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TagFemale Focused

Posted Documentaries

Morgana

It’s never too late to follow your dreams. This message comes across loud and clear in the new documentary Morgana. Directors Isabel Peppard and Josie Hess follow Morgana Muses, an Australian kink performer and free spirit, over five years as she navigates through a new phase in her life. Morgana had always craved intimacy, touch, warmth and connection. She suppressed her sexual desires when it was imposed upon her to play the part of model daughter and wife. Morgana did everything she was supposed to do. She got married, had children and played the part. But then came a mid-life crisis. Morgana broke free from her unhappy marriage and decided it was time to live life on her terms. The 50-something has been on a journey ever since, finding the connection she so desperately craved and using her new found sexual freedom to express her creativity. The film follows Morgana as she poses for styled photoshoots, directs pornographic movies and connects with others in the kink community and beyond.

Morgana is a sex-positive documentary that will inspire viewers to break out of their emotional prisons and explore new possibilities. It also coaxes the viewers to contemplate sexual expression as something not only relegated to the young and thin. Morgana wears her voluptuous frame and her age beautifully, despite her nagging self-loathing, and we would do well to learn to appreciate something outside of societal beauty standards.

Morgana is currently screening as part of the San Francisco Indie Fest 2021 through February 21st.

Posted Female Filmmakers

Sundance: Pleasure

The idea of making money from pleasure is an intoxicating one. Bella Cherry (Sofia Kappel), has traveled from her home in Sweden to Los Angeles, to do just that. She aspires to break into the lucrative porn industry. Newcomers are embraced quickly with their first porn shoot which is packaged and sold as an enticing first experience video. But once that cherry has been popped, it’s more difficult to climb the ranks. Bella has the looks, the body but soon discovers that’s not enough. She’s timid, awkward and reluctant to do more advanced techniques. But she’s also got drive. She wants he top talent agent, the lucrative shoots, the best hair and makeup and the chance to climb to the top. Along the way she discovers how abusive her work really is and in order to make it she needs to not only take that abuse but to give it as well.

Directed by Ninja Thyberg, Pleasure is an expansion of her short film by the same name, Pleasure (2013), which premiered at Cannes and also screened at the Sundance Film Festival. Every industry is toxic in one way or another but the porn industry has a cycle of abuse that can be particularly damaging. Thyberg adeptly explores this in her film and casts a critical eye on how the industry treats young women. Kappel offers the viewer a sense of unease that fits with her character.

Pleasure is rooted in realism. There is plenty of nudity and borderline pornographic scenes. Many of the actors are actually porn stars and real porn genres and brand names are used throughout.

I recommend Rashida Jones’ Hot Girls Wanted, a breakout documentary that premiered at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival and is available to watch on Netflix. Pleasure is almost like a fictionalized version of Jones’ film.

Pleasure premiered at the virtual 2021 Sundance Film Festival as part of their World Cinema Dramatic Competition.

Posted Female Filmmakers

Fantasia Festival: Diabla

When 17-year-old Nayeli (Ruth Ramos) is raped by the neighborhood gringo Rayan (Cesar Mijangos), she seeks help from her brother Uri (Daniel Fuentes Lobo). Uri sides with his friend rather than his sister calling her a whore. Spurned by her brother, she visits the local coven of witches to enact her revenge. Not only is Rayan about to pay the price for his violent act against Nayeli but Uri will have to watch it all go down.

Directed by  Ashley George and set in present day Mexico, Diabla packs a punch in a mere 17 minutes and will linger in your mind long after the film is over.  For female viewers especially, Diabla will serve as a visual representation of all of the revenge fantasies that we have for the men in our lives who have hurt us in one form or another. In this way, Diabla is highly gratifying even when it shocks and disturbs.

Ashley George’s impressive short horror film speaks directly to women who have been hurt physically and emotionally by men.

Diabla is part of the virtual 2020 Fantasia Film Festival.

Posted 1 Comment on Fantasia Festival: Don’t Text Back! Female Filmmakers

Fantasia Festival: Don’t Text Back!

Directed by Mariel Sharp and Kaye Adelaide, Don’t Text Back! is a highly satisfying queer horror-comedy short film about toxic masculinity and the literal horrors of dating.

Kelly (Danielle LaPointe) is a 30-something woman who is seeking the help of an energy healer Jaren (Nancy Webb). She’s in dire straits as the necklace she wears is strangling her and cannot be removed. It tightens every time the guy she’s seeing texts her and only lets up when she texts him back. Jaren helps Kelly uncover that her heteronormative relationship with a men’s right group activist is toxic on many levels. But Kelly needs to discover something about herself first before she can be free.

Gratifying and funny, Don’t Text Back! is a must see for any woman who has felt the effects of toxic masculinity… so pretty much everyone. And I definitely want to see much much more from this filmmaking duo!

Don’t Text Back! had its Canadian premiere at the virtual 2020 Fantasia Film Festival.

Posted Female Filmmakers

CRSHD

“You make things hard for yourself, don’t you?”

Izzy Alden (Isabelle Barbier) needs to get laid. She promised herself that she’d lose her virginity by the end of her freshman year in college. And with finals just around the corner, she’s running out of time. The problem with Izzy is that she’s hopelessly awkward. She doesn’t have the same natural confidence and social intelligence that her two best friends Fiona (Sadie Scott) and Anuka (Deeksha Ketkar) do. Fiona works at the local bowling alley and is lusting after the popular lesbian on campus. Anuka is Izzy’s closest ally but is dealing with her own drama of her complicated feelings for her long-distance boyfriend Juju (Dylan Rogers) and the hot blonde guy she spotted in the cafeteria. Izzy is determined to get an invite to a Crush party, where only people who are submitted as a crush can attend. But Izzy keeps sabotaging herself by putting her friendships at risk and ignoring the one guy, Oliver (Raph Fineberg), who is genuinely interested in her.

CRSHD is a quirky and authentic coming-of-age story that speaks directly to social media savvy youth. Director Emily Cohn wrote the script at age 21, produced it at 22 and wrapped up post-production by 24. She incorporates social media, texting and dating app technology into her film by having the characters act out the communications on screen. Having a young cast and crew working on the film makes the end result more relevant to its intended audience. Cohn and her team have assembled a fine cast of players. Barbier, Ketkar and Scott have natural chemistry with each other. Viewers will feel like they’re watching three friends rather than watching three actors playing friends.

“As a filmmaker, I’ve been interested in finding ways to make a computer or tablet or phone act not only as a prop, but also as a scene partner, since these devices often carry the weight of human emotion but lack the cinematic nuance to convey it.”

Director Emily Cohn

The cast is diverse with different races, ethnicities and sexual orientations represented. There has been a lot of discussion about diversity in film and TV as being forced to meet certain criteria. I appreciate films like CRSHD that demonstrate that this is a natural way of things. It also deconstructs beauty standards and highlights how beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder and should not to be mandated by some artificial cultural norms.

CRSHD is available via virtual cinemas May 8th. Visit the official website for more information.

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