The Bellarmine Film Association is a student-run group dedicated to bringing a wide array of the world's cinema to the Bellarmine campus. The BFA seeks to show films from across the spectrum, from mainstream to avant-garde, from arthouse to drive-in, from blockbusters to micro-cinema, from local to transnational. It also seeks to encourage film and video production in the Bellarmine community and the city of Louisville.

For the 2009-2010 school year, the student director of the Bellarmine Film Association is Seth Dixon and the faculty advisor is Kyle Barnett.

Fearless Freaks - 10/30 @ 7:00 pm
Director: Bradley Beesley
Rating: Not Rated
Production: USA
Hilary’s – Campus Center 122
Co-sponsored by Bellarmine Radio

Fearless Freaks follows the unlikely career of Oklahoma City’s The Flaming Lips. Lead singer Wayne Coyne describes the band in this way: “A couple of hundred years ago we probably would've been pirates, or something. We would've got on some ship and sailed off somewhere and met a bunch of crazy people and crazy things.” Coyne and fellow members Steven Drozd, Michael Ivins, and Kliph Scurlock have created a unique chronicle of a grassroots rock band from the dark heart of Middle America. Director Brad Beesley’s chronicling of the band goes back to the group’s earliest days, allowing for an unprecedented look at the evolution of a unique rock group. Rolling Stone’s Bill Crandall describes the film as “the most intimate portrait of a band you’ll likely see…as heartwarming (and breaking) as the band’s music itself.”

Adventureland (2009) - 11/4 @ 7:00 p.m.
Director: Greg Mottola
Rating: R
Production: USA
Hilary’s – Campus Center 122

One of the sleeper hits of the summer, Adventureland is the latest film from director Greg Mottola (Superbad, Arrested Development). James (Jesse Eisenberg) is a college student whose hopes of a European backpacking trip are dashed when his Dad loses his job. The film is set in the summer of 1987 at a rundown amusement park, where James spends the summer he never wanted. Here comes the twist: Em (Kristen Stewart of Twilight fame), a girl who also works at the amusement park, provides a spark during an otherwise drab period. She’s in another relationship, one that’s not going so well. James and Em gravitate to one another, helping each other through a complicated but memorable summer. Mottola’s film has a great cast, including Saturday Night Live regulars Kristen Wiig and Bill Hader. Digital Spy’s Simon Reynolds calls Adventureland “funny, heartwarming and more meandering and whimsical than you’d expect from a mainstream Hollywood comedy.”

Education of Shelby Knox (2005) - 11/20 @ 7:00 p.m.
Director: Marion Lipschutz/Rose Rosenblatt
Rating: Not Rated
Production: USA
Hilary’s – Campus Center 122
Co-sponsored by Bellarmine’s Alliance for Gender Equality and the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Society (G.L.A.S.S.)

This unlikely documentary focuses on Shelby Knox of Lubbock, Texas, who was fifteen years old when this film was made. Knox is a Southern Baptist who has pledged abstinence until marriage. However, she learns that her hometown has some of the worst statistics in the state concerning teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. She also knows that her county's high schools teach abstinence as the only truly safe sex. Through the course of this film, viewers see the transformation of Shelby Knox, as she advocates for comprehensive sex education and redefines her religious beliefs in the process. "I think that God wants you to question," Shelby says, "to do more than just blindly be a follower, because he can't use blind followers.” This riveting documentary blurs the lines of the red state/blue state polarization we take for granted to a show us a more compelling picture of how one family and one town wrestled with key issues regarding sex and sexuality.