RSVP is needed two days in advance of each movie night to Events@sofree.ca so that we know how many people to expect (limited seating) and to give you the screening location.
Start time: 7:00 pm. Admission: Free for SOFREE members; nominal fee for non-members and guests. Donations are appreciated and are tax-deductible. All payments are accepted via e-transfer to: Treasurer@sofree.ca
Snacks and decaf coffee provided. Feel free to bring your own bottle of water if you wish.
MAY 13, 2025: Children of Men
Children of Men takes place in a dystopian 2027 where humanity is on the brink of extinction after a generation of global infertility, leading to societal and environmental collapse. As civilization crumbles and people become increasingly oppressed by an authoritarian regime, Theo, a disillusioned civil servant is pulled into a perilous journey to protect Kee, a woman who is mysteriously pregnant. Director Alfonso Cuarón re-imagines the story through a secular rather than religious lens, casting the pregnant woman as a refugee of African origin to reflect humanity’s shared ancestry, and a protagonist who acts based on conscience and compassion rather than spiritual awakening. Children of Men shows us that even in a chaotic world, there can be hope for humanity through our ability to overcome adversity through ethical responsibility, understanding, courage, and cooperation.
Starring: Clive Owen, Julianne Moore, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Caine, Claire-Hope Ashitay, and Charlie Hunnam.
APRIL 8, 2025: Whale Rider
In a small Māori village in northeastern New Zealand, the Whangara people have upheld an ancestral tradition for centuries: that tribal leadership passes from firstborn son to firstborn son, tracing back to their legendary ancestor, Paikea, who rode on the back of a baleen whale to lead his people to safety and thus ensured the survival of their culture and way of life.
But when only a daughter, Pai, is born into the chief’s line, her grandfather, Koro, refuses to see her as their tribe’s future leader. Bound by strict tradition, Koro instead searches for a male successor, training only the village boys in ancient customs and warrior skills. As he trains the boys, 12-year-old Pai tries to prove her worth with quiet strength, a fierce love for her people, and respect for the ocean’s gentle giants. A moving humanist story about self-determination, resilience, perseverance, and challenging exclusionary traditions to demonstrate that cultural evolution is possible without compromising cultural identity. Whale Rider explores the courage to lead—not by birthright, but by heart.
MARCH 11, 2025: Out of Innocence
Set in 1980s Ireland, where the Catholic Church and a repressive state governed women’s reproductive rights and bodily autonomy, Out of Innocence is a dramatic film that shows the harrowing repercussions of a justice system steeped in dogma and bias. When a newborn baby’s body washes ashore, suspicion falls on one woman, and she is publicly shamed and accused of the crime by a system determined to make her pay—regardless of the facts and truth. Out of Innocence is a poignant reminder of the detrimental effects of oppression and the courage it takes to resist it.
FEBRUARY 19, 2025: The Evolution of Us
Darwin Day Dinner & Movie: A Feast for the Mind & Palate
The Evolution of Us is a groundbreaking scientific film that unravels the genetic saga behind humanity’s past, present, and future. From our origins among primates millions of years ago in Africa to our expansion all over the world, this captivating journey reveals how genetics and environment have driven every step of human evolution. With stunning location footage and cutting-edge computer visualizations, The Evolution of Us shows us the incredible story of who we are, how we got here, and who we might become.
JANUARY 21, 2025: Ad Astra
In Ad Astra (meaning “to the stars” in Latin), astronaut Major Roy McBride embarks on a perilous mission to Mars to resolve a cosmic threat linked to his estranged father who vanished in space over twenty years earlier while obsessively searching for evidence of extraterrestrial life.
The film highlights human innovation, scientific progress, and the pursuit of knowledge, whilst exploring the age-old philosophical questions about meaning and purpose in life. Roy’s quest is fueled by his desire for personal resolution, and showcases themes of self-reliance, accountability, and moral decision-making rooted in human responsibility rather than faith. His odyssey underscores the importance of human agency and the emotional growth that arises from introspection and human connection.
Ad Astra reflects the essence of humanism, illuminating our potential to navigate challenges and shape our future through human intellect, understanding, and compassion, and having the courage and emotional resilience to make difficult ethical choices in an indifferent universe.
The film stars Brad Pitt, Tommy Lee Jones, Ruth Negga, Liv Tyler, and Donald Sutherland.
DECEMBER 10, 2024: Monty Python’s Life of Brian
1979’s Monty Python’s Life of Brian is an irreverent and clever satire that uses the Python troupe’s signature comedic style to explore the absurdities of dogma, blind faith, and the human condition.
