The 2019 Raymo Awards

It's been a year of few real standouts in film evidenced, to me at least, by seeing only 36 movies at the cinema - the first was Mary Poppins Returns and the last being Jumanji: The Next Level and in a log of ways that sums up the year. Unnecessary sequels and/or remakes.

Most of you would be aware by now that a score of 7/10 is seen as the minimum for a pass - now 7 can be a good score as much as it can be a bad one. Interestingly 28 of my 36 received 7 or more but only 10 scored 8 or higher. That tells me the quality was down.

So here's my top 5 of 2019, unsurprisingly dominated by Marvel.

1. Captain Marvel (9/10)
Very much a polarising character if you believe the internet, Captain Marvel was as big a risk as Guardians, Ant-Man or Doctor Strange and I thought they nailed it. Brie Larson and Samuel L Jackson teamed up so well and the 1990s backdrop paved the way for a great soundtrack. It came with plenty riding on it to complete the Avengers Infinity War/Endgame tie in and it's just great fun too.

2. Ford v Ferrari (9/10)
Definitely didn't expect this Matt Damon/Christian Bale story about the 1966 Le Mans battle for supremacy between the two motor companies to be as outstanding as it turned out. Aided by two superb performances, especially Bale, it's much more about the stories of Ken Miles (Bale) and Carroll Shelby (Damon) than it is about car racing itself. Though the scenes of the actual race are awesome. Be surprised if it's not in a lot of people's lists.

3. Spider-Man Far From Home (9/10)
The second Spider-Man film in the MCU was just as fun as the first and it had the job of kicking off the post-Endgame era. They stacked plenty in, from the duplicitous Mysterio to showing Peter's struggle with being a hero and wanting to just be a teenager for a while and the big reveals at the end. Can't wait for number 3.

4. Avengers: Endgame (8.5/10)
Now this is a controversial one. My original score on first viewing was 8.5 but having seen it a few times more it'd be easily my number one but I go with first impression here. Endgame was a massive undertaking and it worked, despite the always risky time travel plot, and it works more each time you see it. And the soundtrack over the 'signs offs' in the credits is perfect. I do fear the MCU might have peaked but we won't really know until 2021.

5. Ben Is Back (8.5/10)
I love a solid dramatic film and 2019 lacked them noticeably. This one, though, was a ripper. Lucas Hedges is Ben, a drug addict who returns home claiming to be sober much to the disdain of his home town. His mother Holly (Julia Roberts) has to walk the line between wanting it to be true and knowing even if it is it won't last and dealing with the consequences. More of this in 2020 please!.

Honourable mentions: Coming in sixth was Green Book (8.5), which I noted was the year's first great film, Joker (8/10) would have gone higher in hindsight. Brilliant. Rocketman, Hotel Mumbai and Stan & Ollie (all 8/10) are worth seeing for different reasons too.

Surprise of the year: Parasite (7/10) - wouldn't have thought I'd find a Korean film so interesting and it could have gone higher had it not been far too long. It's essentially a story about a family living in poverty gradually taking over the lives of a rich family (hence the name).

Flop of the year (note I didn't see Cats): Us (5/10). Not remotely scary, or even gripping, with a twist you can see coming a mile off. Interesting enough premise, and solid lead performance, but in no way did it live up to the hype.

The film I wanted to like more: Knives Out (7.5/10) gained a respectable score and was quite an entertaining whodunnit. But the way it played out ultimately cost it the higher score I was expecting to give. Great cast, some excellent performances but just proved a bit too smart for its own good.

Letdowns: Most of them are remakes or belated sequels like Hobbs & Shaw, Rambo: Last Blood, Terminator: Dark Fate and Men In Black International (though I kinda expected it to be garbage).

