The lights were out in Stetson Hall and a roomful of students paid attention to the screen. Nobody was taking notes, nor was a professor lecturing. Instead, the 2019 whodunit film “Knives Out” played to a rapt audience in mid-November.
The evening was a chance for the Mercer Film Society to share this film across the campus and to advertise itself as an accessible option for students searching for an outlet for their interest in cinema.
“The main purpose of the film society to me is for a collective of people to come together and watch and analyze films, and how films have an impact on our thoughts, beliefs, culture and society,” Film Society officer Kris Osborne '27 said.
The club presents a variety of film culture-related events including film screenings, film trivia nights and power point nights, where students can present a cinema-themed presentation or, the club said, any other topic that the presenter has an interest in.
The Film Society provides events for students to participate in and allows them to come together and enjoy film not just by watching movies, but having discussions as well.
Those discussions are ultimately one of the goals of the Film Society because they allow both non-film studies students and media and film studies students to have constructive conversations about the media they consumed together.
“What I want students to take from the Film Society is to be able to more critically analyze films on their own because films hold so much art and history,” Osborne said.
One thing about the film society, Osborne added, is that it wants students to go to a place where they can not only discuss film, but also relax and enjoy the environment that they are in. While many clubs have mandatory attendance, but the Film Society wants students to be present without any pressure. Instead, the club prefers to have a few events every semester during which students can come and give their take on that meeting's film.
“We want people to be present in our meetings and engagement discussions, but for those who don’t always have the energy to be present, it’s a good place to still go and feel included and have that community as opposed to other clubs that require a bit of a push I guess you could say,” Film Society President Sydney Gray '26 said.
