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52 Films by Women Vol 7. 2. A E I O U – A QUICK ALPHABET OF LOVE (Director: Nicolette Krebitz)

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  A frivolously enjoyable if slight ‘odd couple’ romantic comedy, German writer-director Nicolette Krebitz’s fourth feature, A E I O U – Das Schnelle Alphabet der Liebe ( A E I O U – A Quick Alphabet of Love ) wears its subversion lightly. Ageing widowed actress Anna (Sophie Rois) reluctantly agrees to offer a juvenile purse snatcher, Adrian (Milan Herms) speech therapy to help him with an upcoming theatrical performance. The young man becomes obsessed and leads Anna into a life of crime on the French Riviera, until the law catches up with them. Krebitz, primarily an actress with more than sixty credits, doesn’t have a particularly satirical eye. At a certain point, she – and we – forget that her protagonist is an actress with a keen awareness of clich é , including the relationship in which Anna finds herself. There is some enjoyment in seeing an older woman find pleasure with a younger man, but at no point is the source of Adrian’s delinquency dealt with. The film begins with...
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52 Films by Women Vol 7. 1. JOYRIDE (Director: Emer Reynolds)

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  The casting of Olivia Colman in Irish editor-turned-documentary-maker-turned-feature film director Emer Reynolds’ Joyride is both a blessing and a curse. Blessing because the Best Actress Academy Award winner gives the film a marquee value it otherwise would not have had – it is playing for a second week at my local multiplex, which for a low-budget Irish road movie is practically unheard. Curse because Colman is neither Irish nor the right age for the part she is playing. To accept the 48-year-old Colman as a new mother is a bit of a stretch. You just have to go with it.   However, there are scenes when her character Joy tries to breast feed – the film doesn’t shy away from nipples put to natural use – and you are acutely aware that a maternal stand-in was used. Showing female breasts in unheard of in Irish cinema. I sensed that Reynolds was making a political point. Breast feeding in public should not be outlawed, although a mother may prefer privacy. Prudes and conservat...
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52 Films by Women Vol 6. 52. ROBUST (Director: Constance Meyer)

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  Robust ( Robuste ) is the debut feature of French co-writer-director Constance Meyer, who had served as a third assistant director on Jonas Carpignano’s Mediterranea and directed a series of shorts of increasing acclaim, including Rhapsody (2016) and La Belle Affaire (2018). In the latter, she worked with G é rard Depardieu, one of France’s greatest screen actors, who in his prime could play any role and make it convincing, but who now resembles a shipwreck, damaged beyond repair, sunken in his own personal abyss. The joy of D é pardieu the actor – as opposed to the man who claimed Russian citizenship for tax purposes in 2013 and who has been accused of the sexual assault of a young actress in 2018, not to mention instances of drunk driving and urinating in a cabin that have marked the last decade or so – is that there is still an artist’s curiosity and a willingness to appear vulnerable on screen. We sense – or perhaps project – a desire for the actor to be reconciled within h...
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52 Films by Women Vol 6. 51. MOON, 66 QUESTIONS (Director: Jacqueline Lentzou)

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  At least two members of the audience leaving the screening of the Greek film, Moon, 66 Questions ( Selini, 66 erotiseis ) that I attended were puzzled. ‘Was he her uncle?’ one woman asked her friend, referring to the late middle-aged man, Paris (Lazaros Ge ô rgakopoulos) being cared for by a young woman, Artemis (Sofia Kokkali), who appeared to have had a falling out with him some years before. ‘He is definitely her father,’ I intervened. No young woman would give up her life to look after a man who wasn’t her direct blood relative. It is clear he has no one else. If he was Artemis’ uncle, I asked myself, where is Artemis’ father? There are a whole group of family members who drop in and out, in some instances to remonstrate with Artemis or to interview potential help or to just use the outdoor pool or play the recorder. Bless you, Victoria (Sofia Polychronou) for your performance. How cruel it must have been to hear your relatives trying to silence you. Watching Moon, 6...
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52 Films by Women Vol 6. 50. GOOD LUCK TO YOU, LEO GRANDE (Director: Sophie Hyde)

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  Good Luck to You, Leo Grande is about the pursuit of female pleasure. Pleasure without guilt, in which the transaction isn’t just financial. It is also about the danger of being a surrogate mother in the bedroom experienced by the protagonist, fifty-something widow, Nancy Stokes (Emma Thompson). Reconciled to never having an orgasm, Nancy wants to experience sex with a much younger man and hires a male prostitute, twenty-something Leo Grande (Daryl McCormack) to please here. Structured around a series of meetings in a luxury hotel in Norwich, the film ‘written and created’ by comedian Katy Brand and directed by Sophie Hyde, explores the tension between buttoned-down former Religious Education teacher Nancy and easy-on-the-eye fantasy plaything, Leo. The performances by Thompson and McCormack are terrific, but what catches the eye are the open curtains in the hotel room, allowing them to be seen from the outside. The curtains are only closed when – well, that would be telling. ...
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