ALL POSTS
Susanne Bier on ‘A Second Chance,’ ‘Serena,’ and Her Upcoming Mary, Queen of Scots Biopic
Susanne Bier is one of the most respected and well-known women directors in the world. One of three female filmmakers to win the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, the prolific Danish helmer’s...
Trailer Watch: ‘She’s Beautiful When She’s Angry’ Chronicles the Turmoil of the Women’s Movement
Feminist movements, then and now, have been largely ignored by the movies. Unlike, say, the civil-rights movements of the 1950s and 1960s, which receives respectful remembrance in high-profile...
Guest Post: Finding a Rare POV on a Familiar Global Issue in ‘Waiting for August’
There have been many discussions in the film industry lately about the stubborn imbalance against women’s representation in cinema. Although we have gone a long way in theright direction, there is...
4 Ways Shonda Rhimes Is Changing the Conversation About Herself
As TV’s most successful female showrunner — and TV’s most successful black showrunner — there are a lot of questions Shonda Rhimes is sick of being asked. Sometimes well-intended,...
The Big O: Who’s More Overdue for a Win — Amy Adams or Julianne Moore?
Think back to last year’s Best Actress category and what a titanic lineup it was. Sandra Bullock for Gravity, Judi Dench for Philomena, Meryl Streep for August: Osage County, and Cate Blanchett,...
The Mother of all Bad Guys: ‘Homeland’ Returns
[This essay contains some spoilers for the last episode of Homeland Season 3 and the first two episodes of Season 4.] I’ve never watched a character go from complicated to villainous in the public...
London Film Fest Director Clare Stewart on Cinephilia as a Religion and Her Advice to Future Programmers
As the Director of the London Film Festival and the Head of Exhibition at the BFI, Clare Stewart has curated and will showcase nearly 250 films this month. The London festival will run from October...
Weekly Update for October 3: Women Centric, Directed and Written Films Playing Near You
Films About Women Opening Gone Girl There hasn’t been a soignée blonde so flat-out hate-able since Gwyneth bitched about the burdens of motherhood. Welcome to the A-list, Gone Girl star Rosamund...
Helen Mirren to Reprise Her Role as Elizabeth II on Broadway
Helen Mirren will soon reprise the role that made her an Oscar winner, that of Queen Elizabeth II, on Broadway. Here’s the twist: Mirren won’t be starring in a stage adaptation of The Queen,...
The Big O: If the Girl in ‘Gone Girl’ Provokes Debate, Oscar Noms Might Follow
Much of the suspense over Gone Girl, at least among the film journalists who were the first to witness David Fincher’s latest thriller at the New York Film Festival, has not revolved around any...
October 2014 Film Preview
October may be the time of ghosts and ghouls, not that you’d know it from the many diverse film offerings made by and starring women this month. But we definitely start with one ghoul: the one in...
‘Makers’ Starts Tonight With History of Women in Comedy
It was less than a decade ago that the late Christopher Hitchens, a respected writer and thinker, wondered aloud in a mainstream publication “why women aren’t funny.” Many rational people...
Review: Rosamund Pike Gives An Oscar Worthy and Career Making Performance in ‘Gone Girl’
There hasn’t been a soignée blonde so flat-out hate-able since Gwyneth bitched about the burdens of motherhood. Welcome to the A-list, Gone Girl star Rosamund Pike! The tall, slender,...
The World Doesn’t See Lydia Diamond As a Female Playwright
The dearth of women in the theater world is well documented. While the three finalists for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama this year were all women, not a single female playwright appeared on the Tony...
Supergirl Coming to TV
Superheroes haven’t just taken over the multiplex, but the Huluplex too. Debuting this fall are Fox’s Gotham and NBC’s Constantine, which will join CW’s The Flash (in its first season) and...
Guest Post: Why I Couldn’t Turn Down Starz’s Filmmaking Experiment ‘The Chair’
When I was offered the role of filmmaker/guinea pig on Chris Moore’s The Chair, a filmmaking experiment-turned-docu-series currently airing on Starz, it was a no brainer. The premise of The Chair...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Boo Ji-Young — ‘Cart’
Boo Ji-Young attended the Korean Academy of Film Arts. She directed the feature film Sisters on the Road (2009), as well as four shorts: Spark (1997), His Humming (2000), A Drop of Clear Salty...
