About

Several years ago, when I first wrote this page (more out of a sense of obligation than anticipation, I have to admit) I said I’d return to it at some point and do it properly. And then I forgot. Now I’ve remembered. So here goes.

According to the site statistics, people visit the ‘About’ page in reasonable numbers (I like the idea that visitors take a look at the site and think ‘what the hell is this?’), so here’s my attempt to do it some justice.

At its most basic level, Films on the Box is a blog covering movies that are going to be screened on television in the United Kingdom. Entries here will be posted on midnight of the day its being shown. In an effort to be inclusive, I only work from Freeview schedules, which means none of the premium Sky channels or Turner Classic Movies. That does however mean a wide variety of stations, including:

• BBC, ITV, Four and Five channels
• Horror Channel
• Movie Mix
• Movies4Men
• True Entertainment
• Yesterday

That aside, there are no rules. I pick up the Radio Times on Tuesday, pick two or three films I’d like to talk about and go from there. Whilst I try and cover a range of genres, I am a man in his fifth decade and I have my own tastes – Westerns, Science Fiction, Hitchcock, World War Two (particularly British war films from the decade following the end of hostilities) get some preferential treatment, and I will clear the schedules for Hammer movies or Film Noir. As an avowed fan of the classics, I make no apologies for dropping out of recent offerings and delving into the past. By my count, almost a quarter of everything discussed here was originally released in the fifties, which it turns out is my favourite decade, and a bloody good one I’m sure you’ll agree.

I hope you like what you see – if so, please leave a comment. I am always interested in reading other people’s thoughts, and whilst I try and maintain a series of links to other sites that I visit and find generally absorbing, I’m sure there are some I’ve not yet noticed, so please let me know who you are and I’ll take a look.

There was a time in the past when I maintained a FOTB Facebook presence, but I gave up on it a long time ago; as for Twitter, I am an infrequent presence as I get a bit intimidated by the rush of news on there – @mikeb196, if you would really like to say hello, though.

FOTB went on an extended hiatus in late 2012, and returned for Christmas 2014. I realised I missed it during those intervening months, however the original plan – to maintain daily entries – was a killer and just unworkable, so the site in its current form is updated two or three times per week generally. Some weeks there may be more, some less. It depends what I have on my plate, also on the wiles of the TV schedules – Christmas is a gift for film lovers, whilst summer can be quite barren. Still, there’s usually something on that’s worth talking about, with Film4 proving to be the real gift in terms of a mixed selection. One thing I have noticed in my work for the site, however, is that with Freeview has come a heavy rotation of certain films – it isn’t uncommon to see some entries appear more than once during the same week, whilst certain networks (ITV and Bond, Indiana Jones on BBC3) just appear to run their favourites on an endless loop. I’m sure no one is bothered by this apart from me, but please, schedulers, please mix it up a bit more.