2023 Insights
Written by Andreas Babiolakis
2023 is here, and we hope you’ve all had a great holiday season! The first thing I will do concerning Films Fatale is go through my anticipated films and series in the next couple of days, so you can look forward to those. In the meantime, I want to take the opportunity to set the tone for the year a little bit. The last couple of years have been all about various projects, particularly best-of lists.
Yeah. I want to return to some sort of normalcy.
When I started Films Fatale, I wanted to be up-to-date with films and television series, and I’ve tried to maintain that since 2019 (New Years Day is our anniversary, by the way, and Films Fatale is now four!). As I’ve taken on a heap of large scale projects, that has sidelined how contemporary I am while overloading my plate with the amount of work I have to do. I’ve accomplished the majority of the lists I’ve wanted to, and so I feel comfortable with where we’re at with them (I will definitely be tailoring and updating them whenever I see fit, so you’ll be seeing this happen occasionally in the future). The idea was I felt as though readers would expect this kind of content, and these lists are still incredibly popular to this day, so I wasn’t exactly wrong. I don’t have to devote years of my life to making them again, mind you, so now we can move on.
Secondly, I wanted to make Films Fatale a place for television-based content as well, and I admittedly had to do a lot of homework there (I was far less fluent in TV series than I am in cinema). I feel as though there is still a bit of work to be done in that department, but that can be fulfilled throughout the year (for instance, I think there should be more television content but am unsure as to what that will look like yet). Nonetheless, I feel like this is underway, and am at a place I’m happy-enough with in order to progress forwards.
So what does all of this meandering mean? I want Films Fatale to be all about the weekly reviews, updates, and insights again. Additionally, I will be entertaining the idea of lists both large and small (they do very well on the site, after all), as well as the reintroduction of masterclass lessons and other academic materials (these are also quite popular on Films Fatale). However, I still need to do some housekeeping before we go underway with all of this (naturally), and that comes in the form of catching up with all of the awards season films I have yet to review (if someone else from Films Fatale hasn’t reviewed them yet, anyway). During the Academy Awards season, we rank every single category’s nominees whilst having our reviews on hand to reflect upon (so, naturally, we need to have a review of every single nominated film). The idea is that we will have (at least nearly) every review already completed before the awards season, so we don’t have to backtrack, but there’s still at least a bit of backtracking needed this year. So we will cover these films before the nominations come out (if our predictions are good enough), or when the nominees are announced (if we missed them).
I want Films Fatale to keep thriving and growing, and I wish to return to our regularly scheduled programming after this year’s awards season (if not even sooner). We’ve got a lot in store for you all and I feel like this site has found its identity and footing. Now, it’s time to solidify Films Fatale as a go-to hub for all things film on a regular basis. That is my resolution for 2023, and I hope to pull this off.
Additionally, we’ll be reintroducing On-This-Day Thursday and Perfect Reception, so let’s get some more requests in for both columns:
We hope you have a good year! Let’s keep the love of cinema alive.
Andreas Babiolakis has a Masters degree in Film and Photography Preservation and Collections Management from Toronto Metropolitan University, as well as a Bachelors degree in Cinema Studies from York University. His favourite times of year are the Criterion Collection flash sales and the annual Toronto International Film Festival.