Opening May 30 – June 5, 2022 – Margaret Barton-Fumo reports

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 that are of particular interest. Film titles highlighted in red have links to full reviews.

Now Playing: 

• Playlist – Strand Releasing (NY; expands to LA June 3) – France – Dramedy written and directed by Nine Antico, starring Sara Forestier and Laetitia Dosch. Sophie lands a job with a comic book publisher despite being unqualified for the position. However, her newfound security is threatened when she breaks up with her boyfriend, the father of the child she is carrying.

Wednesday, June 1 

• Wet Sand – Mubi – Georgia / Switzerland – Drama directed by Elene Naveriani, co-written with Sandro Naveriani. The death of a local patriarch sends shockwaves through a small village on the Black Sea, as the arrival of his estranged daughter forces an insular community to confront a painful history of secrets and lies, as she attempts to untangle the tragic consequences of her father’s hidden love life.

Friday, June 3 

• After Blue – Altered Innocence (Cinemas) – France – Fantasy / Sci-Fi written and directed by Bertrand Mandico. A chimeric future on After Blue, a planet from another galaxy, a virgin planet where only women can survive in the midst of harmless flora and fauna. The story is of a punitive expedition.

 

• Double Threat – VMI Worldwide (VOD) – USA – Thriller starring Danielle C. Ryan. With ruthless mobsters on her tail, a young woman with a split personality becomes entangled with a man on a pilgrimage across the country to scatter his brother’s ashes.

 

• Hollywood Stargirl – Disney+ – USA – Romantic comedy co-written and directed by Julia Hart that follows Stargirl Caraway as she journeys out of Mica into a bigger world of music, dreams and possibility. Starring Grace VanderWaal, Judy Greer and Uma Thurman.

 

• Miracle – Film Movement (Premiere at Film Forum in NYC) – Romania – Thriller written and directed by Bogdan George Apetri. A young nun sneaks out of her monastery to attend to an urgent matter but never makes it back and a police detective’s investigation uncovers clues and revelations that lead not only to the truth but a miracle as well.

 

• Interceptor – Netflix – Australia / USA – Action film starring Elsa Pataky. One Army captain must use her years of tactical training and military expertise when a simultaneous coordinated attack threatens the remote missile interceptor station she is in command of.

 

• Neptune Frost – Kino Lorber (Cinemas) – USA / Rwanda – Sci-Fi musical co-directed by Anisia Uzeyman and Saul Williams. An intersex African hacker, a coltan miner and the virtual marvel born as a result of their union.

 

• Poser – Oscilloscope (Cinemas) – USA – Drama starring Sarah Achor. As Lennon fuels her desire for entrée into a podcast featuring live music and conversations with the artists she so fervently admires, Lennon finds inspiration for her own musical ambitions…and a growing sense of misdirected identity.

 

• Watcher – IFC Midnight (Cinemas) – USA – Horror directed and co-written by Chloe Okuno, starring Maika Monroe and Karl Glusman. A young woman moves into a new apartment with her fiancé only to be tormented by the feeling that she is being stalked by an unseen watcher in an adjacent building.

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.