Set in tumultuous first-century Judea, the film follows Brian Cohen, a naïve and ordinary man who, through a series of hilariously unfortunate misunderstandings, is mistaken for the Messiah. Amid fervent prophets, Roman oppressors with a flair for mispronunciation, and fanatical followers who take everything literally, Brian’s life spirals into chaos.
Blending slapstick, insightful social commentary, and quirky surrealism, Life of Brian shows the value of questioning assumptions, thinking independently, and finding humour in life’s challenges—all accompanied by a wink, a nudge, and a cheeky grin, along with an iconic whistling tune to conclude the journey.
SEPTEMBER 10, 2024: The Sunset Limited
Award-winning actors, Samuel L. Jackson and Tommy Lee Jones, star in The Sunset Limited, a powerful 2011 drama revolving around two characters—referred to only as Black and White—who engage in a deep philosophical discussion on the human condition, focusing on faith, reason, suffering, and the essence of existence. The film centres on the clash of worldviews between a disillusioned professor who contemplates ending his life and a former convict turned devout Christian. The convict, filled with belief in a higher power, hopes to save the professor from his despair, while the professor, grounded in nihilism, challenges the foundations of meaning and purpose in life.
The film is based on a play of the same name by renowned American playwright, Cormac McCarthy.
MAY 14, 2024: Why We Hate – Episodes 5 & 6
What drives certain people to commit horrific acts, such as mass murder, ethnic purging, and other atrocities, and how can we realistically stand up against them? And how can we resist succumbing to our worst impulses and awaken our inner conscience?
EPISODE 5: CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY, with international criminal lawyer, Patricia Viseur Sellers, analyzes the actions of powerful individuals and their loyal followers who orchestrate heinous crimes, along with the courageous individuals who oppose the destructive forces of hatred. EPISODE 6: HOPE follows with neuroscientist, Emile Bruneau, delving into strategies to combat hate, including using our cognitive abilities such as critical thinking, brain plasticity, and leveraging human resources like education and cooperation.
APRIL 9, 2024: Why We Hate – Episodes 3 & 4
EPISODE 3: TOOLS and TACTICS, with historian and journalist, Jelani Cobb, shows how hatred is fostered through propaganda, dehumanizing tactics, the internet, and symbols.
EPISODE 4: EXTREMISM follows, with conflict resolution and extremism expert Sasha Havlicek, who explains why people are drawn to ruthless ideologies that incite violence and cruelty.
MARCH 20, 2024: Why We Hate – Episodes 1 & 2
The disconcerting rise in prejudice, bigotry, contempt, and hate crimes in the world is being driven by all kinds of hatred, including racism, ageism, misogyny, and cultural intolerance. In the six-part series “Why We Hate,” the root causes of hate are examined with the hope of learning how to overcome it.
Episode 1: ORIGINS, led by evolutionary anthropologist Brian Hare, focuses on searching for clues in the past and in various environments.
Episode 2: TRIBALISM, follows with cognitive scientist Laurie Santos, who shows how ethnic and community thinking influences our perceptions of people and circumstances.
FEBRUARY 22, 2024: Creation
Movie, lively conversation, and birthday cake to celebrate Charles Darwin’s 215th birthday!
Creation is a partly biographical, partly fictional, narrative about the renowned naturalist and biologist Charles Darwin (1809-1882) and his struggle to publish his book “On the Origin of Species”. This revolutionary book, published in 1859, explores the scientific concept that life forms evolve over generations through the process of natural selection. While he was sure of his conclusions, they created a rift between Darwin and his wife, Emma Wedgwood, who was devoutly religious. The rift grew wider after the tragic death of their daughter, Annie, at age 10. This grievous loss cemented his disbelief in divine intervention. Emma was opposed to the publication of the book because its discoveries contradicted her lifelong religious beliefs. She worried about the potential consequences for herself and Charles in the afterlife, believing she would go to Heaven and Charles would not.
Fellow biologists, Thomas Huxley and Alfred Russell Wallace, strongly supported the premise of natural selection and encouraged Charles Darwin to share his book with the world.
Emma eventually agreed to the publication after Charles realized that Annie’s health issues may be linked to her parents’ consanguineal relationship, as they were first cousins. That genetic weakness often resulted from inbreeding aligned with his theory of natural selection.
Creation refutes the position of many creationists that Charles Darwin “killed God” and that his work led to genocidal atrocities. The film also shows the struggle that Darwin had in accepting that the universe was actually indifferent to the beings on our little pale blue dot. Starring Paul Bettany and Jennifer Connelly.
