Morning Outposters, it’s Saturday, and time to have a debrief for Thursday’s first-ever Film Club 2.0. This is a quick rundown for those of you who couldn’t tune in to keep you up-to-date on what went on. It’s also an opportunity for those who did attend to let us know your thoughts, to discuss what you liked and disliked, and most importantly to give suggestions on how to make it better!
How It Went
Firstly, I think it went well, to be honest. We have 17 members already signed up to Discord with plenty of “Dank memes” and “NSFW” images filling up the channels. On the night we had at least nine Outposters coming and going during The Thing, obviously, some having to turn off the screen when the boss was approaching! That’s not bad considering it was during work hours for my American brethren. It was good to actually talk to some of you too, it’s funny to hear the voices of our beloved Outposters who shitpost on the site.
Shawn B nailed the arse out of Discord and the experience was pretty seamless. I know one or two of you had an issue using the Film Club chat channel, but you said you were using your phones so perhaps that will just take a little experimentation on your part with the Discord interface to get that working.
That chit-chat was good and being the movie aficionados we are, everyone knew the appropriate time to talk and when to just sit back and watch the events onscreen unfold. In the end, there was a healthy debate about who, or if anyone, was The Thing which was a great way to wrap things up. So all in all, Film Club 2.0 is off to a good start.
Film Club Fridays?
Well, the most obvious issue we have is the time difference between the US and the UK. Stark, Boba Phil, and my good self are in England and I think it’s safe to say quite a few of you are in the US. Not everyone is self-employed so the 2pm / 3pm time slot is not ideal. Also for those of you who are self-employed, schedules and deadlines are not always easy to navigate either.
My suggestion was to move Film Club to a Friday night, that way more of you have the availability to tune in after work, and even let your hair down and maybe even have a beer, or whatever the fuck it is you Americans class as beer.
CST is 6 hours behind the UK, EST is 5 (obviously) which means here in the UK we would be looking at starting a film at about 10pm. Personally, this isn’t an issue for me as it’s Friday, and my kids are grown up so I don’t have to be up early for football clubs etc. the next day. Naturally, I can’t speak for Stark or Phil.
It will mean though that by 10 o’clock on a Friday, I’ll be at least 4 pints deep so that’ll be interesting! However. I am an Englishman and it’s known throughout the world how much of a drinking culture we have so my four pints are probably like 1 for the Americans so don’t worry about me, I’ll be fine, you’ll just have to excuse the inevitable burping and farting.
Weekly, Fortnightly, Monthly
Is expecting everyone to tune in every week maybe a bit much? Personally, I won’t be able to make it every Friday but this isn’t about me, this is about finding the most convenient time for everyone to make Film Club work. Naturally, there are going to be times when some can make it and some can’t so it’s not a big issue.
I just wonder if doing it every week will make the Film Club lose its specialness. By doingless frequently, it gives us time to submit movie suggestions, organize the night as well as our own calendars.
It also gives you the option to spend the occasional Friday night watching a movie with your wife. You know the kind I mean where you spend 45 minutes agreeing on what to watch only for her to either ask relentless questions throughout the film, or, like my missus, fall asleep within the first 30 minutes.
Special Events
I was thinking about not limiting Film Club to regular timeslots and we could have movie nights based on special events too. Last night was Friday 13th so maybe we missed a trick there and should have screened that. We have Halloween at the end of the month and that falls on a Tuesday, so perhaps John Carpetner’s Halloween could be on the menu?
Then you guys have something called Thanksgiving, that gives us Trains, Planes And Automobiles? Then Christmas, Valentine’s, Groundhog Day, and the list goes on and on.
We’ll also have special anniversaries of classic films which we could celebrate. The Wicker Man is 50 years old on 3rd December. Next year The Big Lebowski is 25 years old and so is Saving Private Ryan. Scarface and Risky Business hit 40, The Exorcist is 50, and so on and so forth.
The Next Film Club
We discussed the next genre for the next night, and it was universally agreed that if we do a Friday night and everyone is relaxed and at home, and maybe having a drink, then a comedy would be a good route to go down for the next Film Club.
We specifically discussed Something About Mary because Trollprince had recently watched it, and that got me thinking about Me, Myself & Irene, as well as older classics like Blazing Saddles, Blues Brothers (which I’ve never seen) and the film that turned out to be a documentary about 2023, Idiocracy.
So, that’s the plan for the next Film Club, a comedy that will give us some good old-fashioned belly laughs and I’d appreciate your suggestions, please.
To wrap up then Outposters, what are your thoughts moving forward for Film Club? Let me know in the comments below and discuss amongst yourselves and together we can get this right and make LMO so much more than just a movie site.
As we like to say in the ghettos of the UK – much obliged dear chaps.
