Justine Smith

Film

Why Have There Been No Great Women Cinematographers (According to Hollywood)?

As the Cinémathèque Québécoise pays homage to some of the notable women who have stepped behind the camera and “painted with light,” critic Justine Smith considers why their work is often underrecognized.

Film

Erotic Imagination and Sensual Realities Meet in the Films of Jane Campion

In an era where women still represent the minority of filmmakers and sex on the big screen has continued to diminish, Campion’s films — most of which are now streaming online — explore new depths of desire.

Film

The Crowded, Lonely World of Live Streaming

A wave of documentaries from China, including Present.Perfect and People's Republic of Desire, follow the lives of popular streamers.

Interview

Deconstructing Colonial Cinema with Ethnographic Fiction

Experimental filmmaker Laura Huertas Millán talks to Hyperallergic about challenging the standard modes of exoticism, ethnography, and anthropology.

Film

Bombshell Misses the Mark in Contextualizing #MeToo

While it touches on the toxic masculinity and systematic sexism that permeates Fox News, the film does little to contextualize the industry that allowed this behavior to thrive.

Film

Portrait of a Lady on Fire, a Queer Homage to the Labor of Women Artists

More than being one of the greatest lesbian romances, Céline Sciamma’s latest is a beautiful film about artistic labor and the social contexts that uplift some artists above others.

Interview

"Not Knowing Where You're Going": How Claire Atherton Edits Movies

The veteran film editor speaks to Hyperallergic about her love of organization and her collaborations with Chantal Akerman.

Books

A Former Cam Model Reveals How Desire Can Be Both Liberating and Confining

In her new memoir Camgirl, screenwriter Isa Mazzei joins the long tradition of women who use the personal to explore and deconstruct sex and culture.

Film

"It's All Downhill from Here": Noah Baumbach's Marriage Story

With his latest film, the director pays tribute to Ingmar Bergman's epic Scenes from a Marriage, revealing the disconnect between the public face of marriage and the reality of joined private lives.

Film

The Filmmaking Collective That Let Women Talk Over Men

The documentary Delphine et Carole: Insoumuses looks at Les Insoumuses, the '70s group founded by director Carole Roussopoulos, iconic actress Delphine Seyrig, and Simone de Beauvoir.

Film

The Ethics of Depicting Sexual Assault in Film

The 1979 Quebecois documentary Mourir à tue-tête (“A Scream from Silence”) is a valuable but too overlooked feminist film.

Film

Women Directors Take Risks in New Genre Shorts

The latest edition of the Fantasia International Film Festival continued its trend of elevating female filmmakers.