ALLIANCE OF WOMEN FILM JOURNALISTS

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Opening May 23 – 29, 2022 – Margaret Barton-Fumo reports

Margaret Barton-Fumo , ,
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The Alliance of Women Film Journalists highlights movies made by and about women. With a vigilant eye toward current releases, we maintain an interactive record of films that are pertinent to our interests. Be they female-made or female-centric productions, they are films that represent a wide range of women’s stories and present complex female characters. As such, they are movies that will most likely be reviewed on AWFJ.org and will qualify for consideration for our annual EDA Awards, celebrating exceptional women working in film behind and in front of the camera. Our members are feature writers, columnists and regular contributors to a variety of media outlets and many of us publish regularly on the festival circuit. Our critical voices are widespread and diverse. We invite you to join us in tracking weekly releases of particular interest. And we welcome information about new films that will help us to keep our records updated and our critics alert. Below is a concise list of new releases set for the week of May 23 to 29 that are of particular interest:  

Film titles highlighted in red have links to full reviews.

Tuesday, May 24 

  • Since I Been Down – (VOD) – USA – Documentary written and directed by Gilda Sheppard. In America’s backyard, a community held captive by policies targeting gangs and drugs, sacrifices their youth for a false sense of justice, and safety. Forty years later, a true path to justice and healing is led from inside prison walls.

Friday, May 27 

  • 18½ – Adventure Entertainment (Cinemas) – USA – Drama. In 1974, a White House transcriber is thrust into the Watergate scandal when she obtains the only copy of the infamous 18½ minute gap in Nixon’s tapes. Starring Willa Fitzgerald.

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  • A Chiara – Neon (Cinemas) – Italy – Drama written and directed by Jonas Carpignano following the story of 15-year-old Chiara whose close-knit family falls apart after her father abandons them in Calabria.

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  • Fanny: The Right to Rock – Film Movement (Cinemas) – Canada – Documentary written and directed by Bobbi Jo Hart revealing the untold story of a Filipina American garage band that morphed into the ferocious rock group Fanny, who almost became the female Beatles.

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  • Rite of the Shaman – Purdie Distribution (Cinemas) – USA – Drama co-written and directed by Alicia Oberle Farmer. A high school boy must follow in his shaman grandfather’s footsteps to become the beacon of light he was meant to be.

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  • The Tsugua Diaries – KimStim (Cinemas) – Portugal / France – Drama co-written and directed by Miguel Gomes and Maureen Fazendeiro following Crista, Carloto and João who are building an airy greenhouse for butterflies in the garden and share household routines, but they are not the only ones.

Film descriptions are adapted from press releases. Titles highlighted in red have links to full reviews. Stay tuned in for next week’s releases! Contact us if we’ve overlooked anything.

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Margaret Barton-Fumo

Based in New York, Margaret Barton-Fumo has contributed to Film Comment since 2006. Her monthly online column, “Deep Cuts,” focused on the intersection of film and music. She has interviewed such directors, actors, and musicians as Brian De Palma, James Gray, Harry Dean Stanton, and Paul Williams, and has additionally contributed to Senses of Cinema and Stop Smiling. She is the editor of Paul Verhoeven: Interviews, published by the University Press of Mississippi.