Inspiring Women in Film Recommendations
Contemporary discussion surrounding fair representation of women in film and the need to see an increase in the number of female directors, has come one century too late. However, it is fair to say we have seen a larger number of films produced in recent years, with strong female leads and casts. Here are some of our recommendations, some recent, some classics:
Brave (PG): Determined to make her own path in life, Princess Merida defies a custom that brings chaos to her kingdom. Granted one wish, Merida must rely on her bravery and her archery skills to undo a beastly curse.
Whale Rider (PG): A contemporary story of love, rejection and triumph as a young Maori girl fights to fulfill a destiny her grandfather refuses to recognize.
Queen of Katwe (PG): A Ugandan girl sees her world rapidly change after being introduced to the game of chess.
Arrival (12A): In America, expert linguist Louise Banks (Adams) is called in by the military, who have of course surrounded and isolated this alien object, and is ordered to attempt to communicate with the arrivals.
On the Basis of Sex (12A): A 2018 American biographical legal drama film based on the life and early cases of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Persepolis (12A): A French cartoon co-written and directed by Marjane Satrapi, based on her set of four acclaimed graphic novellas about her upbringing in Iran, before she moved to Paris.
Gravity (12A): Two astronauts work together to survive after an accident leaves them stranded in space.
Million Dollar Baby (12A): The film follows an underappreciated boxing trainer, the mistakes that haunt him from his past, and his quest for atonement by helping an underdog amateur boxer achieve her dream of becoming a professional.
The Hunger Games Trilogy (12A)
The Help (12A): The film and novel recount the story of young white woman and aspiring journalist Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan. The story focuses on her relationship with two black maids, Aibileen Clark and Minny Jackson, during the Civil Rights Movement in 1963 Jackson, Mississippi.
Still Alice (12A): The film stars Julianne Moore as Alice Howland, a linguistics professor diagnosed with familial Alzheimer's disease shortly after her 50th birthday. Alec Baldwin plays her husband, John, and Kristen Stewart, Kate Bosworth and Hunter Parrish play her children, Lydia, Anna and Tom.
Battle of the Sexes (12A): In 1973, the world witnesses one of the greatest tennis matches when the renowned player Billie Jean King competes with the former champion Bobby Riggs, while they deal with personal issues.
Suffragette (12A): In 1912 London, a young working mother is galvanized into radical political activism supporting the right for women to vote, and is willing to meet violence with violence to achieve this end.
Agora (12): A historical drama set in Roman Egypt, concerning a slave who turns to the rising tide of Christianity in the hope of pursuing freedom while falling in love with his mistress, the philosophy and mathematics professor Hypatia of Alexandria.
Bend it like Beckham (12)
10 Things I Hate About You (12)
Victoria (12): The early life of Queen Victoria, from her ascension to the throne at the tender age of 18 to her courtship and marriage to Prince Albert.
Wild (15): A chronicle of one woman's one thousand one hundred mile solo hike undertaken as a way to recover from a recent personal tragedy.
The Color Purple (15): A black Southern woman struggles to find her identity after suffering abuse from her father and others over four decades.
Mustang (15): When five orphan girls are seen innocently playing with boys on a beach, their scandalized conservative guardians confine them while forced marriages are arranged.
Late Night (15): A late night talk show host suspects that she may soon lose her long-running show.
In A World… (15): An underachieving voice coach finds herself competing in the movie trailer voice-over profession against her arrogant father and his protégé.
Erin Brockovich (15): An unemployed single mother becomes a legal assistant and almost single-handedly brings down a California power company accused of polluting a city's water supply.
Mary Queen of Scots (15): Mary Stuart's attempt to overthrow her cousin Elizabeth I, Queen of England, finds her condemned to years of imprisonment before facing execution.
Elizabeth (15): The early years of the reign of Elizabeth I of England and her difficult task of learning what is necessary to be a monarch.
A Private War (15): One of the most celebrated war correspondents of our time, Marie Colvin is an utterly fearless and rebellious spirit, driven to the frontline of conflicts across the globe to give voice to the voiceless.
The Wife (15): A wife questions her life choices as she travels to Stockholm to see her husband receive the Nobel Prize for Literature.
Can You Ever Forgive Me? (15): When Lee Israel falls out of step with current tastes, she turns her art form to deception
A Royal Affair (15): A young queen, who is married to an insane king, falls secretly in love with her physician - and together they start a revolution that changes a nation forever.
Frances Ha (15): A New York woman (who doesn't really have an apartment) apprentices for a dance company (though she's not really a dancer) and throws herself headlong into her dreams, even as the possibility of realising them dwindles.
Sicario (15): An idealistic FBI agent is enlisted by a government task force to aid in the escalating war against drugs at the border area between the U.S. and Mexico.
Judy (12A): Legendary performer Judy Garland arrives in London in the winter of 1968 to perform a series of sold-out concerts.
Wonder Woman: Bloodlines – 22nd October 2019: Wonder Woman tries to help a troubled young girl, Vanessa, who has fallen in with a deadly organisation known as Villainy Inc. headed by Dr. Cyber.
The Aeronauts (PG) – 6th November 2019: Pilot Amelia Wren (Felicity Jones) and scientist James Glaisher (Eddie Redmayne) find themselves in an epic fight for survival while attempting to make discoveries in a gas balloon.
