Preparation

Gosh, now that that holiday-born story is all done it's time to get back to the regular roll of Quirky Muffins until the second summer holiday swings into action. However, today time is pressed, as a particularly length commentary podcast is due to be recorded this evening, so this post might be less whimsical than most.

It takes a lot of effort to prepare for some fan commentaries, and tonight's is a classical example for it is 'The Great Race', which has a duration of 159 minutes. Just watching it to make notes is an effort! But we persevere anyway. The note-taking for preparation is sometimes the worst chore of the whole business, in that you have to concentrate and watch the whole thing through without multi-tasking or being distracted at all, and think about the production on several levels. None of us are trained for single-minded watching or reading of things any more. In any case, the ideas we have to tackle are probably common to typical film reviewing, and include:

The superficial product that you can see;
Underlying concepts and themes;
Unusual structures and formats;
Production design;
Effectiveness and quality.

On top of those things, we also have to put on the Film Bin thematic topic, which is the following question:

"Do we think it is better than it is or was believed to be?".

That question is, after all, part of the original remit of Film Bin Commentaries. In actuality it normally ends up being a long commentary on the wallpaper and moustaches but the intention is there. There will be lots to talk about with 'The Great Race' at least, the most expensive comedy made to date at the time, and a legendary critical failure. How it could be a critical failure is hard to say, but it was certainly ahead of its time on a multitude of levels, and films ahead of their times are often critical and box office failures.

Fortunately the 'Civilization IV' run is now over and work is pressing back into the plans. For the initiated I seem to mesh very well with Hatshepsut of the Egyptians and Gandhi of the Indians. Very spiritual and peaceful. This means that massive amounts of time will be liberated for non-ridiculous reasons and work will resume. Hmmm, suddenly 'Civilization IV' seems more engaging again, if only because the sunny heat wave is continuing. It's so blazing hot out there that even a few seconds could reduce a person to a sweaty mess.

O.