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sjrresearch · 4 years

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“Greyhound” On Target: A Review Of Tom Hanks’ New World War II Naval Drama

Coming on the heels of the successful 2019 naval epic “Midway,” Tom Hanks’ equally intense and exciting “Greyhound” is on target as it chronicles a harrowing 52-hour running battle between an Allied supply convoy’s escorts and a German U-Boat pack across a remote, undefended region of the North Atlantic during World War II.

The fictional story is set in February 1942 and follows the USS Keeling (DD 548), a U.S. Navy Fletcher-class destroyer codenamed “Greyhound,” and its captain, Commander Ernest Krause, as he leads a multinational escort fleet comprising his vessel, the two British destroyers Harry and Eagle, and the Canadian Corvette Dickie. Their mission is to protect the 37-ship Convoy HX-25 from Halifax to Liverpool as it runs the U-Boat gauntlet.

Greyhound was shot aboard the USS Kidd, pictured above.

The USS Kidd stands in for the fictional USS Keeling (Greyhound) in the movie.

This was a daunting task during that early phase of the war, with America having only entered it two months before with a small, unprepared navy and obsolete technology. The Keeling’s radar and sonar are balky, its window wipers freeze up, it’s low on fuel, and the warship does not carry enough depth charges for the job. Moreover, the wintry heavy seas of the North Atlantic are unforgiving, forcing Krause and most of his crew to fight on the Keeling’s weather deck and weapons stations while soaking wet and shivering cold. There is no air cover either since that part of the deep ocean was beyond the reach of Allied land-based anti-submarine aircraft. Naval planners formally named it the “Mid-Atlantic Gap” but sailors and merchant mariners simply called it the “Black Pit.”

An Allied convoy traverses the Atlantic in November 1942.

An Allied convoy crosses the Atlantic Ocean in the Tom Hanks movie.

While contending with the U-Boats, his ship’s limitations, and the environment, Krause himself also has to resolve an inner struggle with his personal frustrations, insecurities, inexperience, and even guilt in killing his German adversaries. In his forties, over-the-hill, and still a low ranking officer, he was the victim of the peacetime Navy’s practice of “fitting and retaining” competent officers by shuffling them from one administrative assignment to another during the 1920s and 1930s without ever assigning them to a sea command. Therefore, he is acutely aware that all eyes in the convoy are upon him since this is not only his first command but also his first combat crossing of the Atlantic.

Krause is emotionally hurting too since, in an early flashback, his girlfriend Evelyn had refused to move from San Francisco to the East Coast with him and accept his marriage proposal. Her explanation that “the world has gone crazy” and that she wanted to wait until they “could be together” rang hollow. What she was really worried about was getting married and then quickly becoming a widow, which a heartbroken Krause understands and accepts. As a consolation, she then gives him a toy destroyer to commemorate his first command at sea and a pair of monogrammed slippers to remember her by.

Krause perseveres under these multiple burdens by drawing upon his devout Christian faith, daily prayers, and a handbill that he has posted on the mirror in his cabin quoting Hebrews 13:8 from the Bible—“Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and forever.” Ultimately, Krause proves to be quick thinking, stalwart, and tactically brilliant, as seen during his first encounter with a U-Boat. Despite his problems, he falls back upon his training and intuition and successfully deduces his enemy’s circular dogfighting path to port, orders a rapid “right full rudder” to cut it off, and then destroys it with depth charges, much to the delight of his crew and British peers. While his men are celebrating their first kill, he takes no joy in his achievement, quietly mourning the deaths of the 50 German souls he had just sent to the bottom of the Atlantic.

This was just the beginning of the Keeling’s ordeal. Over the next two days, Krause, his crew, and the other escorts fight an increasingly desperate series of engagements with the U-Boats, which penetrate the thinly-stretched destroyer screen and pick off several of the merchantmen as they cross the Black Pit. The lead U-Boat commander, calling himself “Grey Wolf,” taunts the Allies with blood-curdling threats and predictions of their doom over the open radio frequencies. “You and your comrades will die today,” the mysterious German skipper warns Krause in his final rant.

The Grey Wolf’s cat-and-mouse game with the Keeling is both deadly and personal but Krause eventually succeeds in his mission though not without loss. Sleep-deprived and exhausted, Krause runs his feet bloody raw during his non-stop scrambling back and forth across the Keeling’s bridge and weatherdeck. He can barely walk before the climactic battle with his nemesis and finally replaces his stiff leather shoes with Evelyn’s lined, warm slippers, not only easing his physical pain but also comforting himself with her virtual presence in the midst of combat.

Hanks’ story of Krause follows closely that of Cecil Scott Forester’s original character in the 1955 novel The Good Shepherd, right down to the sonar and radar bearings, the same orders, and the same combat maneuvers, blow for blow, against the same U-Boats. One notable difference though is that Forester’s Krause is named “George” and he is much more damaged psychologically than “Ernie” in Hank’s film. In the book George Krause suffers overwhelming guilt from a broken marriage, his wife’s infidelity, and their divorce, as well as the professional shame of a stalled career and passed over promotions. He also has to deal with the awkwardness of commanding more experienced crew members and Allied captains in the convoy.

However, both George and Ernie reveal quiet inner strength that allows them to overcome their adversity and to win both their battles and the respect of their sailors. Each is “the man alone,” as Forester liked to call his prime characters, such as Horatio Hornblower, for whom the author is most famous. Indeed George and Ernie embody many of the introverted Hornblower’s traits, including his introspection, his dedication to duty, his discipline, his command brilliance, and his loneliness. Commander Krause is in effect Captain Hornblower in a World War II naval-setting, without the chronic sea sickness.

In his many books Forester (real name Cecil Louis Troughton) went to great lengths to portray his characters, their appearance, equipment, and customs and traditions in minute detail based on meticulous historical research. In 1943, the author was able to sail as a civilian aboard the Royal Navy light cruiser HMS Penelope as it patrolled the Mediterranean Sea. During that experience, he learned first-hand how a ship-of-war operated and made several key naval acquaintances who later served as advisors and proofreaders for his books, including the The Good Shepherd, as reflected in its exquisite accuracy.

Tom Hanks took Forester’s historical approach to heart in making Greyhound and consulted with Naval History Dr. Craig L. Symonds of the Naval War College and Marine Historian Gordon H. Laco to ensure that the film’s technical details and crew interactions and behavior were as historically accurate as possible. He toured the U.S. Naval Academy and filmed as much as he could aboard the USS Kidd (DD 661), the only remaining Fletcher-class destroyer still in existence in its World War II configuration, currently moored as a ship museum in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. According to Symonds, one point of contention was Hanks’ desire to portray a more familiar relationship with Mess Mate George Cleveland, a black sailor who feeds and looks out for his captain when not handling ammunition at his General Quarters gunnery station. Symonds told Hanks that this would have been impossible in the segregated World War II-era Navy which was dominated by hard-nosed, old school, class and race-conscious officers. Hanks resisted but Symonds insisted, so the producer met the historian half-way and split the difference in Greyhound, portraying Krause’s relationship with Cleveland as gentle but firm.

Other details are more authentic, from the uniforms and personal gear to the actual control knobs, lights, and wheels of the Keeling’s control panels and even its guns and their specific rates of fire. The burial at sea scene was also accurately done too, based on Navy regulations and customs of the period, which Hanks researched from the original archived manuals.

The shootout between one of Grey Wolf’s surfaced U-Boats and the Keeling and Dickie at mid-film is based on an actual close-quarters brawl between the Canadian destroyer HMCS Assiniboine and U-210 that occurred on August 6, 1942 while the Assiniboine was escorting Convoy SC-94. Both vessels had encountered each other by chance in the early morning mist and fog. Historian Gordon Laco described the action to USA Today, noting that “They were literally blasting each other with pistols, rifles, revolvers. The cook even came out of the galley and threw an empty case of Coca Cola bottles down the submarine hatch.”

U-210 photographed from Assiniboine's deck, 6 August 1942

There are a few inaccuracies though that should be noted. The USS Keeling itself never existed, since destroyer (DD) hull #548 was canceled before construction, and the first of the Fletcher-class warships did not launch until May 1942, three months after the events of Greyhound. It would have been more authentic to show the Keeling as an earlier Mahan-class destroyer, as Forester originally wrote it, but the Fletcher-class was likely chosen by Hanks because of the availability of the Kidd in Baton Rouge for filming. Further, radar and sonar technology was not quite as advanced as portrayed in the film, even though the U.S. Navy had been participating in convoy operations since early 1941, with the USS Reuben James (DD 245) sunk by U-552 near Iceland on October 31 of that year.

And although the Type VII U-Boats were the most widely used of the war, with 703 built, generally they would not have fought Allied warships on the surface in broad daylight unless it was absolutely necessary, the chance historical battle between the Assiniboine and U-210 notwithstanding. Considering that a U-Boat’s chance of avoiding detection and survival was already slim, stealth was its key weapon and the darkness its ally, as was portrayed in 1981’s German film ‘Das Boot.’

German U-boat U-848 is attacked by a U.S. Navy Consolidated PB4Y-1 Liberator in November 1943.

A German U-boat is besieged in the Tom Hanks Greyhound movie.

Additionally, it would have been suicidal for a U-Boat commander to openly taunt destroyers on open frequencies as shown in the film and thus reveal their presence and locations. Forester did reference one instance in The Good Shepherd in which a British officer refused to send Krause an important message over voice radio because “Jerry’s been on this circuit more than once during the night. He has an English-speaking rating who chips in with rude remarks, and I wouldn’t like him to hear this.” This is undoubtedly the source of Hank’s plotline with the Grey Wolf’s rather childish howling, which is historically implausible, since German naval officers of the period were thorough professionals and considered to be the elite of the Kriegsmarine. They tended to follow Kriegsmarine regulations to the letter, which required strict radio silence while stalking and attacking convoys. The submarine profession is not called the “silent service” for nothing. Consequently, there is no historical record of such taunting ever occurring, even though there are a couple of recorded incidents of U-Boats “blinking” distant destroyers with their signal lamps after dark.

And while we do catch a brief distant glimpse of a brave U-Boat captain fighting his submarine from his conning tower and his crewmen manning its guns during the Keeling-Dickie surface battle, it is also unfortunate that Hanks otherwise chose to depict the Germans collectively through the disembodied, sneering voice of the Grey Wolf, particularly in light of their more realistic portrayals in previous classic films like Das Boot and The Enemy Below.

Those nitpicks aside, Greyhound is an excellent film depicting the often neglected “Battle of the Atlantic,” which was in fact the longest continuous and most complex military campaign of World War II, running from 1939 to 1945. British Prime Minister Winston Churchill himself later wrote that “The only thing that really frightened me during the war was the U-boat peril. I was even more anxious about this battle than I had been about the glorious air fight called the 'Battle of Britain'.” Indeed, 3,500 Allied merchant ships and 175 warships were sunk in the Atlantic, with 36,000 merchant mariners losing their lives, while 783 U-boats were sunk with 28,000 out of 39,000 German submariners perishing by war’s end.

Up to now, there have only been a few films focused on this crucial theater of the war, perhaps because it was previously difficult to capture its vastness and complexity before the advent of current CGI technology made it possible. Among the most notable from a surface warfare perspective are The Cruel Sea (1953) and The Enemy Below (1956), while submarines and submariners are the focus of Das Boot (1981), U-571 (2000), and In Enemy Hands (2004). And although current reviews of Greyhound are mixed, with many reviewers (perhaps spoiled by Midway) complaining about the film’s short length at 90 minutes and its lack of character development, and without any German voices except that of the generically evil Nazi Grey Wolf, they miss the point. The Allied navies and the merchant mariners they protected acted in concert as a team, and because of that “all hands job”, as portrayed in the 52-hour snap shot of Greyhound, the Grey Wolf howled his last howl, portending “Wolf” Hitler’s last howl four years later in April 1945. That too was an “all hand’s job.”

Working on your next award-winning documentary or binge-worthy historical fiction drama? Our team can help you create media so captivating your viewers can’t stop watching. How? By giving you the details you need to turn casual browsers into super fans. From screenplay creation, to costuming, to final review, SJR Research can bring immersive accuracy to your project every step of the way. You can browse SJR Research’s service on your site at SJR Research.

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fixielixie · 7 years

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get to know me tag

okay so i was tagged by @seokjinandtonic to do this and even tho i have 3274362 more of these tags to do im gonna do this one first bc it takes the least amount of creativity to do and im also procrastinating an essay i need to write but shhh

Rules: answer 30 questions then tag 20 Blogs

1. Nicknames: dont really have any, my names not the most ‘nicknameable’ sometimes people shorten it to sorch but that’s kinda boring

2. Gender: female

3. Star sign: libra

4. Height: 5′10′’/5′11′’ idk but im tall enough

5. Time: 7:38pm

6. Birthday: 22nd of October (literally yesterday lmao)

7. Favorite bands: one direction, mayday parade, paramore, you me at six, brand new, i said one direction so im also saying got7. jjproject bc they deserve to be here too. the 1975

8. Favorite solo artists: also one direction, but solo records this time. zayn, beyonce, james blake, leona lewis

9. Song stuck in my head: u got me by got7, but not the whole song, just the english rap jackson does at around the bridge and i honestly think im gonna go crazy he l p

10. Last movie I watched: a 1930s japanese film that i dont remember the name of but we had to watch it for a film and screen studies lecture

11. Last show I watched: rupaul’s drag race

12. When did I create my blog: this one? no idea. early this year, but i didn’t start using it properly until mid summer maybe

13. What do I post: ... i think this is the question on everyones mind lmaoo whatever comes to my head while im ‘’’’in the Moment’’’

14. Last thing googled: bible quotes... for the stupid fucking assignment i am procrastinating right now

15. Do you have other blogs: yes i have two active blogs, this one and my main blog

,16. Do you get asks: occasionally. when i do something particularly stupid and get called out on it... okay this happened once... and i didnt even do anything stupid... it was my first ask... im still salty over it

17. Why did you chose your url: i think you all know why ... jaebum is fucking bald

18. Following: honestly have no idea on this blog... it’s kinda awkward o follow people back on a sideblog r i p

19. Followers: 431 i think lol about 430 more than i ever thought i would get lol

20. Favorite colors: black

21. Average hours of sleep: i need ten hours or else i can literally not Function at all

22. Lucky number: 2 i dont really have one but if i did it would be π

23. Instruments: i can play wonderwall and through the dark by one direction on the guitar and you know what that counts

24. What am I wearing: a holey jumper and pajama pants

25. How many blankets I sleep with: one usually but during the winter two

26. Dream job: bro im double majoring in history and english... ive given up on employment all together

27. Dream trip: im leaving the country for the first time in over a decade in a few days... maybe to go to canada to see yasmin and got7 bc they aint ever coming here and then live in yasmins apartment free of charge without her consent for the rest of my life

28. Favorite food: the edible kind im a college student i have no standards

29. Nationality: irish/english or if we’re getting technical Anglo-Irish, but i am currently living in ireland

30. Favorite song right now: not to b a got7anotor or anything but to me is the best fucking song of this generation also flicker by niall horan

okay so im meant to tag 20 blogs but tbh i don’t think i have that many mutuals lmao and all my mutuals know each other as well so i feel like if i tag them they’ve probably already been tagged so im letting this one out to the public yo do it if u want and tag me in it if u do im v nosy

#this was highkey fun to do #if anyone cares here a lil info about me #i have to do an essay now tho #D:#h e l p #about me #ill come back later and add the read more thing im on mobile right nw and couldnt b bothered to figure out how

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sundayeveningthoughts · 5 years

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3 Very Important Pieces of Art : Part 1

Sunday Evening Thoughts

April 7, 2019

3 Very Important Pieces of Art: Part 1

Dear Paul and Rachel,

The Lord spoke to Moses: See, I have called by name Bezalel son of Uri son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah: and I have filled him with divine spirit, with ability, intelligence, and knowledge in every kind of craft, to devise artistic designs, to work in gold, silver, and bronze, in cutting stones for setting, and in carving wood, in every kind of craft. Exodus 31:1-5

PART 1

This may be TMI, but one of my most pleasant memories of college was when Mom and I were first dating and we walked from the VCU campus to the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts on Saturday afternoons. I was poor, and the VMFA was free, so that made a good mixture.

