Wednesday was International Women’s Day. There is no movie-related cause I care more about than promoting women directors, as evidenced by pieces like this one. As it was IWD, I went all out this year, watching 4 movies directed by women. I’m going to add to those another 3, so here are 7 great films directed by women that you should check out if you haven’t. They’re sorted from oldest to newest.
The Murder of Mr. Devil, Ester Krumbachová, 1970
I didn’t know the name Ester Krumbachová until just this month when the Criterion Channel is featuring her work. This is her only directorial effort, but you probably already know her even if you don’t know the name as worked on scenic design, costumes, and story for such Czech New Wave classics as Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (1970) and Daisies (1966). If I had to guess why she only directed one film, I would say it was probably a matter of timing as the CNW is tapering off by the early 1970s.
Still, the one film Krumbachová did make is well worth your time. The plot concerns a woman probably in her late 30s, attractive but unmarried and mostly okay with that. Sometimes, though, she does get lonely and so when an old school friend comes through, she entertains him a bit. He proceeds to eat her house and home, literally, consuming the contents of her refrigerator, chomping down some broken glass, gnawing off her chair legs, you know the type. It’s like if the end of Daisies wasn’t about sticking it to the greedy elites but was more predatory. It reminded me of the Bible story in Judges 4 where the woman Jael murders Sisera with a tent peg (it’s a great and bizarre story).
The film I thought of most while watching it is Polanski’s Repulsion (1965) as you have a woman in an apartment sort of tormented by a man. But whereas that film leans into German expressionist horror elements, this one leans into the surreal with jarring cutaways to other scenes, bright colors, and a very strange ending. It’s the strange alchemy that makes the Czech New Wave so vibrant on full display. If you like Daisies, or if you like Repulsion but would like to stop supporting the work of Roman Polanski, it’s a must-watch.
Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Amy Heckerling, 1982
This is a fairly famous film, but I think that fame sometimes omits the fact that it was directed by a woman (the same woman who made the 90s classic Clueless later on). I first saw it in college and approached it as a “dumb teen comedy.” And it was fine. But then I heard that Heckerling directed it, so I revisited it, and it “clicked” a lot more for me and became a favorite.
It’s an ensemble film that centers a bit more on Stacy (Jennifer Jason Leigh) than on the other characters. It’s rather simply about high school in the 80s, but the film does a remarkable job highlighting the struggle that accompanies the “fast times.” These kids have to work, and a lot of the film is centered on how labor keeps them from being kids. They also have adult problems like a notable unwanted pregnancy. It is a fun teen comedy movie, but it’s also a film with a lot to say about a specific cultural moment and all the good and bad that came from it. The very definition of an essential 80s movie.
Crossing Delancey, Joan Micklin Silver, 1988
Sandwiched between Moonstruck a year earlier and When Harry Met Sally a year later, this delightful rom-com feels like a combination of the two. We follow Izzy (Amy Irving) as she goes about her reasonably happy and settled life dabbling in romance and eventually falling for this pickle seller. It’s a sweet and uncomplicated movie with a lot of charm and winning performances. I’d also recommend checking out the director’s other films, especially Chilly Scenes of Winter (1979) which was an absolute delight. Joan Micklin Silver is truly a name to know of the American indie world of the late 70s and 80s.
A League of Their Own, Penny Marshall, 1992
This is a pretty famous movie, but one I hadn’t seen until now, so IWD seemed the perfect day to watch it. And it was. The movie understands that in the quest for equity in film, sports, or anything else, the opponent is the system, not the other team. If you watch women’s college basketball, you know that this sense of comradery across teams is a powerful thing. Yes, they want to win the game, but this doesn’t boil over into tension between the teams (usually).
But this is also a great baseball movie, and there aren’t a lot of them. Baseball is an amazing sport and a very weird sport. A lot of the time almost nothing happens, and so much of the appeal is in tracking the managers and lineup changes, and all the other subtle little stuff like ballpark specifics, pitching rotations, and so on. A friend of mine once described baseball as a mood more than a specific event, and I think that’s a great description. And A League of Their Own balances the sports content with the baseball-as-mood content with lots of stuff pushing for gender equality in sports. This is still a huge issue today, probably even more pressing than in the 90s as women’s sports leagues, like the WNBA, have shown more viability in the market. That makes this movie as relevant as ever. With a change-filled baseball season, it’s the perfect time to watch or revisit this one.
Ratcatcher, Lynne Ramsay, 1999
Ramsay has garnered some attention with later works like We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011) and You Were Never Really Here (2017). These are excellent films, as is Morvern Callar (2002), but to my mind, she peaked (so far) with her debut film Ratcatcher. It concerns a young boy in Scotland at the time of an early 80s garbage strike. There’s very little plot, as the boy goes about his neighborhood interacting with people and things. What I find so powerful about the film is that despite it being very dirty, grimy, and filled with decay, Ramsay imbues the film with transcendence and a sense of poetry. For example, in one scene the boy’s friend has a pet rat. The rat is confiscated by some bullies and passed around before it’s tied to a balloon and sent floating off into space. Sure, on one level the scene reflects several themes of the movie—rats/creatures, fate, impending death—but more than that, it’s a brilliant moment of poetry, powerful in a way you can’t fully explain. That’s how I feel about this movie, one I’ve been recommending constantly for the past year.
The Virgin Suicides, Sofia Coppola, 1999
I love Sofia Coppola, and I think this is her best film. What I love best about this film is how it does all the things I like about stylish 90s movies (like Pulp Fiction (1994)) without all the things I don’t like Tarantino and others. The soundtrack is amazing, as is the lush visual language, which basically functions as another character. One could critique the film for centering on the male perspective, but I don’t think Coppola lets us off that easily. Though it is narrated by a boy, the focus is still on the girls. Specifically, the focus is on the world of girls and how limiting it is. The front gate of their house—where one of them dies—makes the house quite literally a prison. Numerous references to the family’s Catholicism function similarly. It is a tragic tale, and admittedly a bit unrealistic, but it resonates with a powerful message about how society traps girls as “virgins” offering them little escape.
If you like it, then check out basically all other Coppola films too. Lost in Translation (2003) is a famous one but also among my least favorites. I prefer slightly less-known titles Marie Antoinette (2006), Somewhere (2010), and the AppleTV+ film On the Rocks (2020).
Love and Basketball, Gina Prince-Blythewood, 2000
This is a movie about, well, Love and Basketball, the debut feature of GPB who went on to make recent great films like The Old Guard (2020) and The Woman King (2022), both currently on Netflix. This movie concerns the relationship of childhood friends as they grow together and apart over the course of a couple of decades. This part is well-executed and compelling enough, but what really makes the movie is the way this love story relates to basketball.
Because their relationship with basketball also changes, from a high school passion to a potential career to a lost dream. In doing so, it really interrogates what role sports play in our lives as a means of connecting us and facilitating our aspirations. The film also has a lot to say about masculinity and femininity specifically as it functions in a Black context. It’s a love story and a passionate one at that, but it’s not just that. It’s kind of a sports movie, but it’s much more than that, too. It’s a movie about the ebbs and flows of human experience and how our dreams and aspirations shape our relationships and passions. It’s really really good, and currently on HBO Max in the US.
This is a very partial list. There were at least two dozen pretty good women-directed films just last year, with what will surely be another two dozen or more this year (I have my eye on Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret and Barbie in particular). These films, and countless others, open up new ways of experiencing film and new stories to tell. They will radically change the way you approach film in general, and that is a great thing.
