still been overall positive. (Incidentally, the movie also moved up more than 30 spots on my in-progress rankings of 2024 films.)

In the end, the task I had been dreading was accomplished entirely within the length of a 25-minute train ride home from work. Which is good, because I'm busy as hell right now, particularly yesterday, when I still had to create and finalize our Christmas cards after getting home (and attain my wife's approval of the photo choices and design) before going to play tennis. If the former wasn't completed before the latter, we might miss another precious day to still receive the cards in time to have our recipients get them before Christmas.

You never read the first review, but if you want to read this version, it's here. 

It was useful to have to do this, as it lowers my fear of the prospect of having to rewrite something in the future. 

What's more, it shows me something I didn't know before this as it relates to my 20-year-old self:

I've still got it. 

Residual enthusiasm and productivity

Note: I wrote this post more than five weeks ago, expecting it would post within a week. The reason it didn't is more proof of what I'm writing about. So I will leave the original text intact and add parenthetical responses written today, March 10th, in bold.

It's funny how cyclical blog writing can be.

A little over a year ago (more than 14 months ago now) I wrote a post in which I marvelled about the productive year 2020 just completed, in which I wrote more posts than all but one other year in the history of this blog. Then later in 2021, my updates got so infrequent that I wondered why I was even still doing this -- resulting in fewer posts than all other years but one since 2013, and third lowest overall. 

Well, as the cycle I alluded to in the opening sentence of this post would indicate, I'm back again. (Boy am I ever.)

There have only been 69 days so far in 2022, and I've posted on 65 of them. 

Posts are always in heavy supply at the start of the year, since that's when movies are most front-and-center in my life -- even more than usual -- as I look back on the year just completed. That's no guarantee, though, that I'll keep writing at such a furious pace after I officially move on to the new year. (Such a furious pace.)

But this year there has been residual enthusiasm and productivity -- even if those posts are just a case of writing about that very enthusiasm and productivity, like this one.

As I write this, it can go up no sooner than two days from now, as I already have a post in the can for tomorrow. (Remember, I never post more than once per day.) (Which is why I kept saving this one until I didn't have something else written that I needed to post first.) It might be longer, though (more than a month longer), as who knows what tonight's viewing might inspire me to post -- not tomorrow, but the day after that. I've also got another post in the can that just needs to go up sometime in February. (Note: This parenthetical comment is being added about a week later, when I have six -- yes, six -- posts currently in the can.) (I was already adding parenthetical future comments back then.) 

I assume I will be posting the post I'm currently writing in February, but at this point, who knows. (Nope. March 10th.)

And to give you an indication of that uncertainty, I've written the earlier sentence in this post as "There have only been xx days so far in 2022, and I've posted on xx of them." I hope I remember to update that before I post this. (Yup. Remembered.)

I suppose calling it residual enthusiasm from the end of the year would be correct on some level, but 2022 has excited me in a whole bunch of new ways. Not only do I have my recurring series, Audient Bollywood and Settling the Scorsese, but I've also determined to post all my previous film rankings from before I started this blog, as a way of backing them up permanently, so a hard drive crash (and a failure of my primary backup) don't leave them lost out there in the ether.

Those posts require some additional analysis and computing of numbers, so they give me something to work on even when I'm not aiming to post them the next day. Then there's also the accompanying project, which is rewatching all my previous #1s in 2022 in order to rank them at the end of the year.

So never fear, Audient readers. I'm not closing up shop anytime soon.

And I need to remember this post the next time I have one of my inevitable droughts. Because movies always come back around again, don't they?

Lifelong passions are not easy to squelch, and a writer writes -- in my case more than most. (Understatement of the year.) I'm at the point now where I feel like if I don't write at least a thousand words a day, I'm not fully satisfying the deep urge to write that most writers feel. They feel it even if they are not always in a position to write, or even if they sort of hate writing on some level. (Hating writing obviously doesn't apply to me.) Writing is a complicated passion. 

Film is a more uncomplicated passion, and it is a resource that gives forever. There's no getting to the end of watching movies. 

