After Agnès Varda: A Discussion
Following Agnès Varda’s death and inspired by the importance of collaboration in Varda’s work, we asked eight writers, programmers and…
Earth Signs: Reading the Post-Pastoral in Alice Rohrwacher’s ‘The Wonders’ (‘Le Meraviglie’)
There is a scene in Alice Rohrwacher’s 2014 film The Wonders (Le Meraviglie) in which the protagonist Gelsomina, the eldest daughter of a…
Wonder in Miniature: Shireen Seno’s ‘Nervous Translation’
In Shireen Seno’s Nervous Translation (2017), the world is cut to eight-year-old Yael’s measure. The film unfolds almost exclusively within…
“Only The Lonely”: Sex Work under Capitalism in Isa Mazzei and Daniel Goldhaber’s ‘Cam’
Isa Mazzei and Daniel Goldhaber’s Cam (2018) begins with camgirl Lola entertaining her male clients with a series of erotic…
In Defence of the Crazy Cat Lady: Carolee Schneemann’s Feline Muses
I came across Carolee Schneemann’s Infinity Kisses earlier this year during an insomniac’s trawl through YouTube, ten years after the…
“Deconstruct, reconstruct, challenge, celebrate”: In Conversation With Barbara Hammer
Another Gaze: Do you remember a moment when you decided to start making films? Barbara Hammer: I was studying painting…
Review: Hikari’s ’37 Seconds’ – Berlinale
A balancing act between dependence and self-determination characterises Yuma Takada’s (Mei Kayama) story as told in 37 Seconds, a film…
Intimate Contact: Images of Suffering in the Work of Carolee Schneemann
“I live for the nude rabble rousing of Carolee Schneemann”.1 These words, written in a recent Facebook post by Lena…
The Precarious Politics of Yorgos Lanthimos’s ‘The Favourite’
In The Monstrous Feminine, Barbara Creed outlines the horror we associate with images of the interior made exterior. Drawing on…
Which of Hundreds of Selves?: Josephine Decker’s Coming-of-Age Trilogy
Josephine Decker’s world is full of secrets. There is something powerful about her ability to craft characters – mostly women…
“A Habit of not Talking about the Past” in Eritrean Italy: Documenting a Diaspora
Asmarina (2015), by Alan Maglio and Medhin Paolos, explores the multiplicity of Eritrean migratory experiences and tells the many stories…
On Necessary and Unnecessary Love in Karyn Kusama’s ‘Destroyer’
Small talk is boring. We hate it, and it’s obvious why – it’s a begrudgingly necessary preamble to any purposeful conversational exchange,…
Macabre Dancing: ‘Die Kinder der Toten’ (‘The Children of the Dead’) – Berlinale
Elfriede Jelinek’s novel Die Kinder der Toten [The Children of the Dead,1995], which has yet to be translated into English, tends to be…
In Search of a ‘Feminist Sensibility’: Two Shorts By Deborah Stratman and Lynne Sachs
Vever (for Barbara) dir. Deborah Stratman, 2019 Carolee, Barbara & Gunvor dir. Lynne Sachs, 2018. When the Bay Area lesbian…
Review: Notes to Self by Christina Battle – part of Forum Expanded, Berlinale
“MY ALGORITHMS ARE ALL FUCKED UP” I watch the words of this phrase – printed in an all-caps, blue serif font – slowly vanish…
‘Can You Ever Forgive Me’: An Ode To Queer Failure
In 2015, Todd Haynes’s Carol explored some of the complexities surrounding lesbian experience in ‘50s New York. The film, beautifully…
Review: Bora Kim’s ‘House of Hummingbird’ (‘Beol-sae’) – Berlinale
Bora Kim’s House of Hummingbird had its world premiere at Busan International Film Festival last October, but I saw it…
What goes up must come down: Marie Kreutzer’s ‘The Ground Beneath My Feet’ – Berlinale
“She’s not fit for this life,” says Lola to a doctor as they stand together beside her sister’s hospital bed….
Screening Female Desire: Bette Gordon’s ‘Variety’ 35 Years On
‘Once in a fiction workshop my professor critiqued a scene because “women wouldn’t ask about a hookup’s performance in bed”…
Portrait of Teona Strugar Mitevska
Teona Strugar Mitevska is an award-winning narrative filmmaker from Macedonia. Her features (‘I Am From Tito Veles’, ‘The Woman Who…
Failing to Act, Acting to Fail: The Films of Margarethe von Trotta
“How is it that some people decide the fate of others?” asks Rosa Luxemburg in the opening of Margarethe von…