It’s a 30-minute walk from Rhodes Hall, where we both lived, to the VMFA, so we conversed about architecture from the campus to the museum noting row houses, Victorian architecture, Colonial homes, and various shapes and sizes of churches and synagogues along the way. We’d spend hours on the three floors (note: the museum was much smaller then, as this was before the completion of their $200 million dollar 12-year expansion in 2012).

Afterward, we’d walk around the corner to the NY Deli and share their New York Special — a pastrami, corn beef and Swiss sandwich with spicy mustard on rye. We’d order an extra Kosher pickle. Occasionally on the first of the month, we’d both order a Dr. Brown’s Cream Soda too. Yum! Sadly, the New York Special is no longer on their menu as the NY Deli has changed hands.

Then, we’d walk back to VCU discussing the various types of art we liked or disliked and why. Finally, we’d head back to the dorm and … well, I better stop here.

The pleasant memory of art surfaced again recently as I bumped into a stimulating, technical book on art called: The Art of the Biblical Narrative by Robert Alter. If you wish to read The Art of Biblical Narrative it will be helpful if you have an academic background on critical studies of the Bible and a working knowledge of Hebrew, though not impossible without it. Alter’s book is the type where you read a few paragraphs and then ask yourself, “What did he just say?” and you have to think slowly about his explanation. I do not understand the complexities of genetics, international tax law, human rights in third world countries, nor data science as you do, but Alter’s description of the Hebrew Bible as narrative art is very interesting.

Alter is a professor of Hebrew and Comparative Literature at U. C. Berkeley, and composed and published a recent translation of the Hebrew Bible in 2018.

But before we examine Alter’s explanation of the Hebrew Bible as narrative art, I want to look at two great artists and their significant pieces of art to illustrate the importance of great art, though from two different genres: Andy Warhol from painting and printmaking, and Francis Ford Coppola from film.

I confess I did not like Andy Warhol until two weeks ago. I’m sure this is because of his outrageous presentation of himself to most of the art world. But in reading a bit about him, I think his behavior was mainly a marketing tool simply to get noticed. Remember the ASL sign for advertisement is like playing the trombone or tooting your horn.

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Warhol was tooting his own horn to look at his art. After-all, who cares about Campbell’s soup cans?

But if you only dig a little into Warhol’s life and his society in general — a typical blue-collar, middle-class, second generation, American life, you begin to appreciate him more. In the third grade, Warhol developed Sydenham’s chorea (a nervous system disease that causes involuntary movements of the arms and legs). It is the result of scarlet fever and causes skin pigmentation blotchiness. Warhol was often confined to his bed during this time, but this is where he learned how to draw, and became fascinated with various radio and Hollywood personalities that he maintained throughout his life. Warhol’s father also died when he was 13, and he developed a special attachment to his mother that he retained even after he became famous.

But why Campbell’s soup?

Campbell’s Soup Cans - 1962

Warhol explained that during his early years of affliction his mom made him Campbell’s soup almost every day for lunch, and this was highly comforting. But in an even greater sense, Campbell’s soup is a huge symbol of both American industrialization and women’s freedom of the late 1930s and early 40s: American industrialization because for the first time in history soup could be safely eaten and stored in a can without refrigeration — and it only cost pennies, and women’s freedom because no longer did women have to laboriously prepare homemade soups. Campbell’s soup was easy, safe, and cheap.

Although Warhol is slightly older than us, both Mom and I fondly remember eating Campbell’s soup regularly as kids. Of course today I think all of us would agree homemade soup tastes much better and is much better for you than Campbell’s soup. The levels of salt and fat found in Campbell’s soup is something most of us now avoid, although I also believe there is a modern market for fresh “homemade soups” that can be purchased on the run in many groceries stores today like Trader’s Joe.

But if we stop for a moment and think about American middle-class life of the 1940s to 70s, what is a greater symbol of that life than Campbell’s soup?

What’s my point? My point is that Warhol describes in art the average American. Doesn’t the Campbell’s soup really represent more than just soup? Doesn’t it also represent most Americans — as in canned or conformity, pre-packaged for consumption without needing deep thoughts, and uniformity in behavior and expectation? So, on one hand, Warhol felt great affection for Campbell’s soup, and on the other he criticizes the very symbolism of uniformity and conformity in American life.

And for people who identify as Christian, isn’t this the dilemma: How much to participate in society and how much to oppose it? If we look at the historical Jesus, Jesus was an average Jew, a tekton — a common laborer, or as Paul Meier who has spend his whole academic career studying the historical Jesus and published a five-volume comprehensive analysis on the topic titled his work, A Marginal Jew. And yet, this same marginal Jew was executed by the political authorities (Rome) for challenging their system of justice.

Have a good week...

Love,

Dad

P.S. Andy Warhol is often referred to as the Father of Pop Art. A similar musical artist sometimes criticized for his outrageous behavior, but preferably referred to as theatrical behavior, is David Bowie who wrote an interesting song called “Andy Warhol.” Yet Bowie’s live acoustic version on a 12-string guitar I find expresses his musical talent differently (better?) than his live theatrical electric guitar versions.

Crank it up…

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lazytacomoon-blog · 6 years

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Cimarron Kansas Cheap car insurance quotes zip 67835

"Cimarron Kansas Cheap car insurance quotes zip 67835

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Why is my car insurance so much cheaper than other companies?

i was looking around for auto insurance to see if there was anything cheaper than what im paying now. im a 20 year old male with a 2005 scion tc. i have been driving for about 2 years and currently use state farm. when i first insured my car 2 years ago, i was paying $148/mo. due to a speeding ticket, it has risen to $194/mo. i also have comprehensive and collision with a $500 deductible. $100,000/$300,000 coverage with full glass also. not complaining, i think this is great i looked at nationwide, allstate, geico, and progressive. these companies are supposed to be so great, but progressive quoted me at $485/mo for the same coverage! the other companies where all in that general area. progressives state minimum coverage plan for me was almost $300/mo. why do these other companies cost so much more? im not complaining about mine, obviously im not gonna switch, but i am curious as to the difference in price.""

Do you need insurence to perform a play at a senior center/hospital?

A small group of actors (10) are preforming a play for Charity at retirement homes and hospitals. Would we need insurance to perform there? Someone was concerned that we might accidentally fall over and break our arm or fall over and break someone else's. Would we need to pay insurance or could we just write a well thought out contract (if so give example in answer) to perform there?

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Churchill Car Insurance Problem?

Had accident which was my fault in Nov 08, hit a van in rear that stopped suddenly going through a roundabout (less than 5mph) and his trailer hitch ball went into my radiator and damaged the hood, grill and radiator. Car was 1996 Honda in very reasonable condition, MOT'd and all in good service despite its 125,000 mileage, new tyres, exhaust, battery, and clean throughout. Had fully comprehensive insurance with 50 deductable, loaner car and legal support so paid to be protected. When car was collected from accident, collecting garage said at that time that due to the mileage my car would not be repaired. However it took 5 to 6 weeks for the insurance examiner to determine that my car was beyond repair, so I did without a car all that time. Despite repeated phone calls to them, they never called me back as their examiner was on holiday. Then when we finally agree that a price of 500 for my car in January 08 and that took some haggling, the cheque never and so I started chasing them down in early February. I am then informed that I did not disclose a speeding violation on my application and they would have to listen to the tapes of my applying to verify this. Again this took several weeks, and I again had to pursue them for an answer to which they then said I had applied on the internet so no record of a phone conversation. The internet application was misleading, asking for what I believed was 3 years worth of offenses. I've only ever had 2 speeding offenses in my entire life - both speed cameras, just over the limit. The first was at 6 a.m. and I passed a bus pulling over to stop and as I passed it got flashed. The second on the day I found my dad had days to live and I was rushing to catch a flight, and as in both instances was doing 42 mph in a 30 mph zone for a very short period. Nonetheless, I was speeding and paid my fines. I wrote to the insurance company and apologised for not telling them of the other speeding ticket from 4 years and 9 months earlier as I forgot about it. But I admitted it, and apologised in writing. Then then came back to me saying that there would be additional premium to pay before I would get paid for my car. Well, its October 08, and I finally got a letter from the insurers saying they are not paying me as I failed to pay the additional premium requested and they were not going to renew my policy. I have never been asked even after repeated letters to them how much the additional premium was, and what I should do. No replies. I have asked for my car back which they agreed to pay for, and now they state there is nothing they can do, and it is their final decision. I went to the financial ombudsman and unbelieveably DID NOT get a reply from them. I've even spoken to one of their survey staff who tells me that they are incredibly busy and it was probably put aside and not dealt with. I'm at a total loss as to where I stand and how to pursue this without spending more than the accident and car was worth. I've written to their data protection officer and obtained copies of all documentation pertaining to this, so by their records can verify all this information quite clearly. Finally, I maintained my cool with them at all times. Never once did I raise my voice or become unprofessional with them. My questions are: 1. Can I legally request my car back as it has never been paid for? 2. Were they taking money for policy on a car they knew that through mileage alone, they would never pay for loaner car, or to have repaired? 3. This has meant over 30 letters and more phone calls than that to deal with, and rarely do they call you back or reply at all. Can I claim for this time and distress? 4. Am I totally wasting my time? Regards, Papa Don""

Questions about car insurance?

Is it illegal for someone to drive someone else's car if they do not have car insurance, but their friend (who owns the car) does? What would happen if they got pulled over for a ticket . . . would there end up being a big problem? What about if they had an accident . . . would they be covered under their friend's insurance? And are there are some types of insurance that would cover an accident if it was caused by the uninsured friend of the insured car owner? Thanks so much :)!""

Im 71 years old will 1 speeding offence offence two years age effect my car insurance?

I have always used a Mobility car, hence the ignorance re, insurance""

What insurance license allows you to sell insurance to businesses?

Affordable kids health insurance in Florida?

I recently got a new job, and my income combined with my husbands will be *just* over 200% of the Federal Poverty Level, making us ineligible for the $20/month payment for Medikids. It would cost $160 for each of our 2 children to continue this full coverage/no co-pay insurance. We cannot afford this. What are some other options? We definitely cannot afford insurance for the whole family.""

What do you do if you cant afford car insurance?

Im a sinlge mother and my bills are more than my income. I seriously have to choose between food or car insurance. i cant take the bus to work the schedule doesnt work out....Im scared Im going to get pulled over. What do I do?

Is there a way to get around expensive car insurance for a 19 year old boy in the UK?

I will eventually have my car when I'm 19 but i want to drive a 1.6 instead of a smaller engine. Is there a way to get around expensive car insurance because i know of people who got it cheap In england

""Im 33 with no job, whats the best affordable way for me to receive health insurance?""

Im 33 with no job, whats the best affordable way for me to receive health insurance?""

When getting an insurance quote do you have tell them what your tickets have been reduced to or....?

I am going to get an insurance quote and need to know if I can tell them what my tickets were reduced to or if I have to tell them what I was actually pulled over for.

""I have no insurance and I need help on OCD I'm in Phoenix, AZ please help.?""

I have no insurance and I need help on OCD I'm in Phoenix, AZ please help.?""

""If you are a teenager with your own car, how much do you pay for car insurance???????""

i was just wondering because i want to get a car eventualy and i know that it will be very high......... also for example if your 16 and you get a car from 1991, how much would you think you would play a month for insurance?""

How will the grandfathered in medical insurance work for Obamacare?

I have had an individual plan since 2004. I just read you can be grandfathered into plans that don't provide coverage options required under the Affordable Care Act. This sure doesn't sound good!! It sounds like if I want protection, I will have to pay twice as much as I am now on the exchange, which I thought was supposed to lower cost. Obama said someone can keep the insurance they have if they'd like, which is half the price as the exchange, so who wouldn't want to pay half as much? If it's not covered under the Affordable Care Act, does that mean I still could be dropped or denied? Why call it the Affordable Care Act when it is only affordable to very low income people? I am middle class, and I read that only 9% of Americans make between $50,000 to $75,000. Do you think this sounds right? This is hard for me to believe.""

Is it illegal to use a wrong address on your car insurance?

I want to use the address my dad lives at for my car insurance because it makes my insurance 200 cheaper. It is my registered address and my driving license, bills and bank is addressed there but I don't technically live there anymore. I live between my boyfriend and another parents house. What is the deal with this?""

How do I get health insurance?

I'm a 18 year old girl and on my own. I have no health insurance and is now two weeks pregnant. Can anyone give me a clue on how to get health insurance? Like step by step?

CHEAPEST CAR INSURANCE IN CANADA!!!?

LOOKING FOR THE CHEAPEST INSURANCE /BROKERS IN CANADA

What's the best health insurance for a 19 yr. old?????

So here's the thing: I just turned nineteen last week, I'm no longer going to college, I have two part-time jobs. If I were still in college I'd be under my mother's insurance but that's not the case. And it's the law in Massachusetts (where I live) for every adult to have H. Insurance. So I'm in the process of quitting one of my part-time jobs. And the other doesn't give me benefits 'cause I'm part-time or whatever. So in the mean time I'm looking online, in newspapers, everywhere like crazy to find a good job that's full-time and gives me benefits that includes H.Insurance. So my question is what would be my best bet....Blue Cross Blue Shield, Pilgrims, what?! It has to be something affordable too right? 'Cause I'm no rich bank here. Please help.""

Car and car insurance?

Okay so I want to buy a car. My credit score is 633. I am 19 and in january I opened 2 credit cards which I pay my bills on time. I also have a phone bill i pay on time. If i wanted to buy a 10,000 dollar car or maybe 8,000, I was wondering how much my APR would be and how much my monthly bill would be. Also how much I would have to put down on the car at first. And I was also wondering how much my insurance cost would be seeing that I am a 19 year old female with 2 tickets on her driving record. (One for speeding, one for phone use.) i just need a rough estimation... Thank you :)""

Do anyone know where i can get cheaper car insurance?

Im with Tesco and am due to renew my insurance next month but what im paying at the moment is sky high. Ive been on the road 2 years now, I have a reno clio.""

Teenage Car Insurance?

What can we expect for a 16 year old having to pay on a monthly base if he has his OWN insurance (as in not co-insured with the parents). This would be in Texas. I am pretty sure that there is a great difference. Just trying to familarize myself with the whole deal and trying to figure a ballpark amount. Any tips you might have are very much welcome. Thanks!!!

Can 15 minutes really save you 15% on car insurance ......?

.... with Geico?

Can your health insurance drop you if you use marijuana?

Hi everyone, I want to start by saying that I am here looking for an answer to my question. Please keep your opinions of marijuana and and sermons on federal law to yourself. =] I have had stomach, bladder and pelvic problems for several years. I was recently diagnosed with interstitial cystitis and am positive I also have IBS (waiting to see dr). I live in california and have a medical marijuana license. If I didn't use it, I would be unable to work and probably addicted to vicodin and xanax. my bf thinks I should be open and tell my pcp that i use it to treat my chronic pain so that he could possibly offer other reasons for my symptoms (even though i know these symptoms have nothing to do with my use my bf ust wants to hear it for himself). the only thing i am worried about is insurance. do insurance companies kick you if they find out you use? i'm not worried about work finding out, just insurance. thanks!""

