This article discusses the use of films and practices concerning the institutional and cultural field at the University of Cartagena, where the film society is central, according to the experience the academic community had with the process of social appropriation of cultural modernity. Through interviews, press and institutional archives and documentary analysis, the uses of film are traced at university level. In the end, it is suggested that the relationship between film societies and the University of Cartagena is significant in terms of cultural background, but not necessarily in terms of teaching practices.