Bitch & Butch

In 1977, a book of photographs captured an awakening - women shedding the cultural restrictions of their childhoods and embracing their full humanity. This documentary revisits those photos, those women and those times and takes aim at our culture today that alarmingly shows the need for continued change.

The life of Sara Winter - former Brazilian feminist and founder of FEMEN in Brazil - told by herself; since the troubled youth, through the years of prostitution and feminist militance, until the discovery of motherhood and God.

What images do we associate with abortion and why? Where do these images and the emotional scripts in our head come from? How do they influence women who (want to) have an abortion, how do they shape the general discussion? Franzis Kabisch’s personal desktop documentary investigates these questions with great precision, clarity and humour (yes, humour, too!).

A cheerful documentary about the daily life of a community of Franciscan sisters. “Hasta mañana, si Dios quiere” (See you tomorrow, God willing) is a film born from the desire to understand that mysterious feminine universe that gives up its life and leaves behind family, home, lovers, disobedience, and physical love.

At a crossroads of borders in the Balkans, Sabina Talović, a feminist activist, faces the violence of a patriarchal system with unwavering resolve. From the Yugoslav wars to the racism of new nationalisms, her voice bears witness to how acts of solidarity are always completely different while remaining fundamentally unchanged. A humbly caring and sharp debut film by Marianna Giorgia Marchesini.

This fascinating political look at a little-known chapter in women's history tells the story of "Jane", the Chicago-based women's health group who performed nearly 12,000 safe illegal abortions between 1969 and 1973 with no formal medical training. As Jane members describe finding feminism and clients describe finding Jane, archival footage and recreations mingle to depict how the repression of the early sixties and social movements of the late sixties influenced this unique group. Both vital knowledge and meditation on the process of empowerment, Jane: An Abortion Service showcases the importance of preserving women's knowledge in the face of revisionist history. JANE: AN ABORTION SERVICE was funded by the Independent Television Service (ITVS) with funds provided by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Some time after her death, film director Jill Craigie (1911- 99), re-opens an old suitcase, prompting memories of the extraordinary life and loves of this forceful, charismatic woman, whose work has been long neglected. Craigie was one of the first women to direct documentaries. Working outside the British Documentary Movement in the 1940s and early 1950s, her films such as To Be Woman (1951), on equal pay, and Out of Chaos (1944), the first film about artists at work, featuring Henry Moore and Paul Nash, tackled new subjects for the cinema through a unique blend of drama, polemic and humour. Independent Miss Craigie uses the director’s unseen papers, and her films, to reveal her energetic struggles to get her radical projects made and distributed, including her last one, on the Yugoslav conflict, made when she was 83, with her husband, former Labour leader, Michael Foot.

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An intimate study of one of the most influential and provocative thinkers of the 20th century tracking feminist icon Susan Sontag’s seminal, life-changing moments through archival materials, accounts from friends, family, colleagues, and lovers, as well as her own words, as read by Patricia Clarkson.

Exploring the concept of the Ecology of Emotions, this musical film portrays an inner journey through the secret garden of creativity put into frame by the nature of Iceland. Hidden Eden is a metaphor for our inner secret garden of creativity. This project bloomed during an art residency in Iceland, sparked by conversations around our shared philosophies on voice and emotional connection. The nature of Iceland inspired us to make the connection on how the landscape reflects the emotional states of creativity and how it helps manage the homeostasis of our inner emotional landscapes. This exchange between emotion and the landscape opens a space for healing. Creativity provides us with the tools to access a garden of our authentic being, nourishing and balancing us. Allowing ourselves to explore the spectrum of our emotions through the lens of our relationship with the Earth invites others to do the same. The creative process can affect our well being and is a key to human evolution.

For the last quarter century, Houston native Arden Eversmeyer journeyed across the country to record hundreds of oral "herstories" with a mostly invisible population that is rapidly disappearing. Old Lesbians honors Arden's legacy by animating the resilient, joyful voices she preserved in the Old Lesbian Oral Herstory Project, from first crush to first love, from the closet to coming out, and finally from loss to connection.

Seven women and one non binary person share their personal experiences with masturbation through short anecdotes and a revolutionary washing machine.

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Click for full movie details & trailers.

As a result of the Holocaust and later, AIDS, the male homosexual community has sustained bitter losses and, according to Praunheim, lesbian women have now placed themselves at the head of the so-called queer movement. The female protagonists in the film represent two different generations; they also incorporate the past and present status of homosexuals in society.

A film about what it means to be a woman cycling in different countries around the world. When Manon left to cycle from Brussels to Tokyo, she took a camera with her and met other women cyclists along the way. Hear their stories!

TOMBOY explores the obstacles that young girls encounter on the recreational stage, the stereotypes, language issues and cultural disparities that follow, and ultimately the insufficient media coverage and compensation that afflicts elite professional athletes seeking full recognition for their talents. The journey of the female athlete is often discouraging, and despite progress achieved during the Title IX era, gender equity in athletics has a long way to go.

In 2016, after the hate-fuelled murder of a woman in Gangnam, young feminists gathered to talk about their experiences, which led to the ‘tsunami’ of the feminist movement reawakening in Korean society. This tsunami included street protests against misogynistic hate crimes, political campaigning in the upcoming presidential elections, protests against sexism and sexual violence in everyday life, and the ‘black’ protests calling for the abolition of the anti-abortion law. The Fearless And Vulnerable focuses on the activities and members of the Feminist Party (known in Korean as “Femidangdang”), a feminist group that was part of this tsunami wave. The pleasure and sincerity with which they conduct their activities are compounded with their courage in the face of conflict, and the sense of fear that permeates the community. The film shows Femidangdang meetings as well as the daily lives and thoughts of members during their activities post-2016.

The film tells the story of the Rote Zora, a militant women’s group in the FRG, which in the 1970s and 1980s carried out actions against various facets of patriarchal power relations. Narrations by various contemporary witnesses, interviews with a historian and former Zoras bring the history of the Rote Zora and the women’s movement of the time back to life. The film shows that many of the Rote Zora’s themes are highly topical and offers exciting material for discussion on how to deal with this history today.

“Touch one, touch us all” is a slogan of the women who took over the streets in Brazil and organized themselves in social networks to face male chauvinist and conservatism. Through testimonies of women who have been subjected to violence, the documentary reveals that, despite legal achievements, the woman still remains vulnerable. Amongst other deponents are Maria da Penha, Joanna Maranhão, Luíza Brunet, and Clara Averbuck.