‘Madam Secretary’ is Her Own Woman
When early news of the CBS series Madam Secretary came out, word was the title role was a fictionalized version of Hillary Clinton. (Meanwhile, NBC was said to be developing a Hillary-centric...
Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer Riff on Cereal in New ‘Broad City’ Teaser
We would never have pegged Broad City’s Abbi and Ilana as morning people, so this first teaser for the second season of the loose, loopy Comedy Central show is a bit of a surprise. The NYC...
Fort Bliss Director Claudia Myers on Women in the Military and the Difficulties of Balancing Motherhood and Film
There are many films about the harrowing experiences of war, but not nearly enough about women soldiers — especially women with families. Returning home after serving her tour in Afghanistan...
Guest Post: Honeymoon, Bloody Unicorns and Spumoni
If you’ve been in an intimate relationship, you’ve had that moment — that awful moment — where the person you’ve been sharing your bed with suddenly seems like a stranger. It was...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Megha Ramaswamy — ‘Newborns’
MeghaRamaswamy is a Mumbai-based screenwriter and director. She wrote the screenplayfor the feature film Shaitan, and wroteand directed the fictional short Bunny. (TIFF official site) Her 8-minute...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Sarah Galea-Davis — ‘An Apartment’
Sarah Galea-Davis is an award-winning director, writerand producer. She works in both fiction and documentary filmmaking. Her last short film, Can You Wave Bye-Bye?, won Best Short Film at the...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Caroline Mailloux — ‘The Barnhouse’
The Barnhouse is the third short film written and directed by Caroline Mailloux. Her films Motel Pluton and Cher Dieu (Dear God) both enjoyed much success on the festival circuit, and Cher Dieu was...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Johanne Ste-Marie — ‘Migration’
Johanne Ste-Marie is a Montreal native who dove head firstinto the burning ring of animation after graduating with a BFA in FilmAnimation from Concordia University. In 2002, she formed an art duo,...
Fall TV Preview Part 2: Shonda, Selfies, and Sick Kids
Last week’s look at some of the fall shows created by women was far from comprehensive. As a commenter pointed out, I did not include the much-anticipated How to Get Away with Murder, from Scandal...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Michelle Latimer — ‘The Underground’
Michelle Latimer, writer and director of the dramatic short The Underground, is an actor, filmmaker, and curator. Her award-winning documentary Aliaspremiered at the 2013 Hot Docs Film Festival...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Atsuko Hirayanagi — ‘Oh Lucy!’
Atsuko Hirayanagi wasborn in Nagano and raised in Chiba, Japan. She is a recent graduate of NYUTisch School of The Arts, Asia, with an MFA in Film Production. Her short films have played at numerous...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Isabel Coixet — ‘Learning to Drive’
Isabel Coixet was born in Barcelona.Since her debut feature, Too Oldto Die Young (1989), she has directedThings I Never Told You (1996), My LifeWithout Me (2003), The Secret Life of Words...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Sophie Barthes — ‘Madame Bovary’
A Columbia University graduate, Sophie Barthes was born in France and grew up in the Middle East and South America. Barthes has just completed an English adaptation of Gustave Flaubert’s Madame...
Is Hillary Clinton Fall’s Biggest TV Star?
America has never been readier for a female president, which may be why there are two new shows about women politicos this fall. The NY Times argues that CBS’s Madam Secretary and NBC’s State...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Elizabeth Lazebnik — ‘Liompa’
Elizabeth Lazebnik is quickly becoming a recognized name in the Canadian film industry. Her shorts have previously played at TIFF, the Montreal World Film Festival and received awards from WWSFF,...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Tamara Erde — ‘This is My Land’
Tamara Erde was born in Tel Aviv. She studied at the Bezalel Academy in Jerusalem and Le Fresnoy in France. In her first feature film, This is My Land, Erde visits six independently run Israeli and...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Linnea Saasen — ‘Meet Me in Montenegro’
Linnea Saasen was born and raised north of the Arctic Circle in Harstad,Norway. She moved to Oslo to study art before settling in Berlin, where sheworked as a contemporary dancer and performance...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Marte Vold — ‘Out of Nature’
Marte Vold (b. 1978 in Tromsø, Norway) studied film at Nordland Art andFilm School, attended the National Art Academy in Oslo, and then graduated fromthe Norwegian Film School in 2005. Between 2002...
