When the Cheshire emerges...

Because THAT'S how excited I am about this. I've written about films for 5 years now, taking in studies and my contributions to Cut Print Review - but the past week's events have conjured what I think is just sheer luck.
I volunteered to fill in as film reviewer for the Daily Liberal over the summer break after our regular movie guy applied for stress leave ahead of his New Year holidays, right? I figured that's something my editor shouldn't have to worry about filling for the period. Plus I wanted to have a crack at newspaper reviews. Which I realised did have a slightly different structure to what I had become used to.

Tomorrow's edition with my latest review

My first review was New Year's Eve last week (average, 2.5/5)... I found out two nights later that said movie guy had actually resigned. I mention something to my editor about Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol yesterday and he turns to me and says "So it looks like you'll have the full-time job." Although under unfortunate circumstances I end up being offered the gig.
I am now proud to say I'm the film critic of the Central West - my reviews carry to the Western Advocate in Bathurst and Central Western Daily in Orange. Woah.

I do admit, I felt more in place writing this week's review - I knew more about how I wanted to structure what I was saying, and I knew to find a picture too for the sub-editors too!

Then something that totally rocked my world.

My editor knows I've written for CPR (although not the Cannes part) and I'm really into film. Today I asked whether he needed a draft printout like everything else we submit, and he just said no because he trusted that it would be fine. Double woah. That's made me feel pretty confident I'm on the right track with my (general writing and) filmic analyses - which I value perhaps more than anything else I write at this point in time.



So with this week's major new release, I accepted my own mission. Having never seen all three of the previous films I watched MI1 on Tuesday and 2/3 in a double on Wednesday. While part of this purpose was to do mini-reviews as a breakout piece [subsequently not published for lack of space :( ], I didn't want to go in blind. And what FUN the series is! While 2 and 3 aren't as strong, there's still certain elements that stick out - namely the character development which always works in its favour. And while it's a shame to see Tom Cruise now that much older-looking, he still has this role down. But the first one's still the best, that really took me by surprise.

So here's the review close-up-ish if you can read it :D

If you've seen it - do you agree? Disagree? Always appreciate the feedback!