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2007 films by and/or about women, thus far

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AWFJ has highlighted the following films, listed in order of release dates during the first half of 2007, as of particular interest to women because they‘re made by or are about women, and/or reflect women‘s perspectives:

  • Comedy of Power – Claude Chabrol’s film about a female judge
  • Freedom Writers – Richard LaGravenese’s film about teacher Erin Gruwell and her students, starring Hilary Swank
  • Miss Potter – Chris Noonan’s film about Beatrix Potter, starring Renee Zellwegger
  • Ever Since the World Ended – A mockumentary set 12 years after a virus has killed off almost the entire human race, with interviews survivors in the San Francisco Bay area about what life is like. Strong women’s roles, and an effective story thread about a young widow who’s part of an ad hoc community and desperately wants a child but doesn’t have a partner.
  • Abduction: The Megumi Yokota Story – In this documentary feature, Sakie Yokota, Megumi’s mother, shows extraordinary determination, fortitude and dignity in her 30-year struggle to find her daughter, who was abducted by North Korean spies in 1977. Co-directed by Patti Kim.
  • Tears of the Black Tiger – This stunning twist on vintage Hollywood westerns/melodramas by way of Thailand presents an interesting take on the role of the female love interest.
  • Alone With Her – about a stalking.
  • Blood and Chocolate – Katja Von Garner’s romantic, mythic twist on the werewolf genre presents a young American loup garoux (Agnes Bruckner) torn between loyalty to her pack and true love. Adapted from Annette Curtis Klause’s novel.
  • Catch and Release – Susannah Grant’s dark comedy about a women (Jennifer Garner) coping with her fiance’s death and the secrets he’d been keeping from her.
  • Breaking and Entering – Anthonly Minghella directs Juliette Binoche, Robin Wright Penn and Vera Farmiga as a trio of interesting, strong women who’s lives are entangled with one misguided man played by Jude Law.
  • Because I Said So – co-written by Karen Leigh Hopkins
  • The Situation – Philip Haas’ fiction feature about a woman journalist (Connie Neilsen) in Iraq to cover the war
  • Screamers – Carla Garapedian follows the rock band System of a Down as they tour Europe and the US pointing out the horrors of modern genocide that began in Armenia in 1915 up though Darfur today.
  • The Decomposition of the Soul – Co-directed by Nina Toussaint
  • Notes on Marie Menken – directed by Martina Kudlacek, about the painter-turned avant garde filmmaker
  • Unconscious – co-written by Teresa Pelegri
  • Four-Eyed Monsters – co-directed by Susan Bruice and Arin Crumley
  • Avenue Montaigne – Directed and co-written by Daniele Thompson
  • Grbavica: The Land of My Dreams – Written and Directed by Jasmila Zbanic, about the results of a woman’s rape by occupying soldiers.
  • Gray Matters – written and directed by Sue Kramer
  • The Cats of Mirikitani – documentary directed by Linda Hattendorf
  • Believe in Me – revolves around a girls’ basketball team
  • The Namesake – directed by Mira Nair, based on Jhumpa Lahiri’s novel
  • The Ultimate Gift – co-written by Cheryl McKay
  • Air Guitar Nation – documentary directed by Alexandra Lipsitz
  • Offside – Young Iranian women are arrested for sneaking in to a stadium to watch a soccer game.
  • The Page Turner – A young women takes revenge against the female pianist who ruined her chances of entering the Conservatory.
  • The Prisoner or: How I Planned to Kill Tony Blair – Co-directed by Petra Epperlein
  • U-Carmen – distinctive portrayal of Bizet and Merimee’s fiery femme fatale as a willful, ferociously independent woman living in a South African township
  • After the Wedding – directed by Susanne Bier
  • Dreaming of Lhasa – co-written and co-directed by Ritu Sarin
  • Red Road – directed and co-written by Andrea Arnold, about a woman seeking revenger for her son’s death.
  • Alice Neel – A documentary about the late painter, Alice Neel (1900-1984), directed by her son.
  • Stephanie Daley – Directed by Hilary Brougher, about a teenager (Amber Tamblyn) who kills her newborn.
  • The Collector – written and directed by Olympia Stone
  • Diggers – directed by Katherine Dieckmann
  • The Invisible – Co-written by Christine Roum
  • Poison Friends (Les Amitiés maléfiques) – Co-written by Marcia Romano
  • Snow Cake – written Angela Pell
  • Something to Cheer About – written and directed by Betsy Blankenbaker
  • Missing Victor Pellerin – Directed by Sephie DeRaspe
  • Waitress – Written and directed by Adrienne Shelly
  • Away from Her – Written and directed by Sarah Polley
  • Lucky You – Produced by Denise Di Novi and Carol Fenelon
  • L’Iceberg – Co-written and co-directed by Fiona Gordon
  • Paris, je t’amie – including the segments Quais de Seine (directed and co-written Gurinder Chadha), Bastille (written and directed by Isabel Coixet), Loin du 16ieme (co-written and co-directed by Daniela Thomas), Quartier Latin (written by Gena Rowlands) and Porte de Choisy (written by Gabrielle Keng and Kathy Li)
  • Day Night Day Night – Directed by Julia Loktev
  • Casting About – Barry Hershey’s documentary about the audition process is a deeply sympathetic insider’s depiction of the audition process and features dozens of actresses competing for three roles in a WWII-era drama
  • Georgia Rule – Three-generations of women in dramatic conflict
  • Provoked – Co-written by journalist Rahila Gupta and dealing with the real-life UK case of Kiranjit Ahluwalia, an Indian woman who murdered her abusive husband.
  • Show Business: The Road to Broadway – Directed by Dori Berinstein
  • The Salon – Based on Shelley Garrett’s play Beauty Shop
  • Fay Grim – Hal Hartley’s woman-centric sequel to “Henry Fool”
  • Amu – written and directed by Shonali Bose Angel
  • Crazy Love – Documentary portrait of a very complicated and deeply dysfunctional relationship in which Linda Riss eventually marries the man who threw acid in her face and disfigured her.
  • Gracie – Written by Lisa Marie Petersen and Karen Janszen, based on true events in the life of actress Elisabeth Shue who, as a teenage girl during the 1970s, played on the boys’ soccer team in middle-school and high school.
  • The Trial of Darryl Hunt – Documentary co-written and co-directed by Ricki Stern and Anne Sundberg
  • Miriam – WWII-era drama based on the true story of Miriam Shafer, a Jewish woman who survived the war by assuming another woman’s identity
  • La Vie en Rose – Based on the turbulent life of French singer Edith Piaf, co-written by Isabelle Sobelman and featuring an extraordinary performance by Marion Cotillard
  • Nancy Drew – Of special interest because so many women came of age reading Nancy Drew novels
  • Strike – A loosely fictionalized version of the life of Gdansk shipyard worker Anna Walentynowicz, dubbed the “Mother of Modern Poland,” whose lifelong struggle for the rights of workers laid the foundation for the Solidarity Movement, but who’s been largely overshadowed by men like Lech Walesa.
  • Unborn in the USA: Inside the War on Abortion
  • When the Road Bends: Tales of a Gypsy Caravan – directed by Jasmine Dellal
  • Manufactured Landscapes – Documentary directed by Jennifer Baichwal
  • Black Sheep – Produced by Philippa Campbell
  • Broken English – Written and directed by Zoe Cassavetes
  • Lady Chatterley – It’s Lady Chatterley, for heaven’s sake – love it or hate it, it’s about perceptions of female sexuality!
  • A Mighty Heart – Based on the memoir of Mariane Pearl, widow of murdered journalist Daniel Pearl
  • In Between Days – Directed and co-written by Korean-American filmmaker So Yong Kim
  • Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soapbox – Documentary directed by Sara Lamm
  • Evening – Co-written by Susan Minot, adapted from her novel, starring two mother and daughter pairs: Vanessa Redgrave and Natasha Richardson, and Meryl Streep and Mamie Gummer
  • Falling – Wtitten and directed by Austrian filmmaker Barbara Albert
  • Flying: Confessions of a Free Women – Filmmaker Jennifer Fox explores conflicts between career, romance and social expectations of women both in the US and countries around the world in this six-hour documentary
  • Introducing the Dwights – Directed by Cherie Nowlan
  • Joshua – Ambivalence about motherhood lies at the heart of this psychological thriller
  • Miracle on 1st Street – a woman boxer fights mobsters to protect her neighborhood.

