A Genteel Black Hole

My year of Project Glowing Rectangle is officially over! Back in late August last year I made the conscious decision to replace some of my doomscrolling time with a more nourishing oblong: cinema.

During my twenties, it wasn’t unusual for me to watch over 100 films in a year, but for various reasons my film-viewing habit dried up in my mid-thirties. I’m happy to say Project Glowing Rectangle has successfully revived it. I saw a total of 75 films in the year of PGR. For comparison, in calendar year 2024 I watched a grand total of 16. In 2022 it went as low as 11! In fact, the last time I saw more films in a calendar year was 2017, with a total of 108.

Watching more films helped me reduce my doomscrolling time. More importantly, it enabled me to process my emotions and nourish my soul with some great films. And if I happened to see a disappointing film here and there, it didn’t matter as much; a better one will be on the way soon enough.

I don’t feel the need to continue tracking PGR into a second year. Now that I’ve successfully revived my love of cinema, the habit should take care of itself, much like my reading does. Future film stats will stick to the calendar year. But here, if you’re at all interested, are the final stats for Project Glowing Rectangle.