Why do i have to have my car inspected by my insurance company?

I just changed insurance companies and the new one wants to inspect the car which I never had to do before. How come?

""How much does it cost to live on your own in Sacramento, CA?""

I need to move out when I turn 18 due to problems at home and with my family. How much would it cost, realistically, to live on my own in a studio apartment in sacramento, roseville, citrus heights, rocklin or the surrounding area? I mean the bare minimum cost, including car insurance, rent, food, medical insurance, etc. I would be paying for everything on my own. Thank you for the input!""

I'm 23 and a female. I've never bought car insurance before. Who's cheaper Geico or Progressive?

Is wanting to pay $100 a month unrealistic?

Car Insurance Problems. Pain in The neck?

Im 22 and I have a terrible credit score. I am looking to insure my car by myself which has always been insured by other people like my parents/boyfriends mom etc. I know my credit score is my own fault but I have been running into difficulties trying to find a decent car insurer for my vehicle. Does anyone know a place that will offer car insurance even though I have poor credit? I know I will pay a lot more than if I had a good credit score but I am in dire need of insurance and am willing to pay a bit more than usual. Alot of places have even denied me car insurance because of the my credit score so If anyone knows a place (not geico, progessive, unitrin or allstate) that will be helpful and will possibly insure me, can u please let me know:-) Oh yeah Im residing in NJ, if thats helpful!""

Cimarron Kansas Cheap car insurance quotes zip 67835

Do I need a canceled registration receipt from my license plates to get better car insurance rates?

My wife got into a car accident and totaled our car. i bent the license plates in half and canceled our policy. its been about 3-4 months and now we bought a new car and were trying to register again, but all the car insurance places are giving us high rates. i think its just cause we've gone so long without insurance but my wife thinks its because we didnt send the registry or the insurance place the receipt for canceling my plates (which i did online). so which is it?""

Car accident insurance?

I was in a car accident where I accidentally hit a car, i called the police but he didn't give me a ticket. The car insurance is under my moms name. The insurance expired on the same day at 12:01am and the accident happen around 11:00am. I guess the cop missed the expired day. The other car door was seriously dented. Will the insurance still pay for the other car since I didn't get no ticket. My mom did renew the insurance the next day.""

I have pre-existing conditions & I'm 61. Where to go for health insurance?

I'm having a hard time trying to find health insurance. I have pre-existing conditions (take medication for a mild heart arrhythmia & for cholesterol) plus I'm on medication for depression. And I'm 61. I've searched the web without luck - insurance agents who've called me say my condition makes me Uninsurable. Either that or I'm contacted by scam artists. Does anyone have experience with the Health Insurance Industry & have suggestions on what company to contact? Or what insurance agents are reputable? I live in California. I welcome your thoughts & suggestions. Thanks!

How much does car insurance cost for a new driver?

""Court date for driving w.o car insurance, what are my likely outcomes?""

I got tagged for driving w.o car insurance in January, now I got a letter in the mail to attend court in a week for the incident. I live in MA where it is illegal to be uninsured and by law your registration also expires as well. I've already been towed and got my car back, now I just have to attend court. Any ideas what's going to come out of this? I have a perfectly clean driving record.""

Can your parents pay your car insurance?

Keep in mind, they don't have a car!! I know i sounds crazy""

If I get my g2 will my parents insurance rise?

I would like to get my g2 in october, but not get insurance and start driving alone until november. Would this raise my parents insurance from just getting my g2. Also, if i have an 80% avg at midterm, will it lower the cost of insurance? If yes then would a 90 avg lower the insurance cost even more?""

Can i drive without insurance?

I just got my license today I'm 16 i live in florida. my parents haven't bought my insurance yet and they say its illegal to drive without insurance. can i drive without insurance if i have my license and I'm dirving my parents car?

Young Driver Insurance?

I am 18 and have recently passed my driving test. I have bought a car, a 55 regVauxhall Corsa 1.2 SXI 3 door, and before I bought it all of the insurance quotes were cheap - none above 2500 a year. I looked today and all of them are over 4000, even if I put both of my parents as named drivers. Does anyone know any good, cheap young driver car insurance companies or have any advice on how I could lower my premium? I have checked the majority of comparison sites.""

Question about Scion Tc insurance?

So I figured it couldn't hurt to ask about the insurance on a Scion Tc. I'm 16 and looking into getting a scion as my first car. My family and I have state farm insurance, and I would co-sign with them. It would be a used scion with about under 50000 miles and probably a year 2006 or 2005. I live in new york if it helps and am a new driver, no tickets or points. So I was just basically wondering how much other people pay a month or year for a scion tc, their age, the year of their car, and the state they live in. Also and more importantly is a scion tc considered a sports car, or is it under sports car insurance. If it is how much extra monthly is that. I would also be eligible for a steer clear program reduction, good grades reduction, and the reduction for taking drivers ed if anyone has any idea how much that would save. Thanks for anyone who can help!""

Car insurance question regarding friends car?

(This is in Ohio). My friend let me drive her car when the roads were kind of bad due to weather. At an intersection, the light turned yellow, and I began to slide on the ice. I had control of the car, however, if I would have continued to slide straight I would have been hit side on by the incoming cars coming through the intersection. Instead, I had to turn the wheel and I hit a pole. No damages were done to the pole, any other cars, or people. Unfortunately when we took the car to an autobody shop, getting an estimate without the use of insurance, we got an average cost of $2,200. There's NOT that much damage on the left bumper to make the cost so expensive. Both me and my friend are insured, however, MY insurance company is saying it's her car, so her insurance has to pay for it. How will this work? If I ask her to pay using her insurance, I don't want her to pay any out of pocket. I would pay the deductible. Will this hurt her insurance, or my pocket? Any other good ideas? Thanks so much.""

Car Insurance Rates: Wyoming vs Nevada?

How too lower car insurance?

this is a extension to my previous question. Im 17 years old and want too buy a 2008 honda civic EX. I would like too start making payments on the car before i head off too college next year. So i need to convince my parents that it wont increase there insurance rates. My dad owns a 1976 jetta and i thought he could put me down as the driver of the jetta and put him as the driver of the 2008 civic so the insurance rates wont go up. is that a good idea ? Any other ideas how i can lower insurance rates? thanks

Is this normal for home insurance?

I have AAA-California home insurance and we had an incident yesterday involving a squirrel and our fire suppression sprinkler lines. AAA says they only cover the damage caused (carpets, sheetrock, moisture, etc.) by the squirrel eating through the lines, but will not cover the cost of repairing the lines. Is this standard for all home insurance, or do I just have a crappy policy?""

Sr22 for car insurance?

does any one know which car insurance company's will carry a sr22

""My husband and I need private health insurance, any recommendations?""

My husband and I need private health insurance because his job does not offer it and I am a stay at home mother of our two year old son. We live in California, make about 2000.00 a month and are a family of three. We just need basic coverage so that if we get sick we can go to the doctor and if we have an emergency we can go to the hospital. Any recommendations for a low cost good plan that would suit us? Thanks so much!""

Good health insurance?

I am a 29 year old male, i don't smoke or have any health problems. I am looking for good health insurance that doesn't have a high monthly cost. any recommendations of what to stay away from or some good ones would be much appreciated. Thanks. :)""

Can I put my partner on my health insurance?

Hi there, My girlfriend and I are going to be moving to New Jersey in May of next year. We are going to get a civil union. At this point will I be able to include her on my health insurance through work? I work in Philadelphia. Wasn't sure of this since PA doesn't recognize civil unions, but didn't know if there is a loop hole since we will be living in New Jersey?? Any help would be great. Thanks!""

Can i get car insurance at age 18 with a permit in NY?

Hey,i have looked around but i seem to have found mixed answers,so i posted my own question to get a straight foward answer.....Will i be able to get Car Insurance with a permit? I am 18yrs old and live in NY state. Thanks""

Is there any cheap insurance out there for students?

Hi, My name is Courtney and I'm looking to buy a car soon but I don't have car insurance. My parents wont put me on theirs so I need something really cheap because I'm a student and I don't have much money. Is there some place that offers coverage for low low prices?""

What is an average insurance rate for a house?

How do they figure insurance costs? About how much would annual insurance be for a $70,000 house? Thanks~!""

Why can't I get car insurance?

I passed my driving test on the 11/10/12 I am not the registered owner on the V5 Log Book, my father is already insured on the vehicle that will be handed over to me as a shared car yet, I can't get my own insurance because I had one claim as a provisional license back in 2010, would it be better to go as an additional driver on my fathers policy or somehow resolve the problem as be the policy holder myself. Also my father admits he will be no longer needing the car when the insurance expires, but what do I do? just to be able to drive my car as I've only recently passed and want to go out for a drive!!!! Will the log book eventually need to be in my name so I can insure it? Also I'm having great difficulty with the claims, I can't seemed to be insured just because of a motorcycle accident claim that wasn't even my fault! thanks.""

I and my friend were thinking to buy a car. He is much older than me. How should we do insurance in this case?

In this case who should be primary driver on insurance policy? me or my friend? How does it matter in terms of insurance premium? My friend will be driving the car much more than me.

Can I fight this no proof of insurance ticket in the state of california?

I purchased my vehicle on 3/13/09 with insurance. I was stopped on 4/7/09 for no license plates and failure to prove financial responsibility i.e. no proof of insurance. Prior to that, the car dealer initially wouldn't even allow me to drive the car off the lot unless it was insured. Also, I hadn't received the insurance card in the mail from State Farm yet. I asked the officer (before he wrote the ticket) if he could identify my vehicle in his system to see that it is in fact insured, at which point he would not oblige. I obviously received the card a few days later and now have the card verifying insurance from 3/13/09 to the present date. Do I have a case here that can rightfully be reversed?""

""Hi i'm 21 no previous driving experience, how much will my bike licensce and insurance on a 125cc-200cc cost?

im considering doing my bike test and just wondering how much it would cost to insure a 125-200cc road bike? Also how much does it cost on average pass your bike TEST THANKS VERY MUCH ANSWERS WILL BE APPRECIATED!

Cimarron Kansas Cheap car insurance quotes zip 67835

""Motorcycle questions? Good old, cheap and cool bike? Insurance?""

Im looking at buying a motorcycle! :) I dont need one that is too quick, I just learned how to drive one and I loved it. I want to get one for the summer. I dont want to pay over 1500, and it doesnt need to be too fast. (what is the 2002 honda civic of motorcycles?) I just want it to be kind of cool looking. I saw a 1985 honda (with the wing on it?) that looked really cool. Im 17, and I want to get one that will only be insured for the summer. For one with a small engine, what is the insurance cost? I know it varies, but does anyone have any ideas? Thanks Matt""

Motorcycle Insurance (600cc vs 750cc)?

I am picking up a new sportbike (Suzuki GSX-R) here in a couple weeks and I was wondering the average cost of motorcycle insurance per month (or year if you pay gross). The bike will be totally paid off when I purchase. Thank you for your time, Kevin BTW: I am 25yrs old in Florida. It will be either a 600cc or 750cc.""

Anyone know insurance companies that would cover my car while in Canada?

I'm a US citizen on a temporary work permit in Ontario. I'm trying to figure out the best way to register my car. If I can find insurance that would cover me in Canada I could maintain registration in Calif. Does anyone know about this? Is there an insurance company that will cover my car while I'm registered in Calif/driving in Ontario? Thanks!

What is the average premium of auto insurance in Toronto?

How much do people in Toronto spend on their car insurance every month? I am moving to Toronto this summer, and I am having a second thought about taking my car with me since I will live by the campus. I only have an one year experience of driving. I know the premium depends on a lot of factors but I am only looking for an approximation or a price range. $100?200?300? Any suggestion of car insurance company? Thx, and I really appreciate your help!""

How much is insurance on a ninja 250?

i am going to buy one in the next few weeks. i have a clean driving record. no tickets. no wrecks. im 22 years old. i live in kentucky. how much is insurance and what company's are best to get a quote from?

How much would insurance be ? ?

im 18 years old and i have a 2006 hyundai sonata and i was wonderinq how much my insurance would be every month .

Am I allowed to do this with my car insurance?

I am 22 and am on my father's insurance policy. My rates started out as only 30 dollars and increased to 50 bucks. They said that the reason my rates increased was bc I was added as a driver of the vehicle. I was wondering, if I were to get my father to take my name off as a driver and just list him would my rates go back down. Also what would happen if i got into a car wreck and my name was not listed on the insurance. I am just trying to keep my insurance down as I am in college and cannot afford it if it keeps increasing. Thanks""

""What is Cheaper, Insurance Group 6E or 4P?""

What is Cheaper, Insurance Group 6E or 4P""

Friend on my car insurance?

I have a friend (age 21+) who needs to get a car insurance but she only has a learner's permit and she cannot get an insurance herself. She has a car under her name. I am willing to add the car to my insurance and have her as a secondary driver. What are the risks I have? Am I, first of all, allowed to add a car which I do not own? Does my insurance premium go up if she gets into accident?""

Car Insurance question ( British Columbia)?

My boyfriend was driving me car and crashed it. Everything is on my insurance.They said the cost of my insurance will be up for three years. and then it will go back to normal. If I don't get insurance for those three years will it go away or will I still have to pay it when I go to get insurance after the three years?

Cheap Car Insurance - Please Help?

Hello in June I will be 17 years old! Obviously like all 17 year old males I want a car! I'm not massively fussed about the car as long as it doesn't cost to much! Today I have been looking at cars such as; FIAT CINQUENCENTO Perodua Nippa EX and a few other cars bellow 1l I live in Northamptonshire and my postcode is NN1 *** on comparison websites i cant find insurance for less than 3500 when that is miles out of my price range! If anyone knows any insurance sites or extremely cheap cars to insure for 17 year olds then please reply to this. Any help will be much appreciated. Thanks

""What would be a cheap car insurance company for me,19 yrs old?""

I did some quotes but some companies couldn't give me a quote.. don't know why though but I am trying to find out what would be a cheap good company for me. The car I was going to buy was the Pontiac grand am year 2000-2002. If you know anything, please let me know. Thanks!""

Car Accident and No Fault Insurance?

My sister was hit by a car while she was crossing the street on her way to school. Now the hospital has sent as a statement asking for her no-fault insurance policy number. We don't have auto insurance so how do we fill in the form? Can we use the insurance number of the part at fault?

""My truck got totaled, now the insurance wants to give me crap for payout. Can I negotiate?""

I had a 2000 Sierra that was probably the nicest truck in town. I have pictures of how it looked, videos of how it ran, and plenty of people to testify it was a nice ride. The insurance wants to give us crap for payout saying that the truck was average to poor condition. Even after stripping off most of my aftermarket stuff, I still have a few thousand $$ still on the truck. I know they don't cover aftermarket stuff, but if I can't take it off, I should be compensated for it. Can I negotiate with them or do I have to take what they offer me? I've already told them that I don't like what they offered me since my truck wasn't the junk car they are paying me for. Can they turn around and just tell me they won't pay anything since I didn't take the first offer?""

Which is better hmo or ppo insurance?

""How much insurance(fully comprehensive, USA) do I have to pay for a 400,000$ car?""

For a 400,000$ car in the state of New-York how much car insurance will I have to pay fully comprehensive insurance. Like a Rolls Royce Phantom Coupe how much insurance has to be paid for that type of car. Don't want an exact number, just round it off.""

