As always, I drift away for months at a time. For the last few weeks, maybe even months, I have been wondering why I haven’t paid a visit to my own blog to write and to expel some thoughts form my brain. I swear, I am going to make a more concerted effort to do so.

To motivate myself to write more, I figure I needed a cause.

The passing of Roger Ebert affected me more than I had expected it to. Now, I am not talking about the sheer shock and dismay that was felt when The news of Heath Ledger broke. Roger Ebert had been sick for some time, yet he had continued his work right up until he could not physically do it any longer. It wasn’t until last week that it really kicked in. I was looking for a movie to waste a Friday night on. I pulled up my standard sites and apps for reviews of the new and breaking film releases and realized that Roger Ebert was no longer there.

Back when I started making films, I began to follow Ebert’s reviews as I slowly learned that they mirrored my tastes in film, in terms of quality, classic taste, as well as popcorn fare. Roger Ebert knew when a movie was just a movie and when a film was art. I would read review after review and my opinions on those same movies often times aligned perfectly. He became my go to critic when it was time to head to the theater. …and I will watch anything, but when it comes to spending hard earned money, I want to make sure that I am getting my money’s worth. Let’s face it. Some movies are made for the big screen. Others are made for television and now, iPad consumption. Django Unchained for example. That’s meant to be watched on a big screen. Sure, it’s entertaining on a small screen, but those visuals, and that cinematography is meant to be on a giant theater screen.

So there was my dilemma. Do I go see Pain and Gain, or do I save my money? I headed over to Rotten Tomatoes and there was no review there that could really help me. I need to find a new critic to align myself with, but nowadays, film critics aren’t the same as they used to be. You now have a world of Internet based critics with little or no film background who do enjoy movies, but are they truly qualified to be critics? You have your genre based websites giving you what is a somewhat jaded and biased opinion based on their tastes in the respective geek culture. Then, you have your magazine critics who are somewhat behind the times and may have been relevant twenty years ago, but their tastes have soured and can be somewhat influenced by advertising dollars.

Roger Ebert, whether you agreed with his opinions or not, was a people’s critic. If it was popcorn fluff, but a good time, he told you so. If it stunk, he let you know.

I order to motivate myself to write, I’m going to attempt to maintain some sort of review ethic and code and sit and force myself to write while I watch. I watch a lot. I read a lot. I need to write more. Last summer I began to write a few reviews of movies I had recently rewatched, and titled them Re-Views. I’m going to do my best to maintain that trend and return to the classics, old and new and fill this blog with opinions, some film lore and just anything else I can say in order to keep the juices flowing.

I neglect my blog. I’m ashamed to admit it. It’s hard to build ones brand when you aren’t providing content. So, my goal this year… Almost five months in, is to provide content. You may agree with me, you may not. I may write things that make you curl your eyebrows and tense your loins. That’s fine with me. At least I am doing something.

If you aren’t writing, you aren’t a writer.