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Ten memorable films from the club’s 2023 screen
A year of cinema is best remembered through the conversations it creates. At Gauhati Cine Club, screenings are rarely isolated events: a film opens into debate, comparison, disagreement, and the discovery of another filmmaker. Looking back at the club’s 2023 programme, these ten titles remain especially vivid for one member.
The selection moves across continents, decades, genres, and cinematic traditions. Some films were formally daring, some emotionally direct, and others gained force from the discussion that followed the screening. Together, they show why a film society remains an important part of Assam’s cultural life.
This is a personal ranking rather than an official award list. It considers the films’ artistic achievement, their power on a shared screen, and the ideas they brought into the club’s lively post-film conversations. Readers can explore screenings, publications, archives, and club activities through the Gauhati Cine Club website.
Films that made memory visible
At number ten, The Fabelmans offered a warm and complicated portrait of cinema as a family inheritance. Steven Spielberg turns autobiography into a study of how images can reveal truths that ordinary conversation conceals. Its strongest moments came from the tension between filmmaking as escape and filmmaking as confrontation.
Aftersun took the ninth place with a quieter emotional vocabulary. Charlotte Wells builds meaning through fragments, gestures, and the unreliable nature of memory. The film’s restraint invited viewers to reconstruct the relationship between father and daughter long after the credits ended.
At number eight, Close stood out for its tenderness and devastating attention to childhood friendship. Lukas Dhont avoids easy explanations, allowing silence, physical distance, and social pressure to carry the story. It was one of the year’s most affecting reminders that emotional cruelty can emerge from ordinary environments.
Moral choices under pressure
Decision to Leave, ranked seventh, brought together romance, crime, and visual precision. Park Chan-wook uses investigation as a language of desire, creating a film in which every glance may be evidence and every act of care may conceal an ulterior motive. Its elegant construction rewarded the close attention encouraged by a cine-club setting.
The sixth choice was The Banshees of Inisherin, Martin McDonagh’s darkly comic study of friendship, pride, and isolation. Its remote island setting gives the conflict an almost theatrical shape, while the sudden cruelty beneath the humour keeps the film from becoming a simple fable. Members responded strongly to its question about the value—and cost—of leaving a mark.
At number five, Court remained as powerful as ever. Chaitanya Tamhane’s restrained courtroom drama examines how bureaucracy, class, language, and ideology shape justice. Its observational style resists melodrama, making small procedural details feel politically significant. The film also connected strongly with discussions about institutions and ordinary citizens in contemporary India.
The central choices
The fourth-ranked film was Village Rockstars, Rima Das’s deeply rooted Assamese story of childhood, poverty, imagination, and resilience. Its natural performances and lived-in landscapes create a world that feels both intimate and expansive. The film’s place in this selection reflects its ability to connect local experience with a universal coming-of-age story.
The Worst Person in the World took third place. Joachim Trier’s portrait of Julie moves through romance, work, identity, and uncertainty without reducing its protagonist to a lesson. Its shifting tone—from comic observation to existential unease—made it especially rewarding to revisit in a group where viewers brought different interpretations.
The second choice was Drive My Car, a film about grief, artistic practice, and the difficult work of listening. Ryusuke Hamaguchi gives Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya a central role, yet the film remains open even to viewers unfamiliar with the play. Its measured rhythm asks for patience and returns that patience with emotional depth.
| Rank | Film | Director | Distinctive strength |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10 | The Fabelmans | Steven Spielberg | Cinema, family, and memory |
| 9 | Aftersun | Charlotte Wells | Emotional fragments |
| 8 | Close | Lukas Dhont | Childhood friendship |
| 7 | Decision to Leave | Park Chan-wook | Desire and visual design |
| 6 | The Banshees of Inisherin | Martin McDonagh | Isolation and dark humour |
| 5 | Court | Chaitanya Tamhane | Law and social power |
| 4 | Village Rockstars | Rima Das | Assamese childhood and resilience |
| 3 | The Worst Person in the World | Joachim Trier | Modern identity |
| 2 | Drive My Car | Ryusuke Hamaguchi | Grief and listening |
| 1 | Parasite | Bong Joon-ho | Class, suspense, and satire |
The film that stayed with everyone
The member’s number one is Parasite. Bong Joon-ho’s film combines social satire, thriller mechanics, black comedy, and tragedy with extraordinary control. Its movement between the wealthy Park household and the Kim family’s precarious home is never merely decorative; architecture becomes a map of class.
What made the screening especially memorable was the audience’s changing response. Laughter gradually became unease, and unease turned into shock as the film’s carefully planted details acquired new meaning. Parasite works as entertainment, but its lasting power comes from how naturally it turns inequality into suspense.
The film also demonstrated the value of seeing major international cinema in a cultural forum rather than consuming it alone. Conversations about translation, economic aspiration, domestic space, and social mobility continued well beyond the screening. That extended life is one reason it leads this personal list.
Why these screenings mattered
The strongest feature of the 2023 programme was its range. A contemporary Assamese film could sit beside a Korean genre masterpiece, a European coming-of-age drama, an Indian courtroom work, and an American filmmaker’s personal recollection. Such variety prevents cinema from being reduced to a single national tradition or aesthetic formula.
The programme also encouraged different kinds of attention. Some films demanded close reading of editing and composition; others depended on performance, landscape, sound, or silence. A club audience makes these distinctions visible because reactions are shared immediately, with each discussion revealing aspects that an individual viewing may overlook.
For members, the archive of a film year is therefore more than a list of titles. It records friendships formed around screenings, arguments that sharpened opinions, and moments when a film altered the way viewers understood their own surroundings. The 2023 selections remain significant because they supported that collective habit of looking closely.
Carrying the conversation forward
A strong film club experience does not end with a ranking. These recommendations can help members revisit the year’s programme and use the films as starting points for broader conversations:
- Pair Village Rockstars with other Assamese films about landscape, childhood, and social change.
- Compare Court and Parasite as stories about institutions, class, and unequal access to power.
- Rewatch Aftersun and Drive My Car with attention to silence, memory, and performance.
- Discuss how Decision to Leave and The Worst Person in the World portray desire through uncertainty.
- Invite new members to choose one overlooked film and defend its place in the list.
A member’s top ten can never close the discussion, and that is precisely its value. It gives a shared programme a personal shape while leaving room for disagreement, discovery, and alternative favourites. Visit a Gauhati Cine Club screening, take part in the conversation, and help shape the next memorable year of cinema in Assam.