Weekly Update for September 5: Women Centric, Directed and Written Films Playing Near You
Films About Women Opening Rocks in My Pockets — Written and Directed by Signe Baumane (Opened September 3) Rocks in My Pockets is Signe Baumane’s autobiographical “funny film about...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Lone Scherfig — ‘The Riot Club’
Lone Scherfig was born inCopenhagen and graduated fromthe National Film School of Denmark.Her features Italian for Beginners(2000), Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself (2002),Just Like Home (2007), and An...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Isidora Marras- ‘I Am Not Lorena’
Isidora Marras was born in Santiago, Chile, and studied audiovisual direction at Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. Her short films include “Mirada a Vapor” (2008) and “En la Azotea”...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Laura Nix — ‘The Yes Men Are Revolting’
Laura Nix is a filmmaker based in Los Angeles.She has over seventy productioncredits and has directed the featurefilm The Politics of Fur (2002) and twofeature documentaries, The Light inHer Eyes...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Tala Hadid — ‘The Narrow Frame of Midnight’
Tala Hadid was born in London, graduated from Columbia University in NewYork City, and participated in the Sundance Institute Directors Lab. Her filmsinclude the documentary feature Sacred Poet, the...
Joan Rivers: An Appreciation of a Feminist Comedy Revolutionary
Like the rest of the world, I’m really sad about Joan Rivers’ death. I didn’t know her, though I met her once at the press day for the riveting and brilliant documentary about her life, Joan...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Martine Époque — ‘Coda: The Finale for The Rite of Spring’
Choreographer Martine Époque is the founder of Montreal’s renowned contemporary dance company Groupe Nouvelle Aire and was its Artistic Director from 1968 to 1981. She was also the driving force...
TIFF Women Directors: Meet Kristina Grozeva (‘The Lesson’)
Kristina Grozeva was born in Sofia, Bulgaria, in1976. She graduated from the National Academy for Theater and Film Art with a degree in Film Directing. She and her co-director Petar Valchanov make...
The Unspoken Biases in Film School
Film school hasbecome an inextricable step in becoming a successful filmmaker. I went to NYU’sTisch School of the Arts and have not regretted it. I know I would not be whereI am today without my...
Signe Baumane Boldly Animates Family Depression in ‘Rocks in My Pockets’
Rocksin My Pockets is Signe Baumane’s autobiographical “funny film about depression,” made with papier-mache, stop-motion and hand-drawn animation. The rich, deep, and very original film...
Meet Outlander, the Anti-Game of Thrones
Women and Hollywood is on vacation this week. While our lights are out, we’ll be reposting our most popular posts of the summer.Ever since I heard Starz was adapting Diana Gabaldon’s racy,...
‘To Be Takei’ Director Jennifer Kroot on George Takei’s “Singular Personality” and the Takeis’ “Functional-Dysfunctional” Marriage
Meet the Takeis — George and Brad — two married men who go around the country talking about Star Trek, gay marriage, and other important issues like the Japanese-American internment...
Heather Graham to Write, Direct, and Star in Her Own Movie
Heather Graham made headlines a couple of days ago (on industry news sites, anyway) when she departed a Neil LaBute play three days after a press meet-and-greet. Buried in that story, though, is...
Weekly Update for August 15: Women Centric, Directed and Written Films Playing Near You
Films About Women Opening Abuse of Weakness — Written and Directed by Catherine Breillat Isabelle Huppert stars as Maud, a film director who one morning wakes up and cannot feel one side of...
‘Abuse of Weakness’ Director Catherine Breillat on How to Blackmail Isabelle Huppert Into Starring in Your Film
With her latest project, French auteur Catherine Breillat follows up brilliantly on her last two fairy-tale films, Bluebeard (2009) and The Sleeping Beauty (2010). The semi-autobiographical Abuse of...
Director Mitra Farahani on Legendary Painter Bahman Mohassess and the Artist’s Plight in Iran
Nakedlimbs, tangled, dancing; gaping mouths; and sightless eyes — much of Iranianartist Bahman Mohassess’ work strikes the first-time viewer alternately as acelebration of the human...