    • You’ll find reviews of many of these films, as well as interviews with many of the directors, in the archives at www.awfj.org.

    Any omissions you can think of? Please let us know.

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    Jennifer Merin

    Jennifer Merin is the Film Critic for Womens eNews and contributes the CINEMA CITIZEN blog for and is managing editor for Women on Film, the online magazine of the Alliance of Women Film Journalists, of which she is President. She has served as a regular critic and film-related interviewer for The New York Press and About.com. She has written about entertainment for USA Today, The L.A. Times, US Magazine, Ms. Magazine, Endless Vacation Magazine, Daily News, New York Post, SoHo News and other publications. After receiving her MFA from Tisch School of the Arts (Grad Acting), Jennifer performed at the O'Neill Theater Center's Playwrights Conference, Long Wharf Theater, American Place Theatre and LaMamma, where she worked with renown Japanese director, Shuji Terayama. She subsequently joined Terayama's theater company in Tokyo, where she also acted in films. Her journalism career began when she was asked to write about Terayama for The Drama Review. She became a regular contributor to the Christian Science Monitor after writing an article about Marketta Kimbrell's Theater For The Forgotten, with which she was performing at the time. She was an O'Neill Theater Center National Critics' Institute Fellow, and then became the institute's Coordinator. While teaching at the Universities of Wisconsin and Rhode Island, she wrote "A Directory of Festivals of Theater, Dance and Folklore Around the World," published by the International Theater Institute. Denmark's Odin Teatret's director, Eugenio Barba, wrote his manifesto in the form of a letter to "Dear Jennifer Merin," which has been published around the world, in languages as diverse as Farsi and Romanian. Jennifer's culturally-oriented travel column began in the LA Times in 1984, then moved to The Associated Press, LA Times Syndicate, Tribune Media, Creators Syndicate and (currently) Arcamax Publishing. She's been news writer/editor for ABC Radio Networks, on-air reporter for NBC, CBS Radio and, currently, for Westwood One's America In the Morning. She is a member of the Critics Choice Association in the Film, Documentary and TV branches and a voting member of the Black Reel Awards. For her AWFJ archive, type "Jennifer Merin" in the Search Box (upper right corner of screen).