What does 2020 hold? I really hope there are some hidden gems out there because the release list is looking very light on quality and high on more of those sequels/reboots. Wonder Woman 1984, Top Gun Maverick and Ghostbusters Afterlife come to mind. Fast & Furious 9 needs to be good too. There's also Black Widow, which I expect to be excellent, and The Eternals will be another risk for Marvel.

Surrounded

I read somewhere recently that it's difficult to stop/quit something if you continue to surround yourself with it.
Makes plenty of sense.
Of course there's probably situations where that's a bit difficult.
Fortunately for me there's one thing I know isn't good for me that I'm trying to give up - by trying I guess I'm saying I want to but am finding it hard to actually do it - and that's certainly not the case.
I might write a bit more about all this after Christmas as I'm about to head back to the home town for a few days.

Talk Hard

'Jam me, Jack me, Push me, Pull me. Talk Hard'.

I can't talk. It doesn't come naturally.

You would think once one has reached what's considered middle age that the art of conversation would be relatively easy.

But like the teenager depicted in the 1990 film Pump Up The Volume, starring Christian Slater as a repressed high school student who is an underground DJ by night and gains a cult following for raising real issues, talking doesn't come naturally.

And it is holding me back. I think.

We all know people who can just talk the legs off a chair. It doesn't matter the topic, there doesn't need to be a topic, they can go and go and go.

Now there are a few things that I can talk at length about, but in general when it comes to conversation I find it very hard. I don't know how interesting I am. Or how interested others are in what I have to say.

Then there's the question of how much I am willing to reveal.

Talk hard. That's the message of Slater's Hard Harry to the kids of Hubert Humphrey High. Rise up, don't keep things inside.

"We're all worried, we're all in pain. That comes with having eyes and having ears. But just remember one thing. It can't get any worse, it can only get better."

Now we have Twitter, Facebook, Instagram etc etc but looking around it doesn't seem to me that the world has changed as far as teenagers go in the last 30 years.

Of course, I'm not a teenager. Maybe I should have listened to Hard Harry a bit more myself.

Simplifying isn't as simple as it sounds

Over the past month or so I've been consuming some information through various platforms about simplifying life, establishing good habits for myself and trying to enjoy the world more.
It's much easier said than done.
The plan has been to de-clutter my room as a start point and other areas of the house. Not made a lot of progress there so far.
I know I have some bad habits and I've been pretty successful (touch wood) so far in shaking off one of them, for the second time, but I guess I'm still in the danger zone.
I've been listening to the Minimalists podcasts since I watched their documentary which explains what minimalism is and how two guys changed from having lives of excess to, as they put it, living with less.
One idea that has stood out for me is that if you're trying to stop something then you need to stop surrounding yourself with it. I'm putting that idea into practice in one particular area.
There's no doubt that I must change things.
Why is it that the bad habits, or certainly unhelpful ones, stick to you like leeches and good habits slide off like you're made of teflon?
Recently I joined the gym and have so far made a good fist of going a few times a week. Small steps first. The gym is a place I don't feel comfortable in, there's still the 25 year old me inside that wants to look as good as most of the people I see in that place and he's hard to let go of.
In reality I can't be an extremely fit 25 year old ever. Not unless I invent, or come across, a time machine.
In a way it's hard to let go of that thought. I have a couple of restrictions that will make significant physical change in the gym difficult but hopefully over the next six months I can see some improvement.
I'm likely to move house some time in the new year so a bit of decluttering early on can only be a good thing. Undoubtedly I have plenty of 'things' I don't need, that don't give me any real joy or add value to life.
The biggest challenge I face is myself.
I was reading Mark Manson's book 'The Subtle Art Of Not Giving A F**k' and aside from being very easy to read he makes a lot of sense in his own un-subtle way.
Some time ago I faced what I'd call a major life hurdle and I let it beat me for quite a number of years. In the book he talks about challenges and how we respond to them. Some people face them head on, and come through them stronger. Others (like me) let themselves be overpowered and as a result find things like change difficult to navigate.
Here's to the first step towards making change a little easier....