The Film Society

Are you a fan of classic movies? Interested in validating your claim as a movie buff? Or perhaps you just want to see a free film on a screen bigger than your laptop for a change?

If so, join the Film Society. This new club on campus regularly screens movies Thursday evenings at 8:00 pm in Olin 014 (the basement room with the big screen).

The club was started by Senior Jack Lichten with tremendous support from Professor James McFarland. “The goal of the society is to promote film culture on campus,” said McFarland.

Film Society is actually not a new club. “That name of an organization has been around 20 years and beyond” explained the Director of Student Activities, Scott McEver.

The original club, created at least two decades ago, screened mainly independent films. Its purpose was to show less-likely-to-be-seen movies, as opposed to mainstream blockbusters.

“In the 90s there was a shifting of focus” said McEver. The club then showed a mix of both older and newer movies, including recently released hits.

The newly restored Film Society is going back to its roots, showing older, classic movies. Professor McFarland describes the new club’s intention: “Movies serve a lot of different purposes: entertainment, instruction, propaganda, and many others. Some of these purposes sort of take care of themselves: big budget popular films don’t really need to be promoted, because they already have advertising budgets and great word-of-mouth. But, there are also a lot of older movies, many of them ‘classics’ that most of us have heard of but many of us have never gotten around to seeing.”

McFarland hopes the club will bring students together to enjoy a movie they may never have heard of before and increase their cultural perspectives on films.

The Film Society has struggled as a club over the years. It has always been a focus by small groups of students, so as students went abroad or graduated, the group has depleted. “I think another aspect that might have hurt [the club] is events happen every weekend and students don’t take advantage of it and it dies out,” said McEver.

Without regular student participation, the club cannot exist. In the past students have taken for granted that there is a weekly movie option, but they do not take into account those students who put hard work into showing these films.

The addition of faculty presence in the club has given Film Society some stability.

“The faculty would like to increase the level of academic challenge Conn College provides its students, and that means not just making classes harder and more rewarding, but promoting a vital intellectual culture outside of the classroom,” explained McFarland. That is why he and several other faculty members are supporting the newly restored Film Society.

Another reason for faculty presence in the club is the issue of copyright. Obtaining a copyright license is necessary, according to the Federal Copyright Act, if an audience is publicly viewing a film, whether admission is charged or not. An exception to this law is to screen the film for educational purposes. The Film Society is only screening films with Professor McFarland present, in order to bypass the copyright issues. He leads a brief and informal discussion about the film after it is screened.

Lichten does make it clear though that the club is run by students. “Although we have great faculty participation, the focal point of the club has always been the student body,” he said.

That means the success of the club depends on the student body as well. A regular crowd is already attending the weekly films and Lichten hopes it will continue.

He added, “This crowd, I hope, will come not because they like the specific film of whatever week, but because they like film in general and want to expand their horizons.  If I can have that kind of participation, then I know that the club has succeeded in its goals.”

As McFarland puts it, “Berets are optional, and you don’t even HAVE to stay for the discussion! But hey, if you can’t be a pretentious intellectual as a college student, then when the heck can you be?”