Melissa Silverstein has put together a list of films directed by women to counteract the BFI’s top 50 best of all time. It’s a man’s man world, baby. Only real men link to her piece, as Roger Ebert did on Twitter. The others? Nada. Zip. No one is covering this story except the few shriekers out there who remain unafraid. You see, griping about racism and sexism comes at a price. You aren’t as cool as the peeps who prefer to blend in. I know this because I was once someone who wanted to blend in. Now, I still hang with the boys on Twitter and Hollywood-Elsewhere, and still gripe about inequality just for the plain fuck of it. As Stephen King once wrote, “sometimes being a bitch is all a woman has to hold onto.”
Here is the list compiled by Silverstein and others who do give a damn. If you had to pick ten, which ones would you choose? I have bolded my favorites (but I haven’t seen all of them).
Chantal Ackerman- Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles
Allison Anders – Gas, Food, Lodging
Gillian Armstrong – My Brilliant Career
Gillian Armstrong – High Tide
Andrea Arnold- Fish Tank
Dorothy Arzner – Dance, Girl, Dance
Susanne Bier – After the Wedding
Kathryn Bigelow- The Hurt Locker
Antonia Bird – Priest
Catherine Breillat – Fat Girl
Jane Campion- The Piano
Jane Campion- Sweetie
Nike Caro- Whale Rider
Lisa Cholodenko – The Kids Are All Right
Sofia Coppola – Lost in Translation
Claire Denis – 35 Shots of Rum
Marleen Gorris – Antonia’s Line
Debra Granik- Winter’s Bone
Randa Haines – Children of a Lesser God
Mary Harron – American Psycho
Amy Heckerling – Clueless
Amy Heckerling – Fast Times at Ridgemont High
Agnieszka Holland – Europa, Europa
Nicole Holofcener – Walking and Talking
Courtney Hunt – Frozen River
Annamarie Jacir – Salt of the Sea
Patty Jenkins – Monster
Miranda July – Me and You an Everyone We Know
Kasi Lemmons- Eve’s Bayou
Barbara Loden – Wanda
Ida Lupino – The Trouble with Angels
Lucretia Martel – The Holy Girl
Elaine May – The Heartbreak Kid
Deepa Mehta – Water
Mira Nair- Monsoon Wedding
Kimberly Peirce- Boys Don’t Cry
Sarah Polley – Away From Her
Sally Potter – Orlando
Lynne Ramsay – We Need to Talk About Kevin
Kelly Reichardt- Meek’s Cutoff
Celine Sciamma – Tomboy
Joan Micklin Silver – Hester Street
Barbra Streisand – Yentl
Julie Taymor – Frida
Agnes Varda – Cleo from 5 to 7
Agnes Varda – Vagabond
Lina Wertmuller – Seven Beauties
Lina Wertmuller- Swept Away
It crushes me that we still live in a time when most of the celebrated films are all by men. White men, usually. At least in the world of lit there is Jane Austen and Flannery O’Connor, and Harper Lee continually shaking things up. And Emily Dickinson trounces every other male poet who ever lived, in my opinion. But the snooty film crowd seems to be mostly made up of males. When did this happen? How did this happen? Why does it continue? Is it because women make “women’s movies” and don’t make universal enough films? We all know what “universal” means, don’t we? Films about African Americans are “black films,” films about women are “women’s films.” Books about women are “chick lit.” It’s 2012 and this shit STILL goes on. Kim Kardashian isn’t helping matters.
But there’s hope on the horizon – with writers like Melissa Silverstein, Thelma Adams, Alyssa Rosenberg on the case maybe we can start to turn this ship around.
