Female Film Critics 24/375
A bleak Warsaw winter that’s made even bleaker by fear and intimidation is the backdrop to director Kasia Adamik’s tense drama/thriller Winter of the Crow. As it tells the story of an unwitting Englishwoman (Lesley Manville) whose visit to the Polish capital in December 1981 is thrown into chaos by the secret police’s declaration of martial law, the film explores what it means to resist an oppressive regime.
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In The Art of Adventure, director Alison Reid (The Woman Who Loved Giraffes) tells the globe-trotting tale of Robert Bateman and Bristol Foster, two longtime Canadian friends whose shared passion for nature and drive to see the world beyond North America led them on an 18-month odyssey across 50,000 miles and 19 countries in the late 1950s — and, later, fueled their careers as passionate stewards of the environment.
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She may be one of the most iconic faces of the 1960s, but chances are you don’t know all that much about Dame Lesley Lawson, aka Twiggy. Director Sadie Frost aims to correct that with Twiggy, an intimate behind-the-scenes documentary about the (in)famous model/actress/singer/daughter/girlfriend/wife/mother — who, it turns out, is awfully down-to-earth for someone who found worldwide fame so young.
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A tradition-loving Ghanaian fisherman who scoffs at the idea of electronic fish finders and turns up his nose at social media and smartphones learns that the modern world isn’t all bad in writer-director Zoey Martinson’s charming feature debut The Fisherman. And the fact that he does it with the help of a cheeky talking fish and a trio of energetic and aspiring young people makes his journey all the more whimsical.
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In a time when what it means to be a feminist seems to be as hotly contested as it ever has been, it’s illuminating to look back at the 1970s, when the “women’s lib” movement was hitting the mainstream. By telling the story of the magazine that strove to support and further that movement, Dear Ms.: A Revolution in Print reminds us of how much has changed since then…and how far we have to go. (AWFJ.org featured Dear Ms.: A Revolution in Print as our MOTW on July 2, 2025, we do so again to honor Ms. Magazine co-founders Gloria Steinem and Robin Morgan, recently deceased.)
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Based on the famous author’s 1919 novel, director Tina Gharavi’s Virginia Woolf’s Night & Day is an earnest feminist drama that centers on an intelligent young woman who’s chafing at the sexism and social limitations of life in 1910 Edwardian England. As she struggles to find a life path that’s not wholly controlled and defined by men, Katharine (Haley Bennett) must decide whether to prioritize intellectual or emotional fulfillment — unless there’s some way she can manage to have both.
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The consequences of misunderstandings and painful secrets become achingly clear in director/co-writer Tessa Blake’s family drama If I Tell You. Based on the book <em>Closed Doors by Lisa O’Donnell and old mostly through the eyes of 12-year-old Michael (Etienne Kellici) — who doesn’t realize why his usually happy household is on the verge of falling apart one otherwise idyllic Midwestern summer — it’s an earnest story about finding hope amid darkness.
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Watching Rory Kennedy’s pressing, powerful documentary Freefall: A Reckoning for Boeing — the follow-up to Kennedy’s equally compelling 2022 film Downfall: The Case Against Boeing — it’s impossible not to dwell on two thoughts: First, these days, the act of choosing to step foot on an American-built plane kind of feels like playing a game of Russian Roulette, and second, it’s appalling how blatantly this country continues to prioritize profits over people’s lives.
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Does the sight of a girl in a brown sash (or blue or green vest) immediately make you crave Thin Mints? If so, you’re definitely not alone. But chances are you haven’t spent too much time thinking about how those cookies got into the girl’s hands — or just how many boxes of them she has to sell if she wants to go to camp next summer. Alysa Nahmias aims to change that with her engaging documentary Cookie Queens.
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The captivating story of an escaped Eurasian eagle-owl named Flaco and the diverse city that embraced his flight to freedom is at the heart of director Penny Lane’s (Our Nixon, Nuts!) engaging documentary Wild Inside. Using Flaco and his adventures in Manhattan to anchor the film and give it structure, Lane spreads her own wings to thoughtfully explore a range of opinions and positions related to animal welfare and wellbeing.
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