What is better - socialized medicine or affordable health insurance?

Where can I find health insurance as an 18 year old and I'm peregnant?

I'm an 18 year old, I live in Florida, I have a job as a CNA, I'm pregnant and married. I was woundering where can I go to get affordable health insurance and if it's likely that I'll get coverage. I would also like to know an average of what it would cost.""

Would insurance for a 16 year old boy be cheaper on a 4-door 03 oldsmobile alero or a 2-door 06 chevy cobalt?

we have a 2003 2-door Oldsmobile Alero and a 2006 2-door Chevrolet Cobalt, the alero is automatic and the cobalt is stick shift. they said i can have whichever insurance is cheapest on. idk if this helps but they are both paid off""

What is the best/cheapest car insurance for me?

im 16, and unfortunately my parents wont let me go under their insurance for the car ( i know that complicates things) but im hopeing that if i get my own car, and pay for my own insurance it wont be too expensive :( does anyone know what insurance company would give me the approx. lowest cost?""

Do you have health insurance?

How much do these bikes cost plus insurance?

i was wondering how much on average these following bikes cost and im looking for a used one as its my first bike, Kawasaki Vulcans 125cc , Honda Rebel 125cc , Yamaha Virago 250 125cc , Suzuki GZ 250 125cc , i also would like to know if anyone knew how much the insurance is for these , i know they depend on factors but anyone from experience , many thanks :)""

Auto insurance broker fee in CA?

Hi I live in CA i just bought a new 2012 hyundai and went to get insurance through Freeway Insurance and I signed up for a 12 month premium with Farmers they did not tell me anything about a broker fee until after i signed all the paperwork. I am 20yrs old and paying $220 a month for full coverage. They charged me a $275 Broker fee I just want to no if this is even legal or if they ripped me off! I walked out spending $560.00 Are they allowed to charge such high fees I will call my credit card and have them refund it immediately if they ripped me off. Please help. Open to all answers thankyou!

Car insurance advice needed?

My nephew passed his driving test yesterday and has a P reg Volkswagon Polo for his first car. I've seen adverts on the tele for Direct Line car insurance and they aren't on comparison websites, does anybody know if they are averagely cheaper or not? Are there any other companies that don't appear on comparison websites? Thanks.""

Which is better hmo or ppo insurance?

Cimarron Kansas Cheap car insurance quotes zip 67835

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severegladiatorcrusade · 7 years

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The Value Proposition in Computer Audio: Entering Multichannel at the Ground Floor

THE VALUE PROPOSITION IN COMPUTER AUDIO

Entering Multichannel at the Ground Floor

“Mommy, where does stereo come from?”

Every audiophile should start each day with a thank-you to Harvey Fletcher and his dummy (whose name was Oscar and who had a microphone in each ear). Fletcher is widely known as the father of stereophonic sound. He first described what he called “auditory perspective” in sound in the early 1930s, later coining the term “stereo”. He won a posthumous Grammy in 2016 for his technical contributions to the recording arts. It was Fletcher, along with his collaborator Wilden Munson, who published the 1933 paper Loudness, its definition, measurement and calculation in the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America that established and quantified the concept of frequency-dependent hearing sensitivity in humans (and spawned the “loudness” button, but don’t blame Fletcher for that).

As Director of Research at Bell Labs, he opened the eyes and ears of the world to the potential of recorded music to unfold before the listener, by using multiple sound sources in separate channels to create sonic images with spatial location and directionality. He partnered with Leopold Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra to prove his concepts and demonstrate their value. As part of this effort, he was responsible for the first direct stereo transmission (by phone lines from Philly to DC) in 1933 and the first stereo recording in 1940. His Bell Labs research team installed recording equipment of their own design in the basement of Philly’s Academy of Music. Fletcher oversaw over 100 stereo recordings and developed groundbreaking equipment to “enhance” recorded sound during playback.

IS MORE ALWAYS BETTER?

We audiophiles all enjoy Fletcher’s genius every time we drop the needle, put a disc in the tray, click the icon, or ask Alexa to tell our favorite streaming service to play a tune. And for most of us (including me, until I decided to write this article), two channels is enough. Given what many of us have traditionally spent on our stereo rigs, the idea of a 3 to 4 fold increase in spend and space requirements was simply not a consideration.

The only multichannel audio experience most audiophiles have had until recently has been through home theater, and most HT systems have historically not been well respected for serious audio. Twenty years ago in Stereophile, Chip Stern expressed the question that many of us were already asking:

“In a rollout of new technologies more or less driven by the expectations of the home-theater crowd, what's in it for us music-lovers?”

And in his review of the Toshiba SD9200 DVD player, he summed it up clearly:

“The Toshiba SD-9200 performed admirably, and offered a good level of audiophile two-channel performance for the price [emphasis added by me]; I trust that what it offers in the way of multichannel panache might put it over the top for some viewer-listeners, but I'll have to leave that conclusion to those colleagues of mine blessed with true surround-sound setups.”

His laissez faire attitude notwithstanding, he damned the audio performance of home theater equipment with the faint praise of “for the price” but did not describe the performance sacrifices made to have more channels for the money. I’ll try to be more specific in this work.

[ENTER THOSE EXPERTS, SOUNDSTAGE LEFT REAR]

It was only through the ears and pen of early devotees like @Kal Rubinson that we were exposed to the potential of multichannel audio for audiophiles. He wrote this about Willie Nelson’s instrumental version of Night and Day in his own review of the same Toshiba SD9200:

“I'll spare you the stereo/surround comparison...Right from the first notes, the multichannel version sounds incredibly live...I sense the ambiance instantly, and every sound is realistic and credible”.

And here’s his summary of the MC Buena Vista Social Club (World Circuit/Nonesuch 79478-9) from the same review:

“Listening to the DVD-A's stereo track... was...satisfying, but when I switched over to the Surround track (not a simple task, under the circumstances), I wanted never to go back.”

His reviews of the day also documented the rigors of MC audio, e.g. “The user interfaces (read: controls and menus) of multichannel components are complex and, um, idiosyncratic”. Worse, source material was not common and came in multiple formats each of which was more expensive than the last. I’ll spare you a complete history of multichannel audio and leave these links for your use if you want to learn a bit more: MC history , mp3 5.1 (!) , MC history according to Dolby , and Surround Sound: the Audio Side of Home Theater.

I’ll also spare you the history of MC equipment for audio. To date, the good stuff has come dear. Almost all of the affordable home theater systems from major electronics producers have been classic, mass market, consumer-level products designed and best suited for watching football games and movies. There are a few HT gems worth the effort it will take to find them, and there are now some excellent and affordable HT receivers that do audio very well. HT is one source of value in MC audio, and if you’re careful and selective in your choices of equipment you can get some fine MC sound for very little money. More about that in a bit.

THE WINDS OF CHANGE

What’s gone is gone and what’s done is done. MC audio just ain’t your father’s home theater any more. I’ve had a HT setup for almost 20 years, with a ceiling mounted projector and a series of receivers and speakers in the house. I started with one of those $200 loss leader HT systems that included a receiver and a small 5.1 speaker setup, just to see what it was all about. We loved the 8’-plus image, but the audio was just not suitable for serious listening. I upgraded each time my projector bulb died, because it was almost as cheap to buy a new projector as it was to replace the bulb back then. And, of course, what’s a better projector without better sound? So I ended up with a pretty nice Pioneer Elite 7.1 receiver with decent DACs (24/192, Burr Brown as I recall) that sound quite fine.

While researching my next pieces on Raspberry Pi and other SBCs, I discovered a 6 in / 8 out DAC HAT for the Pi for $58 that screamed “BUY ME!”. So I thought I’d get one for inclusion in an article on advanced stuff that audiophiles can make and do with a Pi, and I put it in the queue. After getting the article on modifying the Pi for higher performance to Chris, I started working on the next piece. After building a DAW on a rodded 4 gig Pi 4, a few Pi based NASes with different software, a freestanding wireless hub, and an active crossover, I started working with the Octo and had such a great time with MC on the cheap that I decided it deserved its own article. So you’ll read about the other projects in a future article.

FOR ME, MORE IS BETTER ONLY IF WELL AND PROPERLY DONE

When I fired up the first track on the first MC system I set up as part of my research and testing for this article, I had the same experience Kal described: right from the first notes, the multichannel version sounds incredibly live. It was truly eye opening to hear a Mozart Violin Concerto (24/96 flac) played by Marianne Thorsen in 6 channels on decent equipment. I don’t wanna go back to stereo, Mom!

Good MC really is that good. I don’t think I’d have gone for it when it meant doubling or trebling my investment in hardware, even if I’d had the same epiphany 20 years ago. The really good news is that you no longer have to spend your retirement fund to achieve it. There’s now a value based approach to multichannel that converted me in a fraction of a second, once I got it up and running – and that’s what this article is about. The heart of my value-based MC system is a Raspberry Pi, but there are options.

It should be obvious that a truly top quality 4 channel system will be close to twice the cost of a stereo rig of equal quality. For MC, you need as many speakers as you have channels plus enough amplification to power them all and cabling to connect everything. You also need either a MC DAC or a MC digital “splitter” (e.g. the MiniDSP U-DIO8) plus a pair of 2 channel DACs. If you like your current speakers, you’ll need at least 2 more just like them, along with an equal number of amplification channels as good as your stereo rig. And if you’re using a planned upgrade of your current stereo system to expensive stuff as a reason to look at MC, you really want to be sure you love it enough to double or triple up.

So here’s an entry level approach to multichannel audio for the cautious, the curious, the impecunious, the miserly, the skeptical, and/or the value minded audiophile. We’re not talking about state of the art MC audio here. We’re talking about decent sound quality from good basic components that most of us could enjoy in a second or third system, and that more than a few might even use as their only one. This approach will give you a good idea of the capability of MC and whether or not it’s for you. If you decide it’s not, you’ll have a few good and inexpensive little components to resell or repurpose. You can also add a MC interface (e.g. MiniDSP UDIO-8), another DAC and some good inexpensive powered speakers to your current 2 channel system to experience the power and beauty of MC before committing to more expense. Ideas for all of these components will be discussed in a little while.

Instead of a splitter and multiple DACs or a MC DAC, you can use a 4+ out digital audio interface sold for musicians and recording. Earlier DAIs with USB connectivity had duplex USB audio, too – but the current generation is different. On most current models, USB connectivity is limited to power and data exchange with the host computer, and digital I/O is limited to S/PDIF, AES and ADAT. This makes a DAI a less desirable option for many and unusable with a Raspberry Pi unless you add a HAT or other device to provide usable output to the DAI. The other practical limitation on value-based MC is resolution – I haven’t found an entry level MC DAC or DAI that would let you go above 24/192. Many of us listen at or below 24/192 anyway, and it’s certainly good enough to demo the MC concept for you. Doing high res MC requires equipment far more costly than a Pi and an Octo HAT, although improvements in basic SQ of the equipment (independent of source material and format) are often not as dramatic as the associated increase in cost might suggest they should be.

You can get MC sound quality fine enough to please most of us, and certainly fine enough to give skeptics an idea of the potential of MC in a 4 or 5.1 system, for under $1000 complete. Those who love the concept but want better stuff after hearing what you can do for under $1k can easily go as far upscale as desired. Having spent less on a “demo” system than they did for a connecting or power cable, they can use the mule as an extra system, sell it, or give it to a friend or relative with less money and/or less critical taste. So let’s get into the alternatives for what to play, what to play it with, and what to play it through.

SOURCE MATERIAL

MC audio most often used to mean synthesized ambience, because there simply wasn’t much well recorded, high quality program material in native MC formats. But high quality source material from most genres is readily available now in formats we all use daily. You can buy MC from half a dozen fine online vendors as 24/48 and 24/96 flacs, DSD, SACD etc. The gimmicky “surround sound” formats of the past no longer plague us, and MC is just a vehicle to more realistic presentation. Past formats either manipulated 2 channel recordings or used multiple recorded channels to dazzle the listener with sounds that bounced around the room. Audiophiles had no use for these gimmicks.

Today’s synthesized MC is done in your player software and is much much better than the old approaches. Good players like JRiver Media Center and Roon offer multiple output formats for 2 channel sources, and they sound pretty fine. You can get similar flexibility from some of the open source players too, although many require a bit more work to set the output format if you’re running Linux, by making you edit one or more configuration files. Still, instructions and guides are readily available on the web. As with any anonymous advice and (especially) code or command lines, make sure that any advice you take from the web has an authoritative source. I play it safe by first trying things on a canary in the mine – a development computer with no network or internet connection at all.

There are also many fairly high quality videos of great live performances in all genres, available in a number of proprietary formats (some of which require decoders). The most readily available video sound evolved from early Dolby 4 channel in ‘82 to 5.1 in ‘83, Pro Logic in ‘87, DTS in ‘93, 7.1 in ‘07, then Atmos with speakers in the ceiling and finally to 9.1 and beyond. How many channels you “need” is up to you, and MC experts may disagree - but I think that 4 (plus a sub if your main systems don’t sufficiently shiver your timbers) is enough to understand what MC can do for your music. You can also extract audio from videos with a variety of software, e.g. VLC (easy and excellent).

Good music management software like JRiver, Roon etc lets you select your output format from many alternatives. It lets you do a decent job of converting input formats to your desired output format, including 2 channel sources to 4, 5, 6 or more. And several of the open source players rival this flexibility in much simpler packages. If used on an SBC like a Pi, there are functional limits set by processing power, bus speeds, available I/O routes, limited RAM etc. But you can tweak your resource allocation to play MC flacs as long as you don’t also add heavy demands with DSP, GUI, and system tasks & processes that are not associated with audio. We’ll discuss optimizing your SBC for this in a while. I’m listening to an excellent 6 channel 24/96 file right now from a Pi 3B+ with full JRiver Media Center GUI up and running, and the little bugger’s not even breaking a sweat. Below and to the right is the real time performance readout. As you can see, the CPU’s just breezin’ along with the breeze at a very comfortable 41.9C and the music is playing without a pop, crackle, stutter or audible anomaly of any kind. Even the JRiver GUI is working smoothly, if a bit slower than ideal, when browsing the library while listening. This is pretty impressive performance from a $50 device!

THE MUSIC PLAYER

Players that do MC are readily available. Almost all of us already use at least one player that will do it if asked politely. As this series focuses on value in audio (like the crusty old retired audiophile writing it), I’m only discussing open source software and inexpensive proprietary products that deliver the most bang for the buck.

For those of you who already have Roon & / or JRiver Media Center, they both do MC very well out of the box - either is a great choice. I’ve had some trouble with Roon through the OctoPi, which is the renderer / player / DAC I built for $100 around a Raspberry Pi 3B+ and an Octo ADC/DAC HAT. It’s the featured project in this article, to be discussed in a bit. With Roon driving the Octo, I can’t get sound from channels 3-8, no matter what I’ve tried so far. As my Roon plays MC fine from other players on multiple platforms and by HDMI to my 7.1 receiver, I must have set something wrong to cause the problem. JRiver plays MC perfectly through the same OctoPi, and all output formats are correctly enabled and played.

If you don’t want to spend $ for a music management system like Roon or JRiver, you have many excellent choices of open source software that will play MC music for you. On Linux, you can’t go wrong with DeaDBeeF – it plays MC in many formats, sounds great on properly set up machines, and does a decent job of tagging, library management, and display.