JANUARY 16, 2024: An Honest Liar
An Honest Liar is a documentary about James Randi whose initial career was as a magician, illusionist, and escape artist under the stage name “The Amazing Randi”. The realization that others were using the same skills to bilk the public as faith healers, psychics and con artists led him to become an “investigator” (called a “debunker” by others). One of his major targets was Uri Geller – he of “spoon bending” fame/infamy.
He founded the James Randi Educational Foundation (JREF) and co-founded the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal. JREF sponsored the “One Million Dollar Paranormal Challenge” which offered one million dollars to any eligible applicant who could demonstrate evidence of any paranormal, supernatural, or occult power or event. It had yet to be collected by 2015 when it was terminated. The film features interviews with Randi, footage of his TV appearances, and interviews with illusionists and performers, such as Alice Cooper and Uri Geller, and fellow skeptics such as Bill Nye the Science Guy, and Penn & Teller.
Randi identified as an atheist, claiming the “Wizard of Oz” was more believable and more fun than religious texts.
DECEMBER 14, 2023: The Ref
Released in 1994, The Ref is a dark comedy that revolves around a cat burglar named Gus, who takes a bickering couple hostage on Christmas Eve, after he is abandoned by his partner during a heist. As Gus tries to evade the police, he becomes an unwilling referee, forced to mediate the dysfunctional couple as their holiday chaos unfolds. Through a series of hilariously tense and witty exchanges, the film explores themes of family, marriage, and the absurdity of holiday traditions, blending dark humour with heartwarming moments.
NOVEMBER 14, 2023: Inherit the Wind
A powerful dramatization of the historic 1925 Scopes ‘Monkey’ Trial – a pivotal moment in USA history that pitted the forces of scientific discovery against the tenets of religious tradition. It unfolded in July of that year, as John T. Scopes bravely faced conviction for daring to teach Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution to enthusiastic high school students, defying Tennessee’s rigid state laws at the time. At its core, the film champions the cause for intellectual and academic freedom. The convincing portrayals of Matthew Harrison Brady, Henry Drummond, Bertram Cates, and E. K. Hornbeck, mirror the legendary figures of William Jennings Bryan, Clarence Darrow, Scopes himself, and H. L. Mencken, adding a compelling intensity to the riveting narrative.
OCTOBER 10, 2023: The Root of all Evil?
This is a two-part 2006 documentary presented by evolutionary biologist, professor, and author, Richard Dawkins. In this film, Dawkins asserts that humanity would fare better without god beliefs, and that unlike science which develops theories and tests hypotheses, religion relies only on blind faith.
In the first part, “The God Delusion,” Dawkins researches religious beliefs, particularly those presented as facts, and interviews prominent religious leaders, such as Ted Haggard, and Yousef-al-Khattab. He argues that science gives us a much better framework for understanding our world than faith. Dawkins uses Bertrand Russell’s celestial teapot analogy to show that the burden of proof lies with the person making a claim. In the second part, “The Virus Of Faith,” Dawkins looks critically at the moral guidance that many religious extol, visits the radical Hell-House organization that “morally polices” children, and he makes a plea for the end of religious indoctrination of children. Based on his book, The Selfish Gene, he compares faith to a virus passed from parents to children, and from teachers to students, coining the term, “meme”.
Rather accepting scripture and religious rules as a basis for morality, Dawkins advocates learning about science and using critical thinking to better understand our world and act ethically.
SEPTEMBER 28, 2023: Marketing the Messiah
This light-hearted documentary shows how a small Jewish sect morphed into the Catholic Church. According to the Director, Cameron Reilly, this film was created “… with the help of twelve biblical scholars, Renaissance masterpieces, and humorous animation. It’s neither a film about faith nor a film attacking or making fun of Christianity. It’s an honest attempt to piece together a very complex and fascinating story…”
AUGUST 8, 2023: The Invention of Lying
Through a cleverly-woven storyline, “The Invention of Lying” is a thought-provoking comedy that explores the concept of a world where lying does not exist, exposing the complexities and consequences that arise when one man discovers that he has the ability to deceive.
The film stars the renowned comedian and writer, Ricky Gervais, whose parents are of English, French-Canadian, and Haudenosaunee descent. Other prominent cast members include, Jennifer Garner, Tina Fey, Rob Lowe, Fionnula Flanagan, Louis CK, Jonah Hill, as well as cameos from Christopher Guest, Edward Norton, Stephen Merchant, and the late Philip Seymour Hoffman.