Films Directed by Women

People and life can be cruel, and in their face, Fannette is cool: toward an old acquaintance, to her daughter, to colleagues. Beneath the surface, she roils with passion for a lost love, Philippe. She watches "An Affair to Remember" again and again, and when she receives a letter from Philippe asking her to meet him atop the Empire State Building, she swoons. She's writing a book on an aged painter, so she organizes a trip to New York ostensibly to secure photographs of some of his pieces. The publisher assigns her a photographer, Matt, on the surface spontaneous and flip, but also aggressive about his attraction to her. Will she be with the one she loves? Will she smile? Written by

A missed highway exit leads Darry Marzouki, an unemployed magician, to cross paths with Irène Montier Duval, a wealthy woman carrying a Hermès bag full of cash. Out of love, she acted as an intermediary in an arms deal between a French minister and Korea. When the deal was exposed, the minister tried to pin the blame on her. On the run, she offers to pay Darry to drive her to Geneva in his BMW. The problem? The BMW isn’t his—he impulsively stole it from his hot-tempered brother-in-law, who’s out for blood. Unable to accept Irène’s offer, Darry pretends to be an activist heading to a summit in Locarno. Irène, eager for a change, plays along. They have little in common but spend three unforgettable days together—while being chased by Koreans, French intelligence, a minister, and the furious brother-in-law. In the end, one finds love, the other freedom.

1996 film by Tonie Marshall

A private eye finds that her professional and personal lives are beginning to intertwine in this French drama. Maxime Chabrier (Anémone) is a woman in her mid-40s who works as a private detective. Despite her chain smoking and sloppy appearance, Maxime is regarded as a skilled investigator by her colleagues and considered the best PI at her agency by her boss. While Maxime has romantic dalliances with both men and women, she hasn't been involved in a long-term relationship since she left her husband 15 years ago. However, Maxime is hired to look into a case that suggests that her former husband has become involved with insurance fraud, which brings her into contact with her 17-year-old son Baptiste (Gregoire Colin) for the first time since the divorce. Just as Maxime is trying to mend fences with her son and find out what her ex has gotten himself into, she finds herself falling in love with Jacques (Michel Didym), an economist.

2003 film by Tonie Marshall

1989 film by Tonie Marshall

In a near-abandoned subdivision west of Houston, a wayward teen runs headlong into her equally willful and unforgiving neighbor, an aging bullfighter who's seen his best days in the arena; it's a collision that will change them both.

Evangelical Christians are calling out for a second sexual revolution: chastity. As a counter-movement of the attitudes and practices of today's culture, one in six girls in the US has vowed to remain 'unsoiled' until marriage. But the seven children of the Wilson family, founders of the Purity Ball, take this concept of purity of body and mind one step further; even their first kiss will be at the altar. For two years, the filmmakers follow the Wilson offspring as they prepare for their fairytale vision of romance and marriage and seek out their own prince and princess spouses. In the process, a broader theme emerges: how the religious right is grooming a young generation of virgins to embody an Evangelically-grounded Utopia in America.

I meet Herbert in the same week I get diagnosed with cancer. We fall madly in love and plan to stay together for the rest of our lives. Three months later, he is dead. Herbert was a BASE Jumper. Leaping off a cliff with nothing but a parachute, he loses his balance, slams into the rock face and falls to his death. His loss in the midst of my chemotherapy completely throws me. Why does he gamble his life away, while I fight for mine? Desperate for answers, I return to Lauterbrunnen, the scene of the accident where Andreas, his best friend and coach, introduces me to the world of BASE. The jumpers teach me not only about the sport, but about facing fears, harnessing and controlling them. To make the most of the life we get. In the Swiss Death Valley I slowly find my way back to life.

Can a single building impact the career of an architect, the image of a global company and even the skyline of a big city? Just a month and a day after the disastrous attack on the World Trade Center in New York, the first steel beam of a new tower is erected in London. One question is on everybody’s mind: is it the right decision to build a new iconic tower in the midst of London’s financial district, on a site that has already been bombed before? The 40-storey steel and glass tower sparks further controversy. Norman Foster, one of Britain’s most visionary architects, calls his design for the new Swiss Re London headquarters ‘radial – socially, technically, architecturally and spatially’. In fact, its size and shape are so radical that it is almost immediately nicknamed ‘the erotic gherkin’. Will the Gherkin become the landmark they all dream of?

Polo Hofer hat genug: Nach 18 Jahren enger Zusammenarbeit trennt er sich von seiner erfolgreichen Band. Die Mühle Hunziken ist nicht nur Schauplatz der letzten zehn Gigs von Polo und der Schmetterband, sondern auch Treffpunkt von Freunden, Fans, Familie, ehemaligen Mitstreitern und Konkurrenten.

2009 film by Mirjam von Arx

Jade is a young mother in the prime of her life when an acid attack leaves her severely burned. While her face has been reconstructed, her beauty is lost beneath the scars. Descending a self-destructive path with relationships crumbling, Jade must take drastic action to reclaim her life.

On an isolated island in Brittany at the end of the eighteenth century, a female painter is obliged to paint a wedding portrait of a young woman.

Bastu's grandchildren and friends help her pick up the strands of her life after her husband dies.

“While we are here” mixes fiction, travelogue, film diary and documentary to tell the story Lamis, a Lebanese woman who just moved to New York and Wilson, a Brazilian man living illegally for 10 years in the same city. The film narrates the story of their relationship in a personal way by articulating macro-political issues with intimate ones.

An experimental collective film lasting little more than an hour, compiled from 10 episodes by a total of 14 different young Brazilian filmmakers. The project was an initiative of the directing duo Felipe Bragança and Marina Meliande, who sent a ‘letter of concern’ to inspire the participants. In it, a 16-year-old girl wrote about her dreams, which have been translated by the directors into films about love, youth and the possibilities of cinema.

At his parsonage over the Tatra Mountains, Marian Kuffa readily takes care of more than 200 people in need. This unostentatious movie is not just a portrait of a remarkably selfless man but also a more general contemplation of the complicated lives of alcoholics, junkies, and all other social outcasts, as well as an elegant reflection on mercy and the forms that faith can take.

film directed by Jana Ševčíková