Film Categories: Work about Women

  • Women Are Not Little Men

    Contemporary and archival images are contrasted against the text of a 1950’s industrial safety and training manual, exposing and critiquing the widespread belief in the existence of a weaker sex.

  • Light in Our Lizard Bellies, The

    Through choreography and performance by Susanna Hood, and editing and effects in exposure caused by hand-processing, “The Light in Our Lizard Bellies” reflects the intensities that discombobulate us as we go through change and face parts of ourselves previously denied or unknown. “A beautiful capturing of the triumph of the human spirit.” – Barbara Goslawski (Toronto film critic) “I have never seen a dance film work so magically. It is cinematic instead of just choreographic. The hand processing is rich, pushing the film past time. The texture and contrast do that poetic thing of transporting you. Transcendent.” – James Herbert…

  • Struck While the Iron Was Hot

    This documentary film offers a glimpse into the life of an ordinary housewife, the filmmaker’s grandmother, Sally Strauss, who 40 years ago was suddenly catapulted into a media hero by tripping a runaway bank robber. The film laces elements of another era, the sights and sounds of a tight Jewish community and the naiveté of good intent. A woman who reacts instinctually to the “just” way ultimately discovers that her heroic act unexpectedly creates an overwhelming tension in the family.

  • Book of Knives

    “Book of Knives” is based on seven psychiatric case histories dating from 1905 up to the present. These stories are linked through the interrogation of a modern day woman, Iris, who has murdered her plastic surgeon. “Book of Knives” is a short history of women, technology & madness in the twentieth century, and calls into question both the ethics and methodologies of western scientific enquiry.

  • After Morning

    Things the filmmaker forgot and learned about birth control on her trip to America.

  • Switch

    Set in 1949 Toronto, this film tells the story of Isabelle, a telephone operator who is leading a double life. She is having a clandestine affair with another operator, Alice, while her boyfriend Ricky is secretly making plans to elope with her to Niagara Falls. “Switch” is a camp forties-style thriller in which the desires of a lusty femme fatale lead to double-crossing, broken hearts and murder.

  • Larry’s Recent Behaviour

    One of Joyce Wieland’s earliest works, shot in 8mm and finally blown-up to 16mm, “Larry’s Recent Behaviour” has been described by Simon Field as an “irreverent and wilfully juvenile examination” of a nasty habit that Larry has recently acquired.

  • Chloe

    “Unfortunately, not a lot of research has been done on woman-to-woman transmission,” says the Planned Parenthood Counselor. Chloe is a lesbian who discovers that her ex-girlfriend’s ex-lover has tested HIV positive. Chloe is faced with the realization that though she knows the facts about AIDS, she never thought it posed a threat to her. This frightening scenario serves as a wake-up call to lesbians who haven’t thought enough about female-to-female HIV transmission.

  • Marquesa – Portrait of a Dominatrix, The

    This film sets the focus sharply on the often maligned and misunderstood world of sadomasochism. It gives us a glimpse into the life of the Marquesa, a Toronto Dominatrix who guides the audience on a journey through the SM community, its rituals and motivations. The marquesa explores and examines her own relationship to SM, and to the submissives that make the scenes possible. There is not a deliberate attempt to justify the practices of this unique sub-culture to the mainstream, but nonetheless, this piece and the Marquesa dismantle the myths and fallacies surrounding it by straightforward and frank talk. The…

  • Mothers of Me

    “‘Mothers of Me’ is a visually glorious, abstract study in which the filmmaker explores, partly out of fear, the women in her family, their history of insanity and their response to a repressive environment. Through the use of close-ups and fragmented composition we are compelled to participate in her examination.” – Stacey Donen, Toronto Intenational Film Festival, 1999 Awards: 2nd Prize Danzante de Plata, Festival de Cine de Huesca, Spain; Marian McMahon Award, Images Festival, 2001