THE HARDWARE

THE SoC APPROACH

I’ve been looking for a path to MC for music playback with acceptable SQ at a reasonable cost for many years. For most of us, the biggest barrier to entry into the world of many channels has been the cost of the equipment, which (for a “component” digital system) is roughly proportional to the number of channels. But finally, in addition to a few HT-based approaches that let you experience MC audio with HT hardware you may already have, there’s a pretty good value-based approach using a 6 in-8 out Pi HAT DAC (called the Octo) of which most - including me, until a few months ago- have never heard. When I started this project, the Pi 4 was not ready for plug and play use with an Octo, so this article is based on use of a Pi3B+. I finally got full function with the Octo on a 4, and it does more, better and faster than the 3B+. It doesn’t sound any better until processing demands exceed the limits of a 3B+. The SQ of the 3B+ degrades at performance levels far below the 4’s limit.

Both the Zero and the 3B+ support 5.1 / 7.1 PCM to 96kHz, and 4.0 PCM to 192kHz. I wouldn’t expect too much from a Zero beyond stereo 24/192 flacs. And if you want the best SQ from a Zero, especially at greater than Redbook resolution, it can’t be doing anything except playing your sound files to a DAC via OTG USB while on your WLAN to access them from NAS. I suppose you could also get on your network with a USB adapter and use Wifi to stream, but this seems a bit excessive when the object of your affection and interest is a $10 SBC with finite limits on its performance. It’s possible to boot a Zero from USB / OTG using any of a number of tricks you can find on the web. But the USB bus has a limited bandwidth and SQ will suffer if you try to run everything through it in both directions at the same time. You can use a Zero for MC via HDMI – Roon bridge does MC well this way (more on this a bit further down the page).

Neither a Zero nor a 3B+ will bitstream or pass-through Dolby HD or DTS HD. A 4B will play 192k 7.1 PCM. You can decode Dolby HD and DTS HD to these limits. Other MC formats are also supported but most require downsampling. The Pis do support lossy DD/DTS bitstreaming, but DD+ needs to be decoded to PCM or transcoded to DD. Asking any Pi but a 4B to play HD video with a high res multichannel HD soundtrack is pushing your luck.

So the bulk of this project centers around a fan cooled Pi 3B+ with heat sinks and zram, set to its maximum CPU rate and minimum GPU RAM usage (set memory split to minimum under advanced options / memory split in raspi-config). It boots and runs from a USB SSD (240 gig Inland Pro in a Savent housing), which I recommend for most audiophiles. Boot and general response are much faster than from an SD card, and it really helps the JRiver GUI behave like it does on a “real” computer (but don’t tell your Pi I said that – they’re tired of being picked on because of their size!).

Inland is the “house brand” at Microcenter and readily available from others like Amazon. I’ve avoided their prior products because they had measurable performance handicaps when compared to the slightly more expensive brand name alternatives. But the Pro series of SSDs was both cheap enough and well enough reviewed to justify a deeper look. These are apparently made by Phison, a 20 year old Taiwanese company that makes the innards of more than a few well respected brands (which are actually rebrands). Tucked into a $10 USB3 adapter case, this is a great way to get your feet wet with a serious Pi project (or anything else that requires a small SSD). I’m running one on the USB port of my ASUSTOR NAS for the ROON database, & it’s been excellent in continuous use for several months.

THE DAC

Enter the Octo, a 6 in / 8 out Pi HAT ADC/DAC that plays up to 24/96, and costs $58. That’s not a typo and you read it right - FIFTY EIGHT DOLLARS for a 6 in / 8 out 24/96 ADC/DAC complete with separate RCA breakout boards for ins and outs. It’s a Raspberry Pi HAT (Hardware Attached on Top) that connects via the large (40 pin) GPIO on top.

A WORD TO THE TECHNICALLY TIMID: At first glance, it looks as though there is zero support for this device when you buy it. There is absolutely nothing in the package except the board, the standoffs, the breakout boards, and the small ribbon cables that connect them to the main board. There is no contact information. There are no markings on the boxes. Multiple Amazon reviews complain about a lack of support and being on your own if you have a problem. THIS IS SIMPLY NOT THE CASE – you just have to do a little web searching to find both community support and the person behind Octo.

The creator of the Octo is a very nice, knowledgeable and responsive guy named Matt Flax (screen name Flatmax), who lives in Sydney. He’s interested in, supportive of, and responsive to input from users of his creations (Octo’s not his only product). This is his github page and this is his DIYAudio forum. It seems clear that he’s either not trying to build a business around his inventions or he’s woefully inept at marketing and branding…..or both. But he’s definitely there for you if you reach out to him – he just hasn’t provided any channels for customer relationship management.

But support it he does – in spades. For example, it wasn’t obvious to me in what order he had the RCA jacks set up, and there are a few “standards” around the world for channel order (e.g. SMPTE 5.1 is L-R-C-SUB-LR-RR and FILM 5.1 is L-C-R-SUB-LR-RR). So I contacted him with a PM through DIYAudio, and he got back to me within hours. He explained that even though installation seems to configure ALSA for you, it still leaves all options to configure the I/O order as you wish.

SO – ON TO MAKING A MULTICHANNEL MUSIC MACHINE FROM A Pi AND AN OCTO

The first decision is how to house the thing. If you choose not to use a cooled case for the Pi, you can just insert the Octo directly into the GPIO receptacle and use the provided standoffs to support the free end of the board. You can use this assembly exactly as pictured below, if you’re willing to live with a pile of pieces held together by wires. I’d put some insulating feet at the bottom corners if you do this. And with all the conductive spots exposed, an errant wire or metal object could fry everything.

I was unable to find any commercial case that would hold the Pi with its HAT on, except for flimsy Pi bottoms that don’t really protect any part of it from any practical dangers. If you want a case, you’ll have to make one like I did. You can build a single container from scratch to hold the Pi, the Octo, and the connector boards. Or you can build a separate case for the Octo and breakouts, connecting it to the Pi in a cooled case with a ribbon extender. If you go this route, you can power the case fan(s) from the appropriate pins on the GPIO (second and third from the left in the outer row seen in the picture above) by extending the fan wires to be as long as the GPIO ribbon jumper.

Unless you plan to leave the OctoPi in a protected area and never fiddle with it, you should at least cobble up some kind of case or mounting system for the breakout boards if you want to be able to use this like any other audio component. I strongly doubt that there will ever be a commercially available case for the thing because demand can’t possibly be strong enough.

A WORD TO THE WISE: do not assume that the GPIO ribbon cable will automatically connect pin 1 to pin 1. It is not keyed to the header on the Pi and it is not keyed to the pins on the Octo, so you can connect it backwards at either end. Doing so puts a voltage drop across pins that connect to parts unable to handle it, resulting in smoke, smell, and shame – and ya’ gotta buy another Octo :(

If you use it as pictured above, it’s physically supported by the GPIO header plus a pair of nylon standoffs that come with it. I was unable to find a fan cooled case that would hold it this way, and I wanted to be able to use it on multiple SBCs without having to disassemble everything each time. I also wanted a permanent mounting place for the 14 RCA jacks through which it passes analog audio in and out, to facilitate experimenting with DACs, Bluetooth, analytical tools etc. And a case looks right.

So I “borrowed” my wife’s old acrylic recipe box, made a few modifications, and connected the two boards with a 40 pin ribbon cable long enough to let me keep the Pi on top of the breakout box.

Again, I did this project first with a 3B+ because when I began it there were several web reports of failure when used with a 4. I felt obligated to duplicate this out of a sense of duty to the AS community, and my first attempts were indeed met with failure. I also used the 32 bit version of Raspberry Pi OS, because the earliest versions of the 64 bit version were not completely & properly configured for audio and were not easily updated and completed. Updates have been made since the first version, but it’s still not fully functional and ready for audiophiles. So this project is built on the 32 bit Raspberry Pi OS on both 3 and 4. I’ll have a go at the 64 bit version again in a few months.

Although assembly is easy, it takes a little effort to get this up and running. It’s not difficult if you follow the clear instructions found HERE (https://github.com/Audio-Injector/Octo). The procedure is simple:

Download this package to your Pi:

Install the Octo card from the command line with this:

Remove PulseAudio because it can interfere with Octo function; enter this into the terminal:

Reboot and the Octo should show up with all 6 in and all 8 out available to any audio program

You can configure channel lineup at the RCA outs in ALSA, but the defaults work fine for me with JRiver Media Center.

https://github.com/Audio-Injector/Octo/raw/master/audioinjector.octo.setup_0.4_all.deb

sudo dpkg -i Downloads/audioinjector.octo.setup_0.4_all.deb

sudo apt remove pulseaudio

I’ve used every output format option from 2 channel to 7.1 with success

Once it’s installed, just connect the appropriate RCA outputs to your DAC, powered monitors etc and listen away. I’ve had great success with JRiver Media Center, VLC, and a few other such players. Interestingly, I can only get Roon Bridge to work on this with 2 channel output into RCAs 1 and 2. When I go to any MC output format in Roon, there’s either silence or electrical noise from all the RCAs except 1 and 2. I’ve tried everything from editing asoundrc or asound.conf to using card-specific configuration in /usr/share/alsa/cards/<card_name>.conf – and I’ve failed each time. If I figure this out, I’ll post the solution. Searching the Roon database and the community forum finds nothing. This and this are two web pages on configuring ALSA for multichannel use. Neither helped with this.

SO HOW DOES IT SOUND???

All the following observations were made running JRiver Media Center on the Pi, further verified with VLC and Kodi on the same Pi. Remember that the Octo will only go to 24/96, does not do DSD etc, and is a primitive device compared to the current state of the art.

In two words, it sounds very good. It’s a better DAC than almost any I’ve encountered on a consumer mobo or SoC. As I’ll detail below, it’s not quite up to my iFi Nano DSD or my Emotiva Stealth in head to head SQ comparison. But it sounds good enough to serve most of us in a second system or system in a second location. I’ve been using it for a few days at a time over the last 2 months or so for daily 2 channel listening, and I’d have few serious regrets if I had to use it as my only system.

Brian Bronmberg’s bass on Wood is tight enough, although it’s not quite as rich and punchy as it is from a Pi 4 into my iFi. Marianne Thorsen’s Mozart Violin Concerto #4 (5.1 24/96 FLAC) sounds excellent, with only a bit of “haze” flattening its impact a tiny bit compared to my better DACs. Her violin is properly left of center fronting classically positioned and spatially (as well as tonally) accurate sections in a surprisingly intimate playback. This is an outstanding recording that I highly recommend – and I‘m not alone. Kal Rubinson named this an album to die for in the February 2008 Stereophile.

Christian Grøvlen’s piano version of Bach’s Chromatic Fantasia and Fugue in D Minor is a fine example of what 5.1 does for solo piano. The Octopi presents a well sized piano image with balanced tone and a realistically unfocused distribution of highs and lows. When you listen to a real piano in person, you don’t get the left hand from the left speaker and the right hand from the right. Whether open, partially open, or closed, there’s little frequency specific directionality and the piano doesn’t sound like it’s exactly as wide as the space between your speakers. This is even true when you face the pianist’s back, which is almost never done in real life regardless of the genre or venue.

The Octopi puts Grøvlen’s piano in front of and normal to you, as it would be in concert. You’re surrounded by the sonic ambience of a real Steinway grand in a small church. Mixing it down to 2 channels and comparing it to my reference system, I find the sound quality to be a bit behind my SMSL SU-8 v2 driven by Roon Bridge on a Pi 4 playing through my Prima Luna power amp and Focal towers. As I found with Bromberg’s bass, the bottom’s not quite as big and moving as it is on better 2 channel DACs. The sound stage lacks a little depth in comparison, and subtleties like delicate cymbal and brush work are a bit less clear and distinct (especially with the volume way down). But this is a wonderful recording that’s offered up intact by the OctoPi – it’s a joy to hear.

I’ve listened to many 2 channel files as well, to see how comfortable I am with the OctoPi as an everyday player. I like Joni Mitchell’s Hissing of Summer Lawns both as music and as a test of audio fidelity. Critics have panned it as unimaginative, bland, formulaic, etc – but I disagree. Listen to Robben Ford’s dobro playing on Don’t Interrupt the Sorrow and you have to appreciate how sweet the little Octo can play.

Joni’s voice is equal parts rich, inspiring, and depressing….as it’s supposed to be. The background singers are right there as well, even though I’m not convinced I could identify them all from blind listening with any DAC. For the record, you’re hearing James Taylor, David Crosby and Graham Nash! The Octo lets you hear the amazing close harmonies in Joni’s unorthodox, personal guitar tuning alterations. And Max Bennett’s beautifully tight, barky bass is clean and punchy on In France They Kiss on Main Street.

String sections have a bit of grain compared to better DACs. Reeds are closer to excellent, with only a little more reedy roughness than was there live in players like Paul Desmond and Art Pepper. Percussion is clean and solid, with lifelike fading of sizzle and crash cymbals, a palpable chunk chunk from the hi hat, and excellent delineation of different components of the set, e.g. 9x13 mounted toms from 16x16 floor toms. Snares have the right snap and brushes are not lost in the mix, especially the wiping shhhh of a good left hand during a ballad. You’ll also be bowled over by the combo of Joni playing Moog along withThe Warrior Drums of Burundi on The Jungle Line. With Jriver’s upmix to 5.1, this track is so big and alive it’s almost intimidating.

Further, although I never thought I’d go to the trouble of setting up a second system just for MC, the OctoPi now lives in my living room, sharing a shelf with my “good stuff”. It’s my dedicated MC front end, driving my Prima Luna power amp and Focal towers as front L&R (thanks to DACs with good remote control and multiple inputs). But more importantly, it’s good enough to bring you multichannel audio that lets you appreciate its charms. The first time I fired it up, I remembered Kal Rubinson’s statement from his Toshiba SD9200 review (quoted above): “Right from the first notes, the multichannel version sounds incredibly live... I sense the ambiance instantly, and every sound is realistic and credible”. Yes indeed!

LIMITATIONS

The Octo was designed and created to work with the 32 bit Raspberry Pi OS on a 3B+ or earlier Pi. It was not written for, tested on, or intended for use on a 4. With only a little work, I was able to eliminate the SD card and get it to boot and play on a 3B+ from a USB SSD (which I highly recommend). I have it working well on a 4 running from a 64G microSD card, but I still haven’t successfully moved the entire file system to an SSD and booted up a fully functional Octo4 without a card.

Once you install the Octo card on a Pi, most other functions are inaccessible. HDMI audio output cannot be used because the Octo configuration files limit any and all audio output to the Octo. Even if you disconnect the Octo card and want to use the Pi for anything else, you’ll have to reboot it with an OS and file system on a card or drive that’s not configured for the Octo. This is a simple matter of unplugging a USB SDD or removing the Octo-configured SD card and substituting the Pi OS image you want to run instead. But it’s one more step that many nontinkering audiophiles will find annoying.

I suspect it’s possible to make the Octo work with some of the audio software that comes with embedded JEOSs, eg Volumio, piCorePlayer (Tiny Core Linux), etc. I did not take the time to try to figure out how to make that happen, because I’d have to learn in detail what’s in each of those distros, how to load the Octo drivers, which conf files to edit and how, etc. If I find the time, I’ll try to get it to work with piCorePlayer and Volumio. But for now, I can only confirm how well it works on the latest 32 bit Raspberry Pi OS as of September 2, 2020.

Interestingly, it emits a mild click/pop when starting play from idle if directly wired to the output stage. At least in my setup, this is not loud enough to damage anything or be a major annoyance. But I suggest keeping your volume down the first time you start a track, as it may be sensitive to equipment. Interestingly, when I hooked it up to a pair of low latency BT transmitters for wireless 4 channel, that transient disappeared! And speaking of wireless MC……...

