Cirrus@Austlit

'Welcome, dear readers, to a new year and a new issue of the eclectic and serious discussion of cinema. As with every rotation around the sun, this one too brings the results of our hefty World Poll. Composed of 128 contributions from all corners of the globe, the project captures and highlights some of the inexhaustible diversity of our readership, with tastes as heterogeneous as the countries from which they stem. At the same time – in an era of both individualism and global consolidation, as aesthetic opinions and consumption patterns feel more and more atomised and particular (even as they might in truth be ever closer to merging onto a planetary superhighway) – we thought it important and appropriate to take a step back and reflect on the format of the end-of-the-year poll itself, as a discursive genre. In ‘Why Do We Poll?’, a collaborative piece serving as something of an editorial introduction to this year’s poll, we ruminate on the stakes and consequences of annual listmaking, canon formation, and their more and less insipid limitations. For their work on editing this year’s World Poll, we extend our kindest thanks to three expert volunteers: Joanna Batsakis, Avery LaFlamme, and Amelia Leonard. For all the generous contributions, we, as every year, thank our readers and writers. ' (Editorial Introduction)