Radioactive movie review: science, bitch
Rosamund Pike is perfection in this intellectual romance, an unsentimental portrait of a woman striving to be appreciated for her mind at a time even more anti-woman than today. Feminist and flinty.
girls/women
Little Girl (Petite Fille) documentary review: what little girls are made of (EIFF 2020)
Lovely verité documentary about eight-year-old Sasha, who was born into a boy’s body but is definitely a girl. An inspiring portrait of someone asking for so little: to be accepted for who she is.
Disclosure documentary review: what the sorry state of trans representation onscreen means for everyone
Terrific doc unpacks trans representation in Hollywood, unspoken attitudes about gender, sexuality, and race that most people, trans and cis, may never have clocked before… ideas that affect us all.
To Kid or Not to Kid and Seahorse: The Dad Who Gave Birth documentaries review: childfree or child-bound?
Two intimate documentaries about atypical paths to parenthood — or not — invite us to re-evaluate our assumptions, expand our thinking, and be more accommodating of the full spectrum of humanity.
Fanny Lye Deliver’d (aka The Delivered) movie review: birth of the modern woman (EIFF 2020)
Maxine Peake is stupendous in this deliciously audacious period horror, ambitious in emotional scope and with monsters who feel unexpectedly modern: men who wield religion as a tool of oppression.
Miss Juneteenth movie review: ordinary lives drawn with extraordinary grace
A beautiful cinematic experience, delicately subtle and bursting with a gorgeous sense of place and character. There is wonderful intimate suspense in every moment of Nicole Beharie’s performance.
Shirley movie review: lost girls gone mad
A beautiful-ugly film, a work of domestic gothic grotesquerie, of women’s suffocation and sacrifice, pain and isolation. Elisabeth Moss’s performance is next-level glorious in its wackadoo intensity.
Lucky Grandma movie review: brittle old lady
Wild sass, gentle comedy, shivs of poignancy, and instantly vivid characters add up to a wonderful riff on mob movies as a Chinatown granny faces off against gangsters. Tsai Chin is an absolute hoot.
Becoming documentary review: hope floats
Verges on an ad for Michelle Obama’s memoir, but a sincerely warm one. We glimpse a woman authentically funny, self-aware, down-to-earth. Like spending time with a friend you didn’t realize you had.
How to Build a Girl movie review: instruction manual not included
The hypocrisy of the world’s expectations of girls gets a gently sardonic knock via an audaciously confident young woman battling to be herself. This is a lovely, goofy movie, easygoing and chaotic.