DIP YOUR TOES INTO WIRELESS MC WITH OCTOPI & THE LATEST BLUETOOTH

This is another topic on which I’m preparing a full review and discussion. But I can’t resist throwing it into this piece because it’s ideal for the OctoPi and it’s truly cool!

BT has a bad name among audiophiles, and historic experience suggests that it’s justified for most listening more critical than plain vanilla background music. But Bluetooth has come a long way, and the latest Qualcomm AptX codecs in the latest chips work really well within their design parameters. The limit on resolution in currently available devices is “only” 24/48, but the basic specs are impressive: THDN = -80dB, SNR=129 dB, and PEAQ = -0.05. If you’re unfamiliar with PEAQ, I’m working on a review of value-based audio quality measurement and assessment tools & methods, of which PEAQ is starting to appear in promotional material like Qualcomm’s AptX website. For now, I’ll just describe the 4 channel system I set up with the OctoPi and two pairs of adaptive low latency / HD BT transceivers. The HD codec does make a readily audible difference in clarity, definition, background silence, and dynamics – it’s clearly better and well worth buying new stuff to get it.

The critical piece of info here is that you have to be running the same codecs in both the transmitter and receiver to get the desired functions, e.g. low latency, HD. If they don’t match, you get the same old SBC Bluetooth codec that connects your phone to your earbuds. As I found out the hard way because the info was not provided by the manufacturer of the first pair I bought, very few of even the latest BT speakers use the most up to date codecs. You can’t split MC into stereo BT pairs with the latency of a standard BT system because it’s not consistent enough to avoid a subtle random “reverb” effect. Even the latency of the standard HD codec (lower than a standard BT at about 80 ms) is definitely audible if you hard wire the fronts and use BT for the rears, but the latency is sufficiently consistent from device to device in the same room with no barriers between transmitters and receivers to do fully BT MC from an Octo card into multiple DACs. This works OK with my iFi, Emotiva, SMSL, and M-Audio, although I cans ee how different DAC technology might affect synch in playback.

Here are the RainyB long range transceivers I bought to use as transmitters.

All of these units look pretty much alike regardless of manufacturer, and they may all come out of the same factory for all I know. I picked these because the specs are all the same, the Amazon reviews were very good, and they were only $42 compared to some that get close to $100. For the receiving end, I got a pair of $20 HD / LL transceivers that are much smaller because they have internal antennae (pictured below). Again, there are several similar products in that price range with the same specs. All the latest generation BT transceivers have optical I/O as well as line level analog via 1/8” TRS jacks. Most include a hair thin optical cable along with a pair of male RCA-to-male TRS 1/8” cables and a 1’ USB-C to USB-A cable for charging.

Pairing is no different from any other BT you’ve used, except that there’s no GUI to guide you – so it’s possible that you’ll pair one with another BT device within range if it’s also in pairing mode. To prevent this, I sat the two next to each other and activated pairing for both of them simultaneously. Because they have internal batteries, you can do this before moving one or both to the locations in which you want them to live. They also work with the charging cable plugged in, which is good because I hate having to remember to recharge audio device batteries.

Once paired, I used analog lines into the transmitters and optical out of the receivers to Edifier 1280s (which do have integral BT, but it’s not low latency). I was pleasantly surprised at the SQ, which is good enough to demonstrate the endearing qualities of MC and more than fine for casual listening in 2 channels or more. The analog link between DAC and BT transmitter is the weak one here – it’s not going to win Product of the Year in anybody’s book. Using low latency, with line of sight between BT device pairs, there’s no audible time shift between front and rear channels. I also set it up with optical into my SMSL SU-8 DAC driving a Prima Luna power amp and Focal towers in front and the Edifiers in the rear. With LL, there’s no audible delay and the sound is good enough to listen to (and maybe even to write home about).

I find a consistent flattening or slight dulling of the music through BT compared to directly connecting the DAC(s) to the analog inputs. It’s just not as alive, e.g. transients seem a bit slow. The latest AptX low latency and HD codecs both seem to reduce this effect a lot, making it tolerable for extended listening (which I don’t like to do on my old fashioned SBC BT headphones or with a Rocketfish BT receiver I bought years ago). I like the 4 channel setup enough to leave it assembled and ready for use, so I can listen to MC if I’m in the mood.

I haven’t tried using both long range transceivers to send and receive 2 channels to my best rig (Prima Luna / Focal) because I don’t have a computer or even a good DAC with an optical output, and using analog into the BT transmitter limits SQ enough to make it a nonstarter in my main systems.

THE BOTTOM LINE ON THE OCTO

It’s not going to become a Stereophile Class A pick. But mounted on a good Raspberry Pi, the Octo sound card will let you listen to pretty fine multichannel reproduction for a total outlay of about $100 for the entire front end. You’ll have 8 RCA line outputs to drive your amplifiers or powered speakers, so it’s easy to assemble your entry level MC system at very low cost.

You can even start with analog endpoints you may already have, although matched channels are obviously better. I put a series of patchwork systems together to see how they sounded. I mixed and matched Edifier R1280DBs, JBL LSR305s, and passive speakers (Rogers LS3/5a and Focal 726 Towers) powered by various electronics, to see how much the mismatch affected SQ. When upmixing 2 channel to MC formats, mismatched front and rear systems really doesn’t detract much from SQ if both are of high quality. On the best program material recorded as MC (e.g. the Marianne Thorsen Mozart Violin Concerti), better rears do make a difference in image stability, detail, and coherence of transients. But only with MC programs that were created for dramatic surround presentation does it really make a huge difference if the rears are identical or closely matched to the fronts. As most MC music is not intended to dazzle artificially, I’m living happily with my towers up front and the Edifiers bringing up the rear.

The Octo is a great way to get into MC for peanuts. I recommend this project highly for those to whom it appeals. But if the results I describe for this do not seem worth the effort and the Rube Goldberg nature of the equipment, read on – there are other paths to value in MC audio.

CONSIDER THE HOME THEATER RECEIVER FOR MULTICHANNEL AUDIO

I’m a big boy, so I’ll provoke a few flames and take the heat:

DISCLAIMER: I did not buy any new receivers for this project. I spent a fair amount of time listening to them, mostly at Best Buy. The BB we usually use has a big Magnolia “boutique” plus their standard stock. In addition to files on a USB drive, I brought my NuForce iCanDo so I could stream my own files over the web and have a digital source to drive the receivers.

BEGINNING WITH YOUR OLD HOME THEATER RECEIVER

If you’re sitting on a HT receiver that you no longer use, the path to MC begins in the closet where you store it. My trusty 10 year old Pioneer Elite VSX-30 receiver has been out of service for the almost 5 years since we retired and moved from our house to an apartment. We put a big, smart Samsung on the living room wall because I can’t mount our projector in the stressed concrete ceiling of our condo. I forgot all about the Elite until I was beginning my quest for MC knowledge and realized I had a decent receiver with which to experiment.

The down side of older and lower end current HT receivers is that I haven’t found one that would decode anything but wavs, mp3s, and wma files from its USB port. My Elite simply ignores FLACs, dsf, and other “good” files on a USB stick or drive, as does every other older model I could find in friends’ closets and other out of the way places. Another drawback is that many have marginal analog electronics. Their power amps have grossly inflated ratings and are simply nowhere near as powerful or clean as they’d like you to believe. And none that I could find has line level outputs for MC use. Even my Elite, which is far from a bargain basement piece, only has 2 channel line outs (“DVR” and 2nd zone), both of which are fixed level.

The up side is that the better ones actually sound very good. Many (like mine) have decent DAC chips in them and will play up to 24/192 very nicely when fed by a capable source through HDMI, coax, or optical inputs. This makes them ideally suited for use with a SBC (for which I prefer a Raspberry Pi to any other) or any streamer with optical or coax RCA outputs. And you can do MC audio nicely with any of these. You can also play DSD files if you convert to a format the internal DAC will play. Having a full feature remote is icing on the cake, and most of them do. Here’s my Elite playing a dsf file from JRMC on my Pi, downsampled to 32/192 (which I didn’t think the receiver would decode!):

You can buy a decent used VSX30 or similar model from Marantz, Denon, Sony, Yamaha etc for about $100-150. This is great value for a starter MC audio system – you can add a Raspberry Pi for $75, use an open source player like VLC, and have yourself a really nice system with the addition of as many passive speakers as you want and a sub. Start with something like Edifier P12s for $80 / pair (list price) and add a 100W Yamaha 8” sub for another $150. This totals under $500 for a 4 channel + sub system and about $660 for a full 7.1 that will make most of us pretty happy as an entrée into MC – and you can set it up for HT as well, if you’re so inclined. There are a lot of excellent HD music videos.

SQ is really good, especially for the price. And the magic of MC really does what Kal describes – it sounds incredibly live and lets you sense the ambiance instantly. Every sound is a bit more realistic and credible. By the time you get over the joy enough to listen for flaws in SQ, you’ll either love it as a second system used only for MC or be motivated to get good stuff and upgrade your main system to MC.

STARTING FROM SCRATCH WITH A HOME THEATER RECEIVER

A good, inexpensive new HT receiver is another path to multichannel value. Most entry level MC receivers are mass market fodder not well suited for audiophile use. The least expensive (~$300 & under) current models from Yamaha, Denon, Sony, Onkyo, Pioneer etc are marginal performers for pure audio, both in SQ and utility. So they have little appeal for us, e.g. many don’t play FLACs and they don’t do DSD. The nicest thing you can say about some of them is that they come with a polishing cloth. The entry level models also “only” play up to 6 channel (5.1) and do not decode theater MC schema like Atmos. This is irrelevant to most audiophiles, except that JRiver Media Center (and some other programs) will upmix your output to as many as 32 channels if you really want to do that. I don’t.

Because these devices are designed and sold for home theater use, the low hanging fruit on the feature tree is most attractive to video users. As the price goes above true entry level, the first things added are video enhancement (e.g. more HDMI inputs) and HT related features (e.g. more output power plus Atmos and other audio processing). For example, the entry level Sony MC receiver (STRDH590) features 145WPC in “5.2” format (2 RCA sub outs), decodes Dolby Pro Logic II, DTS 96/24, and Dolby Digital, and has 6 DSP modes with auto room correction. It does audiophile formats including DSD (although I couldn’t get a spec for the highest resolution and didn’t bring a DSD4 file with me). The one-step-above Sony (STRDH790) is a 145WPC 5.1.2 receiver with the same inputs. But this one processes DTS, DTS-HD Master Audio, DTS:X, Dolby Atmos, Dolby Digital, and Dolby TrueHD. It has one optical and one coax audio input, and will play from USB storage or your network. But the 2 added audio channels are in the ceiling and are only for Dolby Atmos – it’s still a 5.1 for audio.

If you go a wee bit upscale from the bottom tier, you can find a few fine sounding units for another $100-150. The Yamaha RXV-485 is an example of a decent $400 performer that will play 24/192 flacs and DSD4. It sounds very good, has some DSP, and is easy to use. With network connectivity, USB, BT, and a host of analog & digital I/O ports, it’ll digest whatever you can throw into it from a Rapsberry Pi to a serious network streamer. But you don’t even have to use a front end device with most HT receivers over $400 – you can stream to them from your NAS or plug in a USB drive and play your own files (once you’ve confirmed that the model of interest to you will recognize and play the formats of your choice).

You can also stream internet radio and streaming services on most HT receivers sold today above the $400 price point. You may have to spend $500 depending on the brand and model you like – but you can stream internet radio and streaming services and play MC along with all your usual 2 channel listening very nicely for the price of the receiver plus however many passive speakers yo need for your desired format. Be aware that you won’t find MC preamp outs at this level – that feature requires a bit more outlay, e.g. the $1000 Denon AVR-X3600H. And to be honest, it’s probably not an approach most of us would consider for a value driven MC audio system because you can get a decent 8 channel DAC for far less than that if you’re not satisfied with SQ from an OctoPi or need more flexibility than it can provide. I wouldn’t spend more than $500 on a new HT receiver for MC audio unless you also plan to use it for video or will use other functions. Some of the I/O and switching schema are quite impressive on the better receivers, with at least 4 HDMI inputs plus multiple coax, optical, and USB ports.

Another feature of value in a surprising number of HT receivers from cheap to costly is automatic room correction DSP. Many of these come with a calibrated mic and do an excellent job of normalizing in-room frequency response and phasing if you activate it. I haven’t seen any in which it was automatic or even default – you have to activate it if you want it. Even my 10 year old Elite has this feature, and it works pretty well.

OTHER ALTERNATIVES FOR VALUE BASED MC AUDIO

MC DACs

A MC DAC is no longer a dream and no longer priced out of reach for most of us. As you’ve now learned, the OctoPi is a true 6-in/8-out ADC/DAC with good SQ that brings the total cost of a MC front end to a whopping $100 with a 4 gig Pi 4. If you spring for an 8 gig Pi 4 because you’ll need that much RAM and don’t want to run from a USB SSD with ZRAM, you’re talking about $125. If you run from a small USB SSD, add another $30-$50. But, as I’ve already described, this is not highly flexible for playback – it does what it does, can only be used with a Pi, and limits other functions on that Pi while configured for the Octo. Fortunately, there are value based alternatives besides HT receivers if you don’t like or want to be bothered with an Octo and a Pi.

If you don’t want an HT receiver, the next step up from a Pi with an Octo card would have been a MiniDSP UDAC-8, a device well reviewed by many. Sadly, it was recently discontinued before I (or you) could buy one. However, the slack is being picked up rapidly. Consider the ESI Gigaport EX, a 24/192 8-out USB DAC for $125 that sounds so fine that I’m adding one to my own systems. It’s a really cool little piece about which I can learn nothing beyond its specs. I don’t know what’s inside, e.g. DAC chips, I haven’t bought one yet, and my wife says I should stop disassembling friends’ stuff without their permission. Soon I’ll have my own, but not soon enough to get a more thorough evaluation into this article. The ESI looks good and feels pretty solid even though it’s not metal. The case is made of what feels like pretty solid plastic material, and the connectors are typical board-mounted generic jacks with the same feel as a million other low to mid level electronic devices. Its use is growing rapidly both for live performance and in recording studios by many musicians and small studio owners who only need a few channels and can’t afford or don’t see the need for high dollar stuff. With a USB-C input, it’ll do up to 7.1 and is great for JRiver Media Center, Roon, and every other MC player I’ve tried. Just keep its 24/192 limitations in mind and you’ll be fine with it if it fits your plans.

Many of you know how much I love Emotiva products. With excellent quality, sound, and customer relations, they’ve always been one of my go-tos for anything they offer in my price range that I need. Their MC700 is an 8 channel DAC and control center for $700 list (and they have great sales from time to time). It offers 6 in / 2 out HDMI, plus coax, optical, and analog inputs. There is a USB3 port, but it’s only for their BT dongle (required for BT audio input). I haven’t heard this product, but after owning 2 prior Emotiva DACs and having a Stealth DC-1 now, I can confidently say that I really like the quality and neutrality of the Emotiva sonic signature in DACs. As I have no need for one, I won’t be buying an MC700 – but I encourage any of you to whom its feature set appeals to try one. Emotiva has a 30 day return policy that I’ve never had to use. But if their service is as good on that as it’s been when I needed them for other things, they’ll handle it promptly and gracefully.

There are other MC DACs and front ends at various price points, both internal and external with multiple connection options. You can choose from several designed for musicians, recording, gamers, and/or computer-based HT sound. For example, the $120 Creative Sound Baster X3 is a USB 7.1 DAC that goes to 32/192 & sounds very fine. It has unbalanced TRS 1/8” line out jacks, but it’s quiet (if you practice sound cable hygiene) and it acquits itself very well in a value-driven MC system. I personally think it’s a wee bit clearer, more alive, and more articulate than the Octo card when driven by the same Raspberry Pi. I do not find the 1/8” jacks to be a problem and could happily live with them – YMMV.

