Introduction

The idea behind the club is to do semi-regular film screening evenings for invited people, based around a particular theme every time. The location is rotated around willing members' houses. An evening includes one or two feature films, possibly with one or more shorter (episodic) offerings inbetween. The whole is topped off with a glass of wine or two (or other drink) and maybe some take-away food to compliment the snacks offered by the host.

Why A Society/Club?

No real reason other than it sounds cool. And I've always liked the idea of clubs. The real driving point behind is is this: I've got a lot of DVDs. Many more than I have time to watch. In fact, most evenings I'm busy doing something else and by the time I've finished, it's too late to watch a whole movie.

Therefore, arranging social time around a film screening, rather than the other way around makes sense. I don't have to disappoint people, or become known as never going out, because these are social events, planned in advance. Rotating the locations and themes can make for very interesting evenings and all those DVDs will finally stop simply gathering dust.

Anatomy of a screening session

Themes for a session and the date should be determined at the previous session (or very shortly thereafter) by everyone present. A selection of relevant films should then be suggested too, ideally covering several aspects of the theme. In the period running up to the session, the list of film suggestions should first grow, then shrink as common opinions narrow down the selection. Ideally, a set of films should be agreed upon by all members. In the case of dispute, the host for the session has the final word. The host should also have a 25% voting share (out of prospected attendees) of one of the films shown.

The First Session

The first session was held on Saturday 29th January 2005, at Shering Wood - my place. These were the films watched:

The Mummy (1932)
The Mummy (1999)
The Mummy Returns (2001)

The original Mummy film suprised us by presenting a semi-likable character (creepily played by Boris Karloff) instead of an iconic bad guy, as one would have expected of such an old film. It was also interesting to see how the story elements of the original plot were interpreted by the later films.

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