Movie Magazine International Blog

Born in Flames (1983) © Lizzie Borden Lizzie Borden was guest of honor at the 45th Créteil Films de Femmes festival held March 24 to April 2. Her work was enthusiastically received by a new generation of cinéastes with seminars on her trilogy of films: Regrouping (1976), Born in Flames (1983) and Working Girls (1986). Born in Flames ’ relevance today is illustrated by its intersectionality of race, gender and class that debunks the myth that feminism was a 'white women's movement'. Featuring Kathryn Bigelow as a member of a youth socialist feminist journal, the setting is 10 years after the Socialist Revolution in the US. Borden took seven years to make the film and acquire funding. The brilliant editing of Born in Flames resembles the 'choreographic' editing of Borden’s first film, the documentary Regrouping made in 1976 on four artists in a women’s group. During the course of the film project, Borden introduced other women into the original group and created ...

Blue Jean is set in 1988 after Margaret Thatcher’s conservative government has introduced Section 28, a clause of the Local Government Act which seeks to prohibit “the promotion of homosexuality” by local authorities across the United Kingdom. The clause is directed towards the 'pretend' relationships of lesbians and gay men. Jean is a a high school gym teacher who must keep her life as a lesbian secret at work and cannot risk being open about her relationship with Viv (Kerrie Hayes)   even to her family. The film style by director/writer Georgia Oakley has the look and feel of a film from the 80's. Shot in 16mm the cinematography spotlights run down housing and establishments and an atmosphere that reeks of the butchery of human rights.  Oakley creates an authentic environment at the high school where Jean works. The script written by Oakley is directed towards internalised homophobia of the characters. The enrolment of a new student Lois (Lucy Halliday) who begin...

Mary Harron was a special guest at the San Francisco International Film Festival in April.I had the opportunity to interview her from Sweden after returning from the Créteil International Women's Film Festival in March 24 – April 2. Harron is probably one of the best female auteur filmmakers who writes and directs her own films. She has a very eclectic body of work and her latest film is Daliland about the Spanish filmmaker and surrealist artist Salvador Dalí.  His signature in popular culture is his extravagant looking moustache turned up at the ends held in place with hair oil.  Dalíland takes place when Dalí is 70 years old with flashbacks to his younger years with his muse and Russian wife Gala and the mature Gala is played by the magnificent Barbara Sukowa. Dalí is a curiosity for young people, but he does not impress the film critics of his time when he was in his 70s. He is shown milling around at celebrity parties in the art world where people show up to be ...