Opening Mar 27 to Apr 2, 2023 – 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 March 27 to April 2 that are of particular interest. Titles highlighted in red have links to full reviews on AWFJ.org:  

Monday, March 27

• Perfect Addiction – Fathom Events / DECAL (Cinemas) – USA / Germany – Action / romance film directed by Castille Landon. A successful boxing trainer discovers that her boyfriend, a reigning champion, has been cheating on her with her own sister. She sets out to get revenge by training the one man capable of dethroning him: his arch-nemesis Kayden.

 

• The Whisper of Silence – Bulldog Film Distribution – El Salvador – Drama. Set in the coffee fields of Latin America, the movie unfolds through the eyes of Josefina Moreno, an 18-year-old coffee picker, with a rare and amazing sense of smell.

Friday, March 31

• Enys Men – Neon (Cinemas) – UK – Drama starring Mary Woodvine. Set in 1973 on an uninhabited island off the Cornish coast, a wildlife volunteer’s daily observations of a rare flower turn into a metaphysical journey that forces her as well as the viewer to question what is real and what is a nightmare.

 

• Giraffe – Film Movement – Germany / Denmark – Drama written and directed by Anna Sofie Hartmann. A Danish summer: long days turn into blue nights. A tunnel is being built to connect Denmark and Germany. Three people meet and part ways again.

 

• Imagining the Indian – (NY Cinemas) – USA – Documentary co-directed by Aviva Kempner and Ben West. A feature-length documentary film that examines the movement to eliminate the use of Native American slurs, names, logos, images and gestures that many Native Americans and their allies find demeaning and offensive.

 

• Kill Boksoon – Netflix – South Korea – Action film. A single mother who is a renowned hired killer finds it difficult to achieve a balance between her personal and work life.

 

• Prom Pact – Disney+ – USA – Family film directed by Anya Adams. Follows the main character, a feminist who doesn’t believe in the idea of falling in love, especially in heteronormative love, but then she falls and there’s undeniable chemistry.

 

• Rye Lane – Hulu – UK – Dramedy directed by Raine Allen-Miller. Two youngsters reeling from bad breakups who connect over an eventful day in South-London.

 

• Space Oddity – Samuel Goldwyn Entertainment (Cinemas) – USA – Romantic comedy written by Rebecca Banner, directed by Kyra Sedgwick. A man seeks the help from an insurance company to plan a one-way trip to Mars.

 

• A Thousand and One – Focus Features (Cinemas) – USA – Drama written and directed by A.V. Rockwell. After unapologetic and fiercely loyal Inez kidnaps her son Terry from the foster care system, mother and son set out to reclaim their sense of home, identity, and stability, in a rapidly changing New York City.

 

• The Unheard – Shudder – USA – Horror. Chloe Grayden undergoes an experimental procedure to restore her hearing. So she begins to suffer from auditory hallucinations related to the vanishing of her mother.

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