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cinemagooey · 10 days

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FEMME FILM

In Celebration of Women Filmmakers

Greta Gerwig as Francis Ha!

Remember when that thing happened called the pandemic?

HAHA! Jk...of course we do. We're still living in a mad, disjointed post-pandemic world, four years later. The pandemic pummeled humanity and just about everything else - Hollywood included.

Covid re-wrote the Hollywood playbook. Theater attendance stopped cold. At-home streaming became standard entertainment practice. The last movie I went to see at the theater before the virus invaded was a little-known 2019 horror flick called The Lodge. I don't remember much about the movie, but, looking back, I feel bittersweet about the experience. How was I to know that would be my last, innocent foray before society unraveled in a such way that going to the movies would never be the same?

So what's the connection between the pandemic and female filmmakers, you might ask? Well, just when the Hollywood studios were on their covid-masked knees begging for something to save the theater experience (and their financial lives), along came:

BARBENHEIMER!

Some say it was Top Gun Maverick/Tom Cruse that saved Hollywood after the virus, but I'm sticking to my pink atomic guns that it was the daring duo of Barbie/Oppenheimer.

WHAT A SUMMER! Those two films energized the movie-going experience like no other and Hollywood was as pumped as tween on Twizzlers and RedBulls.

Nolan's Oppenheimer is epic. It is historical. It is emotional. It is long. It is a history lesson about the annihilating evil that man created and that the world can (literally) be relegated to stardust with the push of a button. Applause, applause! Kudos, Christopher Nolan! Your Academy Awards and other trophies were well deserved!

But Barbie? Greta Gerwig's Barbie is communal. It brought people together for a joyous theatrical excursion. Groups gathered at theaters all over the world, dressed in pink, creating bubble-gum colored watch parties, drunk on the female power the film reminded us we have, and sobered at the admonition that the patriarchy is very real. It was also the highest grossing film of 2023, gracing Hollywood with a 1.4 billion box office gift. Applause, applause! Kudos, Greta Gerwig! Your Academy Awar...

Oh. Wait.

The Academy Awards didn't happen for Barbie, other than best song, which is nice, but...

And them's the brakes (and I do mean brakes as well as breaks) for women in Hollywood. The good old boy network rules in LALA land just like it does everywhere else (click here to see the factual, if not depressing, data).

In this post Cinemagooey raises it's fist in solidarity to women filmmakers everywhere, those heroes of feminine empowerment who buck patriarchal odds to bring their creative vision to life and share it with the world, come hell or highwater.

Highlighted below are just some of the women filmmakers who serve as shining stars and beacons of hope for other film warriors who are following in their path:

ELAINE MAY

Elaine May and Walter Matthau in A New Leaf (1971)

Elaine May is a gift to humanity. A true genius, she's been a Broadway star, film star, playwright, screenwriter and director in her long, illustrious career. If you want to introduce yourself to her prodigious talent, I recommend starting with A New Leaf, in which she performed the Hollywood trifecta: writing, directing and starring in this hilarious black comedy. Other writing/directing credits include: The Heartbreak Kid, Mike and Nickey, Heaven Can Wait, Reds, Tootsie, The Birdcage and, famously Ishtar, the film that effectively ended her movie career (here's a little link to that fascinating story). May boasts even more directorial and writing credits, but there's too many to list here. Look her up and prepare to be amazed.

I could go on and on about Elaine May, but I'll save it for a post dedicated exclusively to her and her shining accomplishments. She was one of the early greats who painstakingly forged a path for others in the field.

Today's women filmmakers stand on May's shoulders and owe her a debt of gratitude. Cinemagooey salutes this original, one of a kind bad ass.

With Charles Grodin, directing The Heartbreak Kid

Directing A New Leaf

Schmoozing with the big boys, circa 1980s

NANCY MEYERS

Nancy Meyers is the queen of the cozy romcom. When it comes to LOL-witty love stories that make us swoon, she slays. Meyers is renowned for directing comfy, side-splitting hits such as The Parent Trap (1998), Something's Gotta Give (2003), The Holiday (2006) and It's Complicated (2009), to name a few. She also wrote or co-wrote a number of smash hit screenplays, starting with my favorite, Private Benjamin (1980) but also crafting Irreconcilable Differences (1984), Baby Boom (1987) and the Father of the Bride franchise (1991, 1995 and 2020), just to name a few.

Directing Something's Gotta Give

Meyers is not only famous for her filmmaking acumen, her loyal Instagram fans are obsessed with the houses in her movies, homes that imbue a rich, intimate, put-your-feet-up-by-the-fire-and-let's-have-some-wine kind of coastal vibe. Follow her on Insta. You won't regret it. And watch her movies. You're welcome.

Above: Father of the Bride, starring this house

And the stunning beach home in Something's Gotta Give

PENNY MARSHALL

Penny Marshall Directing Big (1989)

Penny Marshall was a staple in my household in 1976 when she starred as Laverne DeFazio on the television sitcom Laverne and Shirley, about two working class gals sharing an apartment and comedic hijinks in Milwaukee. I loved that show. My sixth grade BFF and I conspired to live just such a life after high school (but with better jobs in a warmer climate). Life can upend the best of plans, howeve - that BFF and I never became Laverne and Shirley and when the show ended, Penny Marshall moved from comedic acting to cinematic directing - lucky for us.

Marshall directed a slew of hits in the 80's and 90s: Jumpin' Jack Flash, Big, Awakenings and The Preacher's Wife. But my all-time favorite is A League of Their Own, starring Geena Davis, Rosie O'Donnell, Madonna and Tom Hanks.

