Film Club: Great Films for Discussion

I was once part of a book club. We were a bunch of women who would pick a book to read each month and then meet at someone's house and discuss the book over an afternoon cup of tea on a Sunday. On occasion, more than 3 people would have read the book the entire way through and on more occasions than I would like to remember the conversation would digress into children and what it was like to be a mum. As a single girl in her twenties, I found these conversations to be the most tiring.

My dad was so disgruntled by my mum's book club - hers actually works in that most people have read the book and it forms the basis of discussion over wine and cheese without splintering into discussions of "women's issues" - that he started his own 'men's awareness group' which was and still is a movie and a meal each month. The movies started off being popcorn fodder that their partners would not want to see however recently they have started to filter their viewing choices more rigorously. All too often the meal would precede the movie and so there was no room for discussion about the film afterwards.

My parents are part of a film society which screens one film each week for 26 weeks of the year on a Sunday early evening. I think the screenings are at 6.30pm. Most of the films aren't main stream hollywood productions and some of the films are quite old. What the film society is missing is the cafe or bar afterwards where people can meet and exchange ideas with others about the films they have just seen.

When I was at university, I did film studies as part of my degree which was great because the 3 or 4 hour lectures included watching films and the tutorials were the forums in which we could discuss the films we had seen. I often adopted the role of devil's advocate in the tutorials as I knew it would incite discussion and debate which was important when getting participation marks.

I am not currently part of a book or film club at present but if I were, these are the films I would want for the purposes of discussion for a once a month film club for the first year.

1. Django Unchained - easily the best Tarantino film yet - so much to it.
2. The Hours
3. L'Auberge Espagnole (The Spanish Apartment)
4. Hotel Rwanda
5. Thank You for Smoking
6. The Wedding Banquet
7. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
8. Spellbound
9. Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others)
10. Trainspotting
11. A Ma Soeur! (Fat Girl)
12. Oldeuboi (Oldboy)

I don't pretend this list is by any means complete. It is really meant to generate discussion between its viewers either because of themes, characters, storyline, film techniques etc...

What would be on your list? Are you part of a film club? If so, how does it work?