So until blogs are just such a ridiculously archaic form that only the most self-absorbed TV characters still pursue, and that's the TV writers' idea of a joke, there will still be posts on The Audient. (Though possibly not tomorrow, as the well has run dry at the moment. And though I'm never more than an idea away from my next post, I'm going to Sydney this weekend, so it could be a few days off you get from The Audient -- finally.)

The end of a record Audient streak

Only 13 months ago, this blog celebrated its tenth birthday with a whimper. I wrote about how I didn't know if I was still producing any useful material, and hinted at an uncertainty about continuing in an age in which blogs are mostly ignored in favor of video (YouTube) or shorter form (Twitter) content.

Well, screw that noise, I guess.

Just yesterday I finished the most prolific period of writing in this blog's now 11-year history. Actually, I should say, the period is not finished, but a break in the action has given me a chance to reflect on it.

The first break in the action in 41 days.

If you've been reading this blog for some time, you may know I have a practice of never posting more than once in a single day. In prolific times, when a lot of different movie thoughts are leaping from my brain into my fingers, this sometimes means I hold back several written pieces at once, until a day without something else planned opens up on my calendar.

Never before, though, have I written something on this blog for 40 consecutive days without a single missed day.

That record streak ended just yesterday, when no new piece traveled from my brain into my fingers on the day after Valentine's Day, even though it was a Saturday, meaning I had more time than usual to write something.

Actually, truth be told, I wrote the post you're reading now yesterday, in anticipation of the fact that I wouldn't write anything yesterday. That's not a Catch-22. As I sensed how long this streak was going, I knew I would write a piece like this whenever it finished. But I could only post it once a day had elapsed without me publishing something. Knowing that would finally happen on Saturday, I got writing.

I don't know that posts on 40 consecutive days is any great feat in the grand scheme of things, as there are likely blogs that dutifully post new content every single day of the year. But me, I've never forced it. Oh, I could have written something yesterday and the streak could have kept going, but I didn't have anything I really wanted to talk about. And only rarely, to break long streaks of inactivity, have I ever forced writing something just for the sake of publishing something new.

The news here is really that for nearly a month-and-a-half, I never had to force it. Each day -- and sometimes for many days in advance -- I had plenty to write about, movie-related thoughts scampering around in my brain and demanding to be committed to permanence, or whatever kind of permanence the internet provides. Thirteen months ago, I never would have imagined that my most fruitful sustained period of writing on this blog still lay ahead of me.

A perfect storm of cinema-related happenings surely assisted with this. From the point when the streak began on January 6th, I had the end of my viewing year to discuss, followed quickly by my posting of my best of 2019 and the two posts that traditionally follow that one. That was immediately followed by three best-of-the-decade posts. Since it was the start of a new year, I also had two separate posts announcing my new monthly and bi-monthly viewing series, plus two actual installments of the former. The Oscars were earlier than usual this year, meaning I then turned my thoughts to them, plus there were also three prominent people who died during this period who I wanted to memorialize. Finally, the period ended with Valentine's Day, a day I always try to recommend some romantic movie to my readers.

At my busiest and most backed up, I had as many as six posts waiting to be published. Now granted, some of those were long-term works in progress, best of the year and best of the decade posts that can't be written in one day. But there were times when I didn't know if I'd ever post certain things I'd written, which were delayed as long as two weeks after I originally wrote them, while other, more urgent material surfaced. At times I felt like a newspaper editor trying to figure out which needed to post now and which could wait for a slower period, without anything losing its sense of timeliness.

It's hard to say what my previous record was, because I broke regularly enough in my updating of this blog that it was never something I had any reason to keep track of. But just scanning the history of this blog, something that is easy enough to do because the total number of posts in each month appear next to it in parenthesis, there were only a few months where I wrote even within three posts of the total number of days in that month, and that never occurred in consecutive months. That pretty much rules out anything over 30 in a row, and my longest streak was surely closer to 20.

Well, it's over now.

That's a joke of sorts -- clearly I am still in this period, effectively. And I could easily start a new streak today and be backed up by three posts only a day or two from now.

