Drag queens, Dutch detectives and septagenarians are just a few of the diverse characters seen on the screen of SUB Films in the past year, and more people than ever have been paying attention.

SUB Films are movies out of the mainstream that are shown most Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays in the Pioneer Room of the Memorial Union.

“This semester has been the best since I’ve been here,” said Joel Gibson, commitee member of SUB Films and a grad student in entomology. He said attendance has greatly increased this year, and that an average of 25-30 people turn up each night.

Tom Seymour, SUB Films adviser and grad student in education leadership and policy, attributes this increase of audiences to more effective advertising and the plethora of posters put up.

“We hit every building on campus, dorms, and even Campustown,” he said.

Seymour said going to a SUB Film offers an experience that watching a video or attending a movie can’t provide.

“We’ve got more of a community vibe and a big variety of films,” he explained. “Plus, it’s a great deal – only $2.”

Foreign movies, anime, cult films, documentaries and rock muscials are some of the types of movies SUB Films shows, said Rachel Hadaway, SUB Films committee member and a junior in computer engineering.

“They’re usually a lot more thought-provoking than those shown in popular movie theaters,” said Lindsay Carpp, senior in biochemistry and regular attendee of SUB Films. “Even though they’re old, they’re picking the best from the older ones. They still have great writing and unique plot lines, and those kind of things transcend time. My favorite this year was `Harold and Maude’ – it was just quirky and its off-beat humor made me laugh.”

Carpp and Hadaway both spoke about another unique feature of SUB Films – the introductions to the movies given by SUB Films committee members. “For `Hedwig and the Angry Inch’ for example, they dressed in drag,” Carpp said. “That’s something you don’t get wth regular movies – funny little introductions.”

Hadaway mentioned trivia contests in the past that preceded the shows.

“When we showed `UHF,’ we did Weird Al trivia and gave out plastic dinosaurs as prizes.”

Gibson said people occasionally use SUB Films for reasons other than sheer entertainment.

“We don’t always consciously tie it in with something else on campus, but sometimes it happens. For example, for LGBTAA’s Awareness Week, we showed `Before Night Falls.’ “

“Before Night Falls” correlated with LGBTAA because it features a gay protagonist from Cuba, Hadaway explained.

Students occasionally use SUB Films for class credit.

“We get people from film classes and we have to sign a slip to say they were there,” Hadaway said.

Gibson said many students from German classes came to see “Faust,” a German silent film that combines classic expressionism and German mythology.

“It attracts a wide range of people; that’s the best part about it,” Gibson said. “We get people on dates, older couples, groups of older women and sometimes what appears to be kids from Ames High school. We’d like to think we’re involved with the community.”

There is one more film to be shown this year.

“It’s called `Brain Candy’ and is from `Kids in the Hall,’ a comedy group from Canada,” Gibson said. “After they stopped doing their TV show, they did this. It has kind of a Monty Python approach: each person plays a lot of characters and there’s 10 or 15 sketches within the larger story. It has a subtle message about medication as a solution to life’s problems, but mostly they try to make people laugh.”

It will be shown Thursday, Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. in the Pioneer Room.