Round of 32 Reflections

Once again, you’re going to need your Delorean to take you to six days ago. Because a lot has changed since then.

The Sweet 16

For the most part, the Round of 32 evened out the landscape a bit. There aren’t a lot of surprises in the Sweet 16. With one big exception. The Matrix becomes the first #15 seed to make it to the Movie Madness Sweet 16. It tore through the appointed #2 Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind by 41 in the first round, and then surprised the heck out of me by beating the oft-talked about #7 Seven (not a typo – it’s the seed and the movie) by 47. After losing to The Godfather in the second round last year as a #7 seed, it might just be the year of the Matrix. The other stunner in the second round was #7 Independence Day beating #2 The Sixth Sense in a close one. This little-mentioned movie has a curious amount of momentum.

But the most fun match to watch was Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince against The Godfather. Bobby Lubaszewski went ahead and added anywhere from 10-35 people in the morning and begged them to vote for Harry Potter. I’ve been waiting for this to happen, and it certainly added a boost to the Movie Madness numbers, as this was the highest scoring match ever with 132 total votes. Ultimately, Harry (and Bobby) fell short, partly due to Bobby not vetting his emergency help properly, as a few of them voted for The Godfather anyway, despite his plea. And there was another overtime game, with Oceans 11 barely sneaking by Monty Python and the Holy Grail, thanks to a panicked cat lady leaping to her civic duty.

As for the brackets, John Weatherley’s strong Round 2 has flip-flopped him with Tamara Lords for the top spot, with most of the rest waiting to see if Shawshank Redemption, Forrest Gump, or a 3^rd party outlier is going to win the whole thing.

The Standings at the Sweet 16

It’s been an exciting season so far and it’s a shame it will all be over in two weeks, but seeing as how there’s no Star Wars in this, I really have no idea who will win.