RECYCLING OTHER MULTICHANNEL AUDIO PROCESSORS

Devices like the Oppo 105 can be excellent MC DACs or complete front ends. The 105 and similar products contain network streamers and do internet radio & streaming very well. They’re no longer state of the art, but they’re still pretty good for dipping your toes into MC – and many of us could live happily with one of these as a front end in a second system dedicated to MC & HT. If your 105’s been gathering dust since you set up that new streamer, dig it out and try MC with it. With discrete line level outputs for 7.1, I think it sounds better than the OctoPi – it’s very clear, clean, articulate, and accurate.

Be careful about planned repurposing. Not all devices allow access to functions you’d think would be integral. For example, the Oppo BDP-95 (a predecessor to the 105 and a very nice device) does not provide direct access to the DAC. So you can’t use it as a stand-alone processor. But if your legacy device is usable as a MC DAC, you can use it to start exploring the joys of MC on the cheap.

AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST….MAKING MC RECORDINGS WITH THE OCTOPI

I’m preparing another article on Pi projects, featuring my mini-DAW. It’s based on a fully rodded and fan cooled Pi 3B+ because the Octo card wouldn’t work with the 4 when I first got it. And it’s amazingly capable, both with Audacity and with Ardour. Because real time monitoring requires the CPU to process the existing tracks for playback while processing the track(s) being added for recording, the 3B+ is not up to simultaneous monitoring and recording. The degradation in SQ is grossly apparent, with dropouts, crackling, and assorted pseudo-biologic noises on playback that suggest serious indigestion of the processing tract. As long as mic levels are set properly and you’ve done a thorough sound check before the program starts, real time monitoring (although the best way to assure the quality of the recording) is not strictly necessary. You do need to monitor the meters closely to be sure you’re not overloading any inputs when recording live music.

Sadly, the club in which we play is (like most other southeastern Pennsylvania clubs) still closed. So I couldn’t make any full length recordings to demo for you how well the little rig performs live. But I’ve made many MC recordings on it by laying down one track at a time in my home studio, using a click track to keep me on time because of the described inability to play recorded tracks in real time while adding more.

As I’ve posted on AS many times, I love ART equipment. They make wonderful products at great prices, and they represent true value for the audiophile as well as the musician and the recording engineer with a tight budget. That little tube preamp has XLR balanced I/O and sounds most excellent! Although crude, the bench version of my OctoPi DAW is fully functional and will do its job faithfully. Here’s the uncased DAW sitting on the iPad with inputs on the left and outputs on the right:

Here’s a shot of an Ardour MC session with 2 tracks recorded and #3 going in. You can see that the CPU is working fairly hard at 62% (the red usage widget in the lower right corner). But the temp is only 66 degrees and everything’s going perfectly well.

You can set Ardour preferences to route monitoring internally through the computer or through external hardware. Using internal processing is what makes the Pi choke. But using the latter setting and monitoring the track being recorded from its input, there’s no problem with SQ and latency is compensated by the recording program. Ardour and Audacity both do this very well, although it takes a bit of work to set Audacity up for this. Here are the instructions for latency correction in Audacity, to give you an idea of how easy or difficult you might find working with this program. Once it’s set for a given computer, it’s done and does not need to be changed unless you change hardware or software.

RIPPING WITH THE DAW

Remember that the Octo is an ADC as well as a DAC. So you can record directly into the RCA jacks from preamp out or any other line level analog sources. Although you could use any recording program you like, I prefer Audacity for ripping vinyl and CDs. It runs extremely well on a Pi 3B+ or 4. It’s an excellent program that rips to wav files. It lets you export and work with your recordings in any format and resolution you prefer (as long as the processor can handle it), which is not at all a problem for saving as Redbook files, even for MC rips. It won’t export to DSD or other serious formats, but you can capture the wav file at up to 384k. When exporting, you can convert to about 20 lossless formats, set FLAC bit depth and compression level, etc.

Here’s a minute of my rip of Dave Grusin’s Discovered Again (Sheffield Direct to Disc original vinyl, 1976, typical review HERE). This was ripped from my Thorens TD125 with fixed shell SME 3009, Audioquest cartridge, and Parasound Zphono USB directly to the OctoPi.

WAV File

FLAC File

If you’re interested in serious recording with a Pi, there’s also a balanced Octo card that’s either about to come out or already available (it was still beta when I last looked).

SUMMARY

Multichannel audio is cool, fun, and well worth exploring even if you have no desire or intent to adopt it. Many of you think you don’t want it but will change your minds within seconds of a first listen. The really great news is that you can apply what I’ve written here to set up an inexpensive MC system with sufficient SQ to amuse, amaze, and attract you into its lair. You can probably use some or all of what you have now. You can mix and match old and new components, and you can probably use the player(s) you love for MC formats.

I can’t believe how exciting good MC audio can be, and I urge you all to at least give it a whirl. The education alone is worth the effort – and I’ll bet that at least half of you get hooked firmly enough to keep a MC setup in use.

Stay safe and enjoy!!

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thejoeydavis · 8 years

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Movies of 2016

(I’m posting this late but for archival purposes I’m putting it here)

Every January I do a list of all the movies I watched over the past year in chronological order and this,, as you can tell,, is that list. Each movie is rated out of 10 and rounded to the nearest whole number for simplicity and because I use the letterboxd app to log all my movies and it uses a 5 star system. These number ratings are meant to be as objective as possible, which means they’re judged on commonly agreed upon film conventions and what most critics and kinophiles would consider to be “good film,” as pretentious as that sounds. Really it just means I went with my gut feeling and then considered technical aspects and effectiveness on all of these. Paired with each are some thoughts to talk about what I liked or disliked, how it made me feel, etc. I’ll try to keep it short on as many as I can since there are so many. tl;dr: top 10 is at the bottom

Anomalisa – 7 – a predictably depressing Charlie Kaufman film about loneliness and being human—somewhat ironic considering it’s a stop motion film. Don’t let the puppets with 3d printed faces fool you; this is a very human movie with one of the most realistic sex scenes ever captured on film. Probably don’t see this with your mom like I did.

Inside Llewyn Davis – 8 – one of my favorite movies of the past few years and one of my top Coen bros movies. The charismatic but dickish performance by Oscar Isaac and beautiful folk soundtrack depicts a hard life for a musician in early 1960s New York that will make you feel better about yourself (unless you’re a musician).

Me, and Earl, and the Dying Girl – 8 – also one of my favorite movies of the past few years, this love letter to classic film by Alfonso Gomez-Rejon is a beautiful story of a popular kid in high school who befriends a girl with terminal cancer. Essentially Perks of Being a Wallflower meets criterion collection.

Project X – 7 – one of my guilty pleasure movies. Lots of fun.

The Hateful Eight (70mm) – 6 – I got to see this in 70mm complete with preshow overture and intermission and it was an incredible experience. I loved the movie but it’s not Tarantino’s best by any stretch. Note the huge disparity in rating from last year when I gave it a 9.2. This film is not a 9.2.

The Forest – 3 – in this movie Natalie Dormer goes to the Japanese suicide forest to search for her sister who went missing. Suicide is a very apt theme here considering how heavily I considered ending my life during this movie. Truly awful.

Carol – 6 – one of those movies that I know is good but I just didn’t enjoy. It’s about Rooney Mara and Cate Blanchett as they try to hide their forbidden romantic relationship in 1950s New York. Long, slow, but very pretty and touching, I’d recommend it if you like character driven stories—especially ones about LGBT issues because it’s very good in that regard.

Hail, Caesar – 7 – underrated mystery film by the Coen’s about old Hollywood and communists. More along the lines of the Big Lebowski than No Country For Old Men. Just a really fun movie with a great sense of world building that makes 1930s Hollywood really come alive.

Deadpool – 7 – pretty funny and exactly the kind of movie Ryan Reynolds and fans wanted. Probably the only good Marvel movie made by Fox.

The Witch – 8 – a visceral and disturbing film about a cursed life in 1600s New England, The Witch (stylized as The VVitch) is one of the best horror movies I’ve ever seen. Be warned though, it’s the definition of slow burn horror so you’ll probably dislike it if you’re used to modern horror films.

10 Cloverfield Lane – 7 – one of the big surprises of the year and also one of the most thrilling, Mary Elizabeth Winstead and John Goodman both give excellent performances. It’s basically a bottle episode completely unrelated to the first film. People have criticized Winstead’s character for her actions at the end but it completes her character arc perfectly so it definitely works.

Room – 8 – beautiful film. Somewhat overrated.

Brooklyn – 8 – one of my favorites from 2015 and immensely enjoyable from start to finish. This story of an Irish girl moving to Brooklyn shows that the conflict doesn’t have to be high stakes for it to be compelling.

Batman v Superman – 4 – wow surprise surprise, Zack Snyder made another shit movie. Awful film full of clichés and nonsensical dialogue, bizarre editing, and the incredibly moronic decision to try and kickstart an entire cinematic universe in a dreadfully painful 2+ hour runtime. This movie sucks and DC needs to either hire some competent scriptwriters and directors or just give up already.

Zootopia – 7 – ah the quintessential furry movie 2016. I really enjoyed this and it has great rewatch value. One of the most beautifully animated movies of the year.

Midnight Special – 6 – I had no expectations for this movie and I was pleasantly surprised by it, although somewhat let down by the ending. It’s an interesting story about a kid with unknown supernatural powers being smuggled to a specific coordinates where he says something will happen. The mystery unfolds throughout the run time and there are some pretty cool scenes. Fun sci-fi to rent maybe.

Midnight in Paris – 7 – 1920s Paris is arguably one of the best eras to be alive in and Woody Allen captures the magic of the period well. As with most modern Woody Allen films it’s pretty cheesy—especially the modern day scenes—but the scenes that take place in the 1920s with F Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, and Picasso are truly a delight. One of my favorite movies from 2011.

Captain America Civil War – 7 – not bad but much worse than Winter Soldier. It was enjoyable at least and miles ahead of Avengers 2.

Green Room – 8 – a disturbing, white-knuckle rollercoaster of a film that follows a punk band as they fight off a bar full of alt-righ—I mean neo-nazis. An absolute must-see.

The Nice Guys – 7 – fun from start to finish, Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe give two funny and over the top performances in this 1970s period film about two detectives who get caught up in a case that’s way over their heads. Definite recommendation. Crowe’s performance in the first third/half or so is very melodramatic and over the top cool-guy but I believe it was intended to be tongue in cheek so don’t let it throw you.

The Jungle Book – 6 – not bad.

Raiders of the Lost Ark – 9 – a near perfect movie and one of, if not the best action movie of all time.

x x x s u m m e r x x x

Make Happy – 8 – Bo Burnham tweeted about a special premiere screening of his new special back in March so I bought tickets and went with Andrew to see it. We went to the Largo in West Hollywood and were treated to a short comedy show and the grand premiere of Make Happy, Bo’s last one-man show for the foreseeable future. It was an incredible experience.

The World of Tomorrow – 8 – it’s only 16 minutes and it’s by Don Herzfeldt—what’s not to love? Get ready for an existential crisis.

The Conjuring 2 – 7 – pretty spooky in some parts with a cool little i spy game you can play with the name of the ghost demon lady. Not as good as the first.

Finding Dory – 7 – older Pixar films have a certain level of charm that all their films post-Toy Story 3 (barring Monsters University) don’t seem to have and this is no exception. It was very enjoyable but it just felt like it doesn’t have the magic that the old ones have.

The Shallows – 4 – the amount of praise this movie received was deadass baffling. This is one of the worst movies I’ve seen this year and I don’t see how so many people missed the cliché dialogue and plot, ridiculous shark cgi, exploitative ass shots, and absolutely insane and unrealistic attempts to kill the shark. Critics and audiences comparing this to Jaws is an insult to not only Spielberg, but also the art of filmmaking itself.

Frances Ha – 9 – one of my favorite movies of all time, this black and white indie film by Noah Baumbach and Greta Gerwig is a cozy tale of solipsistic loneliness, friendship, and following your dreams. It’s depressing, but in a very relatable and reassuring way. Greta Gerwig as the New York dancer Frances is so believable that seeing her in other roles feels almost disingenuous. Honestly if you watch anything on this list you should watch this first, foremost and as soon as possible. It’s on netflix!

Mistress America – 7 – another one by Noah Baumbach and Greta Gerwig and it was actually my introduction to their work. I loved this movie when I first saw it but it pales in comparison to Frances. Still a great movie with wonderful acting and snappy as hell dialogue. Fun fact: Noah Baumbach worked with Wes Anderson in the past and it shows here, especially in the dialogue.

The Neon Demon – 8 – one of the most polarizing films of the year but a definite return to form by the near infamous Nicolas Winding Refn. The success of the 2011 masterpiece Drive was not good for Refn’s ego apparently as he followed it up with the nauseatingly self-indulgent Only God Forgives. Thank goodness he was able to find a balance between pure art film and accessible indie film with the Neon Demon. It’s by no means very accessible but the acting, especially from the main girls and a sleazy Keanu Reeves, is great and the visuals are incredibly surreal and v e r y v e r y n e o n . Recommend if you like artsy films with lots of sex and blood.

Back to the Future – 10 – a textbook example of what a perfect movie looks like.

It Follows – 8 – nothing but love for this creepy and atmospheric 2015 horror/suspense film about the end of childhood and the impending dread of adulthood. Really it’s about a supernatural shape shifting thing with its “rule” being that acts like an std being passed down through sexual partners. If the thing catches you, it then goes after the previous person in the chain and so on, so the only way to save yourself is to pass it on or run endlessly in futility. Please do see this it’s great.

The Secret Life of Pets – 6 – a disappointment but Louis CK as a dog was fun to see.

Hush – 5 – not very good Netflix horror movie about a guy terrorizing a deaf lady at her home in the woods for some reason.

Snatch – 6 – I suppose if I were more familiar with Guy Ritchie’s work I would’ve enjoyed it more but it looks like it was shot by a Tarantino wannabe edgelord and edited in windows moviemaker. Still entertaining though.

Horace and Pete – 10 – Horace and Pete is a dramedy web series multi-camera sitcom written, directed, and produced by Louis CK and it’s the single best serial program I’ve ever seen. This is a true masterpiece in every sense and the writing and acting is some of the best in a serial program. It was so good that I actually could not enjoy anything else for days after because everything paled in comparison. For example, I watched Stranger Things the day after I finished this and I had to stop watching three episodes in because it was completely and utterly awful compared to Horace and Pete. The quality of writing is unbelievable and I laughed and cried at many many points. Louis CK, Steve Buscemi, Edie Falco, and Alan Alda, bring career defining performances to the small screen and I cannot wait to watch it again—although I’m not sure I’m prepared for it.

Breathless (1960) – 7 – one of the most defining films of the French New Wave, this film by Jean Luc-Godard is a love story shot in some of the most unconventional ways I’ve seen in a film. It’s not surreal or weird but it certainly is interesting. Worth a watch if you like the cinematography of Wes Anderson, Woody Allen, or Louis CK—although it’s a much more saturated French New Wave style since all those styles are derivative of this. Has some of the most intriguing and innovative tracking/dolly shots I’ve ever seen. In fact, at one point two characters are walking down the street but they couldn’t afford a dolly for the tracking shot, so they had the cameraman sit in a wheelchair and film while someone pulled him backwards to make the shot. Really that’s what French New Wave is all about: innovating and using filmmaking techniques that were unprecedented at the time.