But I think it's nice to pause and recognize that this blog is not as dead as I passively proclaimed it last January. Movies have continued to stimulate my writing brain, sometimes more than I can handle, sometimes so urgently that I need to sit down right then and there and write what I'm thinking.

It may still not produce your favorite content to read, but it's keeping me plenty busy and satisfied.

Hallelujah.

How not to write a synopsis

As a guy who's done a lot of film writing in my day, I've also synopsized a lot of movies.

And by this I don't mean I've summarized the plot of a lot of movies -- that's not the point of a synopsis. If you want that -- and I sometimes do, if I've been falling to sleep during the second half of a movie -- wikipedia usually has excellently detailed outlines of movie plots from beginning to end (even if they are not always excellently written). The spoiler alert is assumed.

The synopsis is really to give readers a taste of what the movie is about -- to give them about what the trailer gives them, assuming it's a trailer with the standard level of exposition. Roughly approximated, it's about as much information as you would learn in the first ten or fifteen minutes of the movie -- who the characters are, and what their (overt) goals seem to be.

And so it's very important not to write a synopsis based on information you could have only gleaned by watching the whole movie. If you're going to synopsize a movie for public consumption after you've seen it, you have to be oh-so-careful to remember what information you learned, when.

This is why I'm pulling out an example from one of my own former colleagues for this post. It's not because he's a bad guy (in fact I don't know him personally), and I actually think he can be quite a strong writer. It's because he pretty much blew some of the key surprises about Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol by failing to adhere to this simple synopsizing protocol (if you will). (But because I don't want to throw him under the bus, I'm not going to name him or the site name in this post.)

And because this plot synopsis will constitute a spoiler for those of you who haven't seen the movie, I'm going to invite anyone in that category to stop reading right now.

Okay, we good?

Actually, there's really only one sentence in his synopsis that's relevant to today's discussion, so I'll include only that. (Which will also make it less likely that you'll track down who I'm talking about.) Here's what he wrote:

"As the movie opens, Ethan Hunt (played once again by Tom Cruise) is busted out of a Russian jail, where he was imprisoned for taking revenge for the apparent death of his wife (Michelle Monaghan)."

If you've seen the movie (and I'm assuming everyone who's still reading has, or doesn't care if they haven't), you know that there are actually three violations of synopsizing etiquette in this sentence. In possible order of their magnitude:

1) At the beginning of the movie, we know only that Hunt was in a Russian prison. We have no idea why he was there until much later, when it is part of a key reveal in the plot.

2) That key reveal is that his wife was killed, and he took revenge on those who killed her. However, this reveal probably does not come until an hour in, at which point, we are supposed to take it at face value. Plot synopses are all about the parts of the plot we are supposed to take at face value. So even if her death was revealed in the first 15 minutes, and therefore appropriate as part of a synopsis, you wouldn't want to call it an "apparent" death -- that only signals to the reader that things are not as they seem. (Imagine synopsizing The Sixth Sense and referring to Bruce Willis' character as "a psychiatrist who may or may not be alive.")

3) By giving Michelle Monaghan's name in parentheses, you are essentially telling the reader she appears in this movie -- something that doesn't occur until its final five minutes. Sure, you could just be reminding the reader of what he/she knows from Mission: Impossible III, but unless an actor or actress appears in the cast of the current movie, parenthetically mentioning them in connection with a character name is misleading at best. (Of course, she could have been killed in the opening of this movie, but once they start watching, viewers will quickly realize that's not the case -- and have the rest of the movie tarnished for them at that point.)

People who write about film for a public audience have such a sacred responsibility to respect the intentions of the filmmakers, not to mention create the best possible circumstances for a viewer to receive and benefit from those intentions, that I can't help but write about this. I know that my appreciation of this incredibly fun action movie would have been severely compromised if I'd read this synopsis before I saw the movie.

So I hate to single you out, So-and-So from Such-and-Such website. But my own intentions are only good ones. And if you do happen to read this, maybe it'll help make you a better synopsizer -- and help save some of your readers from having future movies casually spoiled through careless writing.