The first rule of the Dad’s Movie Club is that we have to follow all of the rules. We have many of them.
Rule #5: Movie night shall occur on the second Wednesday of every month, unless a special exception is granted in a given month and all three officers unanimously agree to the exception, which has happened only once when movie night fell on my wedding anniversary and we voted to go on Tuesday night in April so as not to dent the utopia that is H & D’s marriage.
Rule #8a: The movie showtime must be in the early evening slot because the late slot is too late for three old guys and wouldn’t leave time afterward to have a beer at one of the few establishments open past ten o’clock in Delmar.
Rule #17: The movie club consists only of its three founding members, and no other person may join us unless a unanimous exception is granted, which happened on the very first movie night back in November 2024 when my niece Ani joined us because she was staying with me that night.
Rule #17b: The movie club accepts membership applications as long as the applicant completes the 500-word required essay on why they should be granted membership and how their membership would improve the club. So far, no applications have been received.
Rule #3: Movie club always takes place at the Spectrum Theater in Albany, the local theater whose support from us was the entire impetus for forming the movie club in the first place.
Rule #6: Members must arrive at least 15 minutes before the scheduled showtime to ensure optimal seat selection. So far, this hasn’t been a problem (see photo).
Rule #6c: Any amendments to the Rules & Regulations must be proposed, debated, and voted upon while we are waiting for the movie to begin, since we arrived too early and have nothing else to do. For instance, last night we debated whether we should take turns bringing one guest along to movie night, with said guest being allowed to attend only once. We were unable to take a vote because the movie started.
Rule #2: The three members shall take turns choosing what movie we see, and the turn also includes driving the three of us and treating to a beer afterward.
Rule #4: Members have the option of sharing a hit or two off a joint before heading into the theater in order to enhance or at least alter the viewing experience. Entirely optional.
Rule #1d: The person whose turn it is to choose the movie must select from the available films and showtimes that are on the schedule for the second Wednesday of the month, which means the selected movie may not be one that we were eager or even otherwise willing to see.
Which brings us to last night, Paul’s turn, and he chose “We Were Dangerous.”
From the Spectrum Theater website: “Nellie, Daisy, and Louisa attend an institution for delinquent girls on an isolated island in 1954 New Zealand. The trio rail against the system, finding strength in their friendship.”
The institution is run by a brutal, rigid matron in the mold of Nurse Ratched from “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.” It’s a somewhat tired character trope, and the matron was the weak point of the film, never straying from her one note of hard-edged discipline in the name of the bible. Would have helped if she had a modicum of self-awareness.
On the other hand, the three young friends were fresh, interesting, and the actors gave compelling performances. The backbone of the story is their evolving relationships with each other and their plan to blow up the hut where sterilizations on the girls are taking place and then make their escape from the island on a makeshift raft. But it takes too long for this narrative to take shape. The film meanders and ends up feeling longer than its short 122-minute run time.
Not the best film, but bearing enough differences from the usual fare to eliminate any regrets about having to see what’s available that night as stated in Rule#1d.
In other words, I’m not sorry I saw it. And the movie club, and its complex set of rules, survives for the seventh consecutive month.