Star Trek Beyond – 6 – a really fun return to the franchise that actually felt somewhat like a Star Trek film—unlike that last one. It’s still just an action movie franchise now but it’s just a real good time.

Lights Out – 3 – again, the praise this film received was COMPLETELY unwarranted and totally baffling. This movie blows and is so saturated with clichés that I can’t imagine liking this film. don’t waste ur time.

Mike & Dave Need Wedding Dates – 5 – actually hilarious movie. Really dumb but so goddamn funny. Zach Efron and Adam Devine are a great duo. Has arguably the best exchange about fisting in the history of film.

Café Society – 6 – a pretty good modern Woody Allen film. Much better than his last two, Irrational Man and Magic in the Moonlight. It’s nice to see a film from Woody Allen that isn’t about a much older man falling in love with a much younger woman.

Suicide Squad – 2 – “roses are red/there is no god/my favorite movie?/suicide squad.” – Gideon Ondap deadass one of the worst movies I have ever seen. I wrote a 10 page essay on this after it came out but basically the editing is jarring enough to induce brain trauma, the acting is atrocious, and the script is objectively bad. A complete and utter failure of a film. The name is a warning.

The Room – 1 – another one of the worst movies I’ve ever seen yet 1000x more enjoyable than Suicide Squad. Tommy Wisseau is a genius and this is his magnum opus. Required viewing. Also I must say that a Suicide Squad/The Room double feature makes for one of the funniest nights of life.

Scott Pilgrim vs The World – 8 – honestly one of my favorite movies. A super well done adaptation directed by Edgar Wright, this film is able to stand independently next to the already spectacular Scott Pilgrim graphic novel series. The music is incredible. It never gets old.

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Sausage Party – 5 – obscene, racist, vulgar, and dumb as hell with a giant food orgy at one point. Still laughed at much of it.

Captain Fantastic – 8 – a dad raising his kids to survive in the wilderness of Washington must bring them into society to attend their dead mother’s funeral. A big surprise and one of the most enjoyable movies I saw this year.

Don’t Think Twice – 8 – Mike Birbiglia has always been one of my favorite comedians because his stories were so heartwarming, wholesome, and packed to the brim with jokes that would reward you on multiple viewings or listens. Don’t Think Twice is Mike’s second movie I believe, and it’s about an improv group in Brooklyn having fun doing their craft while trying to make a life for themselves. When you’re a comedian/improviser,, your friends are too, but if one of you actually gets a big break then it’s that person’s break and no one else’s. It causes a lot of tension between performers because even though they’re all friends, they’re still actively competing in a highly sought after profession. Judd Apatow came out after he saw the movie and said how accurately it depicts the life of comedy performers. It’s a really depressing (in a relatable way) and realistic take on the competitive world of improv and deals with friendship, comedy, and how cruel life can really be. Beautiful movie.

American Beauty – 8 – really did not like this the first time but warmed up to it on the second viewing and it really shines despite many dated aspects.

Antz – 6 – woody allen as a ant oy vey

Back to the Future II – 5 – pretty bad sequel until he goes back to 1955. Worse than the third tbh

Everybody Wants Some!! – 7 – even after the abortion that was Boyhood I didn’t give up on Richard Linklater and I’m glad I didn’t. This spiritual sequel to Dazed and Confused (but in the 80s this time!) was a ton of fun.

Clapping for the Wrong Reasons – 8 – this short film written by Donald Glover and directed by Hiro Murai is about a surreal day in the life of The Boy, a character Donald Glover created as the speaker of his Because the Internet album (his magnum opus imo). Hot take: Chance v Bino push up contest contender for best film scene ever.

Kubo and the Two Strings – 7 – the most beautiful disappointment of the year. The incredible stop motion animation is unfortunately much more enjoyable than the underwhelming story. Not as good as Coraline.

Hell or High Water – 8 – the director of photography from Sicario returns for this modern western about two brothers who rob the banks that screwed over their mother. Great performances from Jeff Bridges, Ben Foster, and Chris Pine.

Don’t Breathe – 7 – this horror film about three thieves who break into an old blind man’s house borders on exploitation film towards the end. Not that bad.

Blair Witch – 6 – not as bad as everyone said it was. It’s a soft reboot of 99’s Blair Witch Project but with a modern horror twist—which means it relies mainly on jump scares and unnecessary use of found footage tropes rather than atmosphere building and genuine terror. I still thoroughly enjoyed it and thought the last 15 minutes or so were really spooky. The creature design was really great and the way time moved was an interesting horror device. If you liked the first one but were bored by it then you’ll probably like this one because it moves a bit faster although you might be bored by it too. Oh but side note: that drone scene was fucking stupid.

Over The Garden Wall – 10 – this 10 episode cartoon network animated miniseries aired in the fall of 2014 and follows two boys as they wander through the woods to find their way back home. It stars Elijah Wood, Christopher Lloyd, Melanie Lynskey, John Cleese, Tom Lennon, and Tim Curry among others. The story itself is inspired by Dante Alighieri’s Inferno and the music is inspired by early 20th century Americana folk music. It’s literally the single most charming thing I’ve ever seen and it’s an absolute MUST SEE.

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Doctor Strange – 7 – not much to say about this one but I liked it. The visuals were top notch and although Dr Strange is basically just Tony Stark pt 2, it makes sense considering how much lesser of a role Stark will play in later movies. I’m really excited for the new Thor movie now.

The Purge Election Year – 4 – each Purge movie is better than the last and this third installment is still a 4. That’s pretty much all there is to say. There are some legitimately hilarious parts in this though—all unintentional.

O Brother, Where Art Thou? – 7 – another silly Coen film and one of their most accessible. Good film based on the Odyssey.

Arrival – 9 – Dennis Villeneuve is quickly becoming one of my favorite directors after last year’s Sicario and now 2016’s Arrival. This is a film about humanity, the complete frivolity of our problems, and how staying divided will be our undoing. The cinematography is breathtaking, the score is great (much of it follows the circle of 5ths, which will make sense after watching), the acting is good, and the film just has a beautiful sense of scope to it. I encourage you to watch this and DON’T WATCH ANY TRAILERS OR READ ANYTHING ABOUT IT. I assure you; you’ll want to go into this as blind as possible (and you should never watch trailers anyway they literally ruin films). In Trump’s America this movie is even more important so please I urge you to watch this.

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them – 5 – the Phantom Menace of the Harry Potter universe, Fantastic Beasts has so much exposition and forced world building that anyone who hasn’t seen the first 8 hp films will probably have a tough time figuring out what’s going on. The opening sequence is literally just a montage of newspaper headlines saying how terrible this dark wizard is, which was done in harry potter but over the span of roughly 3 movies rather than 1 minute. Overall positives: the creature designs were fun, Jacob was rad, the humor was effective, the cgi wasn’t /that/ bad, newt’s hair was wavy af (and he was a hufflepuff, which I appreciate), and the costumes may get an Oscar nomination. As for the cons: so much panning, craning, and tracking that I could barely see what was going on due to low framerate, the first 10-15 minutes are a suicide squad level editing disaster, the pacing was weird at times, they revealed who the main antagonist was in his actual first scene, too many plotlines interweaved, inexcusably bad framing in a few shots, and the ending was a little bit Chekhov’s gun but was pretty much deus ex machina. This just didn’t feel as magical as the harry potter films and, like star wars 7, it feels like a failed attempt to recapture what made people love the franchise in the first place. It was a very flawed film but I still enjoyed it and will watch it again.

Moana – 6 – VERY overrated but still good. How a lot of people felt about Frozen is how I feel about this movie. The animation was incredible, the voice acting was great, the songs were good (although not nearly as catchy or memorable as Frozen, save for Shiny) and it ends up being another Tangled, a movie I enjoyed but will forget about very soon—hell I’ve already forgotten about it. Just think about how long Frozen was a thing. People were talking about Frozen for months after and I haven’t seen anyone mention Moana since its opening weekend. Overall a huge disappointment. Zootopia was the far superior animated feature this year.

The Handmaiden – 8 – my first Park Chan-wook film and I loved it ! This film is fucking enigma for the first half and then as soon as one detail is revealed it suddenly opens up and becomes an incredible psychological thriller. I honestly was not enjoying this film for the first act or so because of how seemingly meaningless it was but it really shaped up to be one of my favorites of the year. Never before have I experienced a film that made me 180 on opinion during the course of its runtime. Be warned: don’t see this with your parents or anyone you would feel awkward watching porn with because this shit is basically pornography at MANY points during the film. I don’t know if my friend and his brother have forgiven me yet.

Unedited Footage of a Bear – 8 – there’s a tl;dr at the bottom of this one because it’s a little long and expository. I was watching an idubbbz video (https://youtu.be/5Bs45yITIt0) back in November and many criticized how unfunny and bizarre it was compared to his other content. People started to speculate that he was doing a metafictional series about his channel along the lines of alantutorial (https://www.youtube.com/user/alantutorial), a channel in which performance artist Alan Resnick plays a fictionalized version of himself who is depicted as a mentally ill young man obsessed with making tutorial videos. This alantutorial series is a commentary on poorly made tutorial videos that flood youtube, as well as social media in general and the overwhelming desire for likes, favorites, going viral, etc. after discovering Alan Resnick and watching all his videos I started to seek out his other content and I found this short film that aired as part of Adult Swim’s infomercial slot at 4 a.m. This may sound familiar to some as the timeslot for Too Many Cooks, which went viral. This short film, titled Unedited Footage of a Bear, can be watched here: https://youtu.be/2gMjJNGg9Z8 and parodies those commercials you’ll often see on tv about drugs that are peddled to mentally ill people without proper testing. This film depicts addiction as a force that can and will ruin your life, your family’s life, and will kill you if left unchecked. There’s an explanation you can watch here: https://youtu.be/_2e5ia9j0TA that explains it really well and is worth the watch. tl;dr: cool 10-minute short horror film about addiction by performance artist Alan Resnick – check it out.

Twin Peaks (Pilot) – 8 – it was good

This House Has People In It – 8 – hey look another Alan Resnick short film. you can watch it here: https://youtu.be/x-pj8OtyO2I and the attempted explanation is here: https://youtu.be/mjBTAnCUbZc because this one is pretty complicated compared to footage of a bear. also worth the watch simply for the L O R E

No Country For Old Men – 10 – one of the best movies of this century hands down. not sure if I rate it quite as high as There Will Be Blood though, which came out the same year. The Coen’s crowning achievement (although you could argue that title belongs to The Big Lebowski for reasons)

Moonlight – 9 – a very heavy coming of age film about a young boy living in the south who attempts to find himself while growing up in an incredibly unforgiving environment. beautiful film and I’m excited to see it again. very very important film for LGBT issues.

Nocturnal Animals – 8 – one of the biggest surprises this year. I LOVED this movie and it stayed with me for days. as soon as it started I made a mental note that I’d have to really pay attention to everything because I figured it would be heavy with metaphor and symbolism and boi was I right about that. Amy Adams and Jake Gyllenhaal give great performances and I honestly can’t tell you the last time I got so emotionally invested in a film. people have criticized Adams’ performance as melodramatic and cold, which is the point because she’s not supposed to be likeable. the narrative structure is refreshing and fun to piece together and the visuals were pretty alright. my favorite part of this movie was piecing together all the metaphors (of which there are many) and figuring out what the events of the Nocturnal Animals manuscript (in the film) means for the characters. It’s been a very polarizing film apparently, which surprised me since it doesn’t really try to be anything more than it is. It definitely rewards close observation but I can’t guarantee everyone will like this one. I won’t say more because going into it blind is the best way but I do recommend it. Tense, emotional, gripping, funny. It’s good.

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Star Wars Rogue One – 8 – I really enjoyed this. I probably don’t need to say much because it’s star wars but this was the best star wars film since Empire Strikes Back in my opinion (although episode III wasn’t that bad). the characters were a little flat, some of the humor was out of place, and the first 30 minutes had bad pacing, but overall it was great. the action in this one was insane and I’m so happy that we finally got to see a proper space battle (and holy shit is it a good one). this has one of my favorite moments of the entire series and it actually feels like a star wars movie unlike episode VII.

La La Land – 10 – I’m at a loss for words honestly. This movie is so fucking good. The soundtrack is incredible, the choreography is awesome, the cinematography is BEAUTIFUL, and the performances are wonderful. I could keep thinking of adjectives or I could just tell you to go see this movie as soon as you can. Best movie of the year hands down. LA has never looked so fucking good OH MAN please go see this movie you’ll surely regret it if you don’t. OH and we went to see this in the Vista Theater in LA, which was a once in a lifetime experience. See this in the most old-Hollywood theater you can because it actually improves it if that’s possible. Now there are some flaws, mainly in third act pacing, but it’s so enjoyable that it doesn’t matter.

Ferris Bueller’s Day Off – 10 – it’s a classic and could be considered a perfect film. not much to say but it’s definitely one of my favorites of all time. never gets old.

Home Alone – 8 – this was the first time I watched Home Alone and I liked it.

Assassin’s Creed – 6 – the neckbeard-y guy doing anime runs up and down the stairs of the theatre behind us really set the tone for this movie. I didn’t hate it but it was pretty dreary and I feel like almost nothing happened. I don’t think it translates to the screen well but it did capture the feel of the games, or at least the first one. Let’s just say after seeing this I went on a mission to watch at least one more movie so it wouldn’t be my last of the year.

Swiss Army Man – 7 – the praise for this movie was a bit unwarranted. It’s really silly and touching but it wasn’t the modern masterpiece that everyone was saying it was. maybe I missed something but the corpse of Daniel Radcliffe farting is only tolerable and funny for so long. I will say that this is one of the most unique movies I’ve ever seen, so I’ll give it props for that, and the soundtrack was actually incredible. I enjoyed it very much and need to watch it again but it was alright.

Come Together – 8 – an H&M short film by Wes Anderson that can be watched here: https://youtu.be/VDinoNRC49c . It was cute and I guess it’ll hold me over until Isle of Dogs, which comes out in 2018 (no it won’t)

The Lobster – 8 – this absurd commentary on relationships and their influence on society is just bizarre and has a wonderfully dry performance from Colin Farrell and, well, every other actor too. this film is just crazy and I really need to watch it again. Expect it to be on my next year’s list as well. TOP TEN RELEASED IN 2016 xxx 10 – The Nice Guys

9 – Hell or High Water

8 – The Handmaiden

7 – Don’t Think Twice

6 – The Witch

5 – Moonlight

4 – Nocturnal Animals

3 – Green Room

2 – Arrival

1 – La La Land honorable mentions: Captain Fantastic, Horace and Pete, The Neon Demon, Make Happy recommendations: Frances Ha, Mistress America, Over the Garden Wall, The World of Tomorrow, Midnight in Paris, Me, and Earl, and the Dying Girl, The Lobster and finally the award for worst movie of the year goes to ,,,,, SUICIDE SQUAD duh. In 2016 I watched 77 movies, which is terrible considering I watched 124 last year and 92 in 2014. That gap from September to November really killed me in that regard and hopefully it won’t happen again or for as long next time. Overall this was actually a pretty weak year for movies it seems. Looking at my top of the year list, it looks significantly weaker than last year’s which had The Revenant, It Follows, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl, Sicario, and Brooklyn. If anyone has questions or suggestions about anything I’d love to have a discussion so feel free. Here’s to another year of great movies. also if you’d like to follow me on twitter @thejoeydavis please do because I’m a huge slut for likes and I desperately want and need your approval. thanks for reading

#movies of 2016 #joey davis #joseph davis

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