It’s a strange thing that, whenever somebody strikes up a club, they think they have to have rules. So lets start at the jump by paraphrasing Pirates of the Caribbean and saying that these are guidelines, not rules. Feel free to cherry pick where you will. These are simply the guidelines used in our group.
The Guidelines
1) Meet every second Saturday of the Month.
I wanted this to be a monthly meeting, any more than that, and it gets intrusive on people’s schedule. The second Saturday was chosen simply because there are almost no holidays on that weekend in most months, guaranteeing minimal schedule conflict.
2) All movies shown will focus around a central theme.
Otherwise it’s not a marathon, now is it?
3) Each topic will be decided by a majority vote.
It keeps the participants involved, making them a part of the direction for the year. It’s also a good idea to keep to have topics queued up, and keep the number of choices small to prevent fragmentation of the votes. 3 choices is a good number.
4) The first movie shown will be a bridge between the previous month’s them and the current one.
This is where it gets fun. It can be a serious challenge from time-to-time. One example is going from Vampires to Space-Invaders with Lifeforce: which features Space Vampires. Yes, Space Vampires.
5) At least one snack and/or beverage will reflect the theme of the evening.
It’s a party, so have chips, pizza, beer, whatever, but it’s another bit of a fun challenge to come up with snacks that fit the theme. Perfect exampe is for Werewolves we had Full Moon beer and Moon Pies. Later film themes were more of a challenge. For insects we had jello shots with gummi bug middles.
6) Have a system for cutting a movie short.
We’re watching the bottom of the barrel of cinema history here, so it’s no surprise that every once in a while, we end up with movies that are soul-suckingly bad enough to make your audience restless, violent, or worse…bored. To that end, you need a system for allowing the audience to “vote a movie off the island.” Ours is as follows:
- Unanimous vote or
- One person does 3 shots of the worst-tasting liquor we have.
As time went on, and some movies became a hotbed of controversy, we allowed a counter system to allow for “drink-offs,” with the winner determining the fate of the movie. This all leads us to…
7) Have backup movies.
As movies don’t always play as well as one might hope, it’s a good idea to have alternate selections. Each one of our write-ups have suggested alternatives, and frequently we bring them along to an event as a backup.
Subtitles are your friends
Even if the movie is in English, have the subtitles up there if they’re an option. With everybody hooting and shouting at the screen, it’s easy to lose track of what plot there is to some of the features. Keeping the subtitles in play allows for people who want to keep track of things to do so.
Finally, as a throwaway: We used to use Buffy the Vampire Slayer and the Angel spin-off television shows as previews to the main event of the movies. Its mostly to have something on the TV while people arrive, and catch-up with each other. The reason we use those shows is that for our creature features, they tended to have an episode in-if you’ll forgive the pun-the proper vein.
As the Cavalcade branches out from creature features next year, we will probably have other previews. It’s not a full-on guideline, just something that grew out of the gatherings.
To summarize:
- Meet once a month.
- All movies shown will focus around a central theme.
- Each topic will be decided by a majority vote.
- Bridge each theme with a movie matching both topic.
- Snacks should match the theme.
- Have a system for cutting a movie short.
- Have backup movies.
- Use Subtitles
