About Me

Hello, readers, welcome to Silver Screen Fanatic! Here’s a little bit about me.

I’m originally from the Orlando-Sanford area in Florida. Moved up to Michigan as a kid and to this day, as Stevie Ray Vaughan once said, “Couldn’t stand the weather.”

I have four main passions in life: music, roller coasters, sports and, obviously, movies. I come from a family of musicians, and play four instruments myself, beginning with drums nearly twenty-five years ago, and later adding bass, piano and guitar to my arsenal. My four favorite authors are J. R. R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, Robert Louis Stevenson and Edgar Allen Poe. That’s right. I am a Ringer and proud of it. My favorite film director(s) is a tie between Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese and my top five films are Pulp Fiction, The Empire Strikes Back, Jaws, The Wizard of Oz and The Godfather. Cedar Point is my Mecca, and I make an effort to make a pilgrimage there every year. You know those Thrills, Chills and Spills theme park specials they air on Discovery during Memorial Day Weekend? Those are my Shark Week.

“America’s Roller Coast” is also where I developed my love/hate relationship with Hondas. The hate stems from a long, completely separate story for another day. The love stems from the fact that I now, ironically, drive one and they just run so well.

My love for writing and film dates all the way back to my childhood, but it really began to take root with a short horror story I wrote during my senior year of high school. It gave two of my classmates nightmares. Tim and Marissa, if you ever stumble upon this site, there’s your nod. I still have it on file and looking back at it, the dialogue is laughable and the story is absolute cornball. Today, it would easily earn a spot in my “What the Hell Were They Thinking?!” segment. You gotta start somewhere, though, and it’s that story and all those dumb, dopey little short films I made with my friends that gave me my learning experiences.

I take no shame in admitting that I use to have a pretty bad addiction to Rob Schneider and Adam Sandler films. I was saved and rehabilitated by both Francis Ford Coppola and Quentin Tarantino after watching The Godfather and Reservoir Dogs. God knows where I’d be now if not for them. Probably giving Grown Ups and its sequel an A+ .

Well, that’s all for now. I have the daily content schedule listed below. Thanks for stopping by, and I hope you enjoy the site!

– Benjamin Marlatt, “bjmarlatt0716”

DAILY CONTENT SCHEDULE:

Monday

  • Box Office Recap
  • What the Hell Were They Thinking?!

Tuesday

  • Trailer Tuesday
  • Benjamin’s Stash

Wednesday

  • Mid-Week Quick Takes
  • Oscar Picks, Predictions and Recaps
  • For Better or Worse (various top best or worst categories)

Thursday-Saturday

  • Current release movie reviews