How fem­i­nist pro­gram­ming is forg­ing a pro­gres­sive future for women in cinema

Tra­di­tion­al­ly speak­ing, reper­to­ry cin­e­ma has posed seri­ous chal­lenges to inter­sec­tion­al fem­i­nist film pro­gram­mers. The obvi­ous issues stem from an accept­ed canon of white male film­mak­ers, mak­ing it hard to attract audi­ences to a less­er-known name. Fur­ther dif­fi­cul­ties arise from hav­ing to con­tex­tu­alise film choic­es to a mod­ern audi­ence, par­tic­u­lar­ly when they seem to chafe against con­tem­po­rary per­spec­tives on women’s roles. In addi­tion, the role of a fem­i­nist film pro­gram­mer involves find­ing, restor­ing and advo­cat­ing for obscure and ignored films which put women – espe­cial­ly women of colour – front and centre.

Cin­e­ma Redis­cov­ered, a reper­to­ry mini-fest based at Bristol’s Water­shed Cin­e­ma, is a case study in how fem­i­nist film pro­gram­ming can thrive in the con­text of a ret­ro­spec­tive­ly-focused fes­ti­val. Fea­tur­ing pro­gram­ming choic­es from a clutch of dif­fer­ent organ­i­sa­tions, includ­ing South­west Silents and var­i­ous BFI Film Hubs, there was no lack of silent films or Hol­ly­wood clas­sics on the dock­et at this year’s event.

But the weekend’s cura­tion also fea­tured strong input from Madeleine Prob­st, Pro­gramme Pro­duc­er at Water­shed, and Tara Judah, team mem­ber at the cin­e­ma as well as the Direc­tor at 20^th Cen­tu­ry Flicks. Their selec­tions includ­ed a beau­ti­ful 4K restora­tion of Julie Dash’s Daugh­ters of the Dust, and a fol­low-up of sorts in the form of Lizzie Borden’s sem­i­nal pseu­do-doc sci-fi Born in Flames.

For the view­er, that dou­ble-bill was as the­mat­i­cal­ly and visu­al­ly dis­parate as one could imag­ine. Daugh­ters of the Dust, a dense, poet­ic exam­i­na­tion of the inter-gen­er­a­tional ten­sions of turn-of-the-cen­tu­ry Gul­lah women. It was unavail­able for years after its 1991 release. Set dur­ing a peri­od where slav­ery was with­in the realm of lived mem­o­ry, the film’s focus on the descen­dants of slaves made for a strik­ing choice in the con­text of this Bris­tol-based fes­ti­val. Bris­tol itself was a noto­ri­ous hub for the transat­lantic slave trade, with many of its long-stand­ing build­ings fund­ed by and named after those who traf­ficked human flesh. Not only does this lend an added poten­cy to the film – which touch­es on the mass slave sui­cide at Igbo Land­ing – but the choice offers its own lit­tle kick­back at a city that still leans on its che­quered past.

The pro­gram­mers also invit­ed a group of tal­ent­ed female film pro­fes­sion­als and thinkers along to dis­cuss the films, host­ing pan­els and Q+A ses­sions after both screen­ings. These were led by pro­gram­mer Tara Judah, as well as crit­ic and activist Sophie May­er, cura­tor Karen Alexan­der, and pro­gram­mer Muf­fin Hix. Born in Flames is an in-your-face take­down of bougie white left­ism and fem­i­nism, but it’s also intel­li­gent­ly nuanced. Direc­tor Bor­den takes care to show how the fem­i­nist con­scious­ness of priv­i­leged white women is only shak­en after a black woman is mur­dered in police custody.

Daugh­ters of the Dust was co-pre­sent­ed by Bris­tol-based black cul­tur­al col­lec­tive Come the Rev­o­lu­tion, rep­re­sent­ed onstage by Liz Chege. But they weren’t the only inde­pen­dent film club to be found in Cin­e­ma Rediscovered’s line-up. An evening screen­ing was pre­sent­ed by film club The Final Girls, who focus on inter­ro­gat­ing women’s roles in hor­ror. They screened The Enti­ty, a har­row­ing super­nat­ur­al thriller from 1982 based on a mys­te­ri­ous real-life case. A sin­gle moth­er claimed a pol­ter­geist of some kind had been sex­u­al­ly assault­ing her in her home, with mul­ti­ple cor­rob­o­ra­tions from peo­ple she knew.

It’s far from an easy watch. It plays loose and fast with metaphor­i­cal ideas about rape cul­ture, male blame, and the way that men feel com­pelled to ratio­nalise about rape while cast­ing judge­ment on vic­tims. The twitchy, dag­ger-sharp elec­tron­ic score makes pro­ceed­ings even more ter­ri­fy­ing. The Final Girls made a point of stat­ing how The Enti­ty was deemed misog­y­nis­tic upon its release, and asked the audi­ence to recon­sid­er this as we watched.

The Final Girls are fol­low­ing on from oth­er inde­pen­dent fem­i­nist film clubs, like Club des Femmes and I am Dora. Many have had sig­nif­i­cant part to play in the increas­ing inter­est around for­got­ten female-led films. Not behold­en to the same bureau­cra­cies as brick-and-mor­tar estab­lish­ments, they’ve led the way in fur­ther­ing the cause for films like Girl­friends, rein­tro­duced to a UK audi­ence by I am Dora. Mean­while, Bechdel Test Fest​’s wide vari­ety of screen­ings have includ­ed sev­er­al films of the ​’90s and ear­ly 2000s. From Cheryl Dunne’s 1996 film The Water­mel­on Woman to Gina Prince-Blythwood’s Love & Bas­ket­ball from 2000, BTF con­tin­ues to chose films that high­light the roman­tic expe­ri­ences of black women of var­i­ous orientations.

To forge a pro­gres­sive future for women in cin­e­ma, one must see how they have been por­trayed – and over­looked – in the past. With its squad of inci­sive women cura­tors, Cin­e­ma Redis­cov­ered offers a real attempt at this. At the post-screen­ing Q&A for Born in Flames, pan­el­list Sophie May­er remarked of the film: ​“It kind of gives you an activist infec­tion.” This state­ment can be applied more wide­ly to the films select­ed at Cin­e­ma Redis­cov­ered. Think­ing about the chain of com­mand in bud­get­ing a small fes­ti­val such as this, it’s encour­ag­ing that so many women are now posi­tioned as gate­keep­ers at local film hubs and beyond.

See­ing these three empow­er­ing films grouped togeth­er had a cer­tain cumu­la­tive effect. As a view­ing expe­ri­ence it was as artis­ti­cal­ly sat­is­fy­ing as it was polit­i­cal­ly invig­o­rat­ing. When big­ger cin­e­mas and film fes­ti­vals begin to bor­row some of the spir­it of lo-fi, dar­ing film clubs – host­ing strands of rad­i­cal fem­i­nist cin­e­ma and lead­ing with films by and about women – it will be a wel­come sight indeed.

For more about Cin­e­ma Redis­cov­ered vis­it water​shed​.co​.uk