A League of Their Own (1992) (turn up the volume and watch this buddy moment between Madonna and Rosie O'Donnell)

The film is a Rosie-the-Riveter-meets-the-MLB story of the The All American Girls Professional Baseball League, an organization started during WWII when it was feared that men's baseball would die off as a casualty of war. The movie recounts an age when men marched off to the trenches and women were suddenly valued for more than their domestic talents, challenging patriarchal traditions and set-in-stone cultural beliefs. It's all heart and Madonna's moving "This Used To Be My Playground" theme song, as well as the reunion of the real life women who were in the league at the end of the film, poignantly encapsulate a brief, shining moment for women in sports.

Penny Marshall died in 2018. But her cinematic legacy and comedic versatility lives on in her extraordinary films, as well as the dozens of comedic roles she inhabited on t.v. (The Odd Couple, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Frasier, Portlandia and Hocus Pocus, to name but a few). It's well worth your time to dig into her films to appreciate this one of a kind female director.

Directing Tom Hanks in Big (1988)

Awakenings, starring Robin Williams (1990). Pass the kleenex

GRETA GERWIG

With Ben Stiller in Greenburg (2010)

Before Barbie and Lady Bird - two films that placed Greta Gerwig squarely on the Hollywood writing and directing map, she was the darling of a lesser known indie-film movement called Mumblecore. This cinematic genre peaked in the mid-aughts and is best described as movies with impromptu dialogue, realistic settings and low-budget markings. This is where Gerwig got her start in movies as an actress/sometimes screenwriter.

After mumbling her way through a myriad of films, Gerwig teamed up with her (now) real-life partner, Noah Baumbaugh and co-wrote and starred in a sweet little movie called Francis Ha!.

Gerwig, dancing through the streets of Manhattan in Francis Ha!

I fell, and am still, in love with Francis Ha!, a comedy about a dreamer living in NYC whose life is derailed when she loses her roommate and best friend, as well as her position in a dance company, rendering her an unemployed, aimless nomad. Francis Ha! became an indie smash, nominated for several awards (Golden Globe, Independent Spirit, London Film Critics Circle Film Awards, to name a few), and cementing Gerwig as a force in film.

Bouyed by this success, Gerwig wrote and directed Lady Bird (2017), Little Women (2019, an adaptation from the Louise May Alcott novel) and of course Barbie (2023). I can't wait to see what Hollywood's new femme-fab director brings to the table next. If it's an original movie that resonates with millions and draws in big crowds and big bucks, like Barbie did, maybe the Academy will finally give this remarkable talent the recognition she more than deserves.

Gerwig, directing Ryan Gosling in Barbie

And there are more, but not enough...

Despite the fierce odds against them, women have been fighting to share their celluloid visions with audiences since the advent of film (the first: Alice Guy-Blanché made her first movie in 1896). Hats off to the past pioneers and present day warriors who continue to fight the good fight and inspire future femme filmmakers everywhere. I wish I could write a tribute to them all, but here are a few of the greats and one film that I recommend from each, in no particular order:

Jane Campion The Piano (1993), Sophia Coppola, Lost In Translation (2003), Kathryn Bigelow, The Hurt Locker (2008), Ava DuVernay, Selma (2014), Nora Ephron, Julie and Julia (2009), Kelly Reichardt, Certain Women (2016), Debra Granik, Winter's Bone (2010), Lana Wachowski and Lilli Wachowski, The Matrix (1999), Jennifer Kent, The Babadook (2014), Charlotte Wells, Aftersun (2022).

Kathryn Bigelow, making history as the first woman to receive the Oscar for Best Director for The Hurt Locker.

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mikesq10 · 1 month

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My Top 50 Favorite Movies

Lost in Translation (2003)

Have you ever asked yourself, if you were a movie what would you be? It took me years to find this answer to a question I never asked myself until I saw Sophia Coppola's Lost in Translation. This is the most beautiful movie I have ever seen. There isn't a single moment, not scene, I mean moment as in seconds that I do not appreciate. It is 2 strangers in Tokyo, Japan that are there for their own reasons that eventually form a bond, unexpected and coincidental to both of them. They are both lost in life but during different stages between identity crisis that is Charlotte (Scarlett Johansson) and mid-life crisis in his older years, Bob (Bill Murray). Both phases in life are completely relatable and natural. The best medicine for these two in particular is that they are away in another world, out of their current element of reality and almost in a dream like scenario in Japan that is foreign in both language and culture. Their sudden friendship brings them even closer when they attend a party thrown by a friend of Charlotte's who goes by Charlie Brown. This is where the adventure element and some comedic relief is kicked in and makes us feel like we are in Japan enjoying life at it's absolute fullest, with no thoughts or burden. The serious moments are Bob's telephone conversations with his estranged wife and Charlotte's distant gap connection with her newly wed husband, both moments are great precursors to what follows, explained above. Just like any trip, Bob and Charlotte will need to say their good-byes and this where the movie's conclusion becomes pretty sad, knowing they'll never see each other again. What I love here is that, this movie is not romantic, it's an imaginative method of meeting your perfect counterpart in a perfect setting at a perfect time - and all of it was completely unexpected making the movie that much more relatable. Lost in Translation was filmed by using film which gives a grainy stock effect for the viewer and puts pictures in motion like a collage and just so happens to be instrumental to the movie's success. Filmed in 27 days, Bill Murray's all time favorite movie is also mine and Lost In Translation is a forever mood captured on screen and sits at number 1 comfortably.

#lost in translation #sophia coppola #bill murray #scarlett johansson #bob harris #charlotte #suntory #japan #tokyo

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