First Post!

Cool, I'm a blogger now! :)

About me: My name is Marat, I am a senior studying Psychology. I hope to finish my degree this December, a semester earlier than originally scheduled 4 years ago. I am from Carol Stream, IL, which is about a half-hour drive north of campus. But I am originally from Kazakhstan, I was born there, adopted, and brought to America when I was one year-old. Unfortunately, English is the only language I am fluent in, I took years of Spanish in the past but I don't retain too much of it anymore. I am currently a First Year Mentor on campus and I used to be a Resident Assistant. I also used to be a student athlete here, I ran Cross Country and Track. 

I have tried to get more into watching movies this year, in the past I almost exclusively watched Marvel movies but I've gotten bored of them recently so I tried some things I normally wouldn't have. My favorite movie usually is affected by recency bias, and right now I would probably say that Top Gun: Maverick is my favorite. I watched it twice in theatres, I also watched The Batman twice in theatre this year. I watched Elvis in a theatre and I watched Spiderhead on Netflix. I did not see Everything Everywhere All at Once and I'm still hoping to see it. Anything else that I missed is because I didn't care to go see it. 

I'm hoping to enjoy this class a lot! I think film study is one of those fields that I hear about a lot online, but was never something I thought I could do well in, so I'm excited to try! I hope to learn about visual storytelling and be able to notice more details about films when I watch them in the future. I worry a little bit about noticing too much about movies, what if I start judging them more and thinking they are bad if they don't live up to the standards presented in this class? I guess we'll find out!