182. Women Make Film - Part One; movie review

WOMEN MAKE FILM - PART ONE
Cert 15
180 mins
BBFC advice: Contains strong violence, sex, sexual violence, sex references, drug misuse

I have often mused on what it would be like to go back to university and be a mature student of film.
This thought was probably prompted by a magazine article which stated that any movie critic should have studied the art to be able to understand it.
Actually, the more I think about that, the more facetious it is. I pay my money so I am allowed an opinion whether I have a degree in film studies or not.
However, I do respect those who can see more deeply and that is clearly the case with the creators of Women Make Film.
Mark Cousins has done a staggering job of creating 40 chapters, telling the story of how movies are made with hugely varied examples from around the world and across time.
A clip from a female-directed movie is used to highlight each point of Tilda Swinton's detailed narrative.
This is a Cousins labour of love - it was not funded because studios deemed it too unwieldy at 14 hours.
I must admit I could only find the time to watch the first of its five parts and even that ran at three hours.
The description highlights nuances which would only be picked up by a trained eye and would never have occurred to me.
However, I found the documentary part revealing and part frustrating because it highlights brilliant pictures and then cuts them off just as I am getting into them.
And then it returns to them for another clip to prompt me to salivate after them even more.
It is clear women have made some wonderful movies and have a different perspective to men and that Cousins has done a superb job of making this point.
Unfortunately, watching clips over three hours feels too much like a university lecture rather than a cinematic experience.
But for the record, I can't fathom why men have such dominance among studios and, as Women Make Film demonstrates, we would have a greater variety in pictures if they didn't.

Reasons to watch: If you are a student of film
Reasons to avoid: If the intricacies of cinema aren't for you 

Laughs: None
Jumps: None
Vomit: None
Nudity: None
Overall rating: 7/10

Did you know? The percentages of women working as directors, writers, producers, executive producers and editors on independent films reached historic highs in 2018-19. Women comprised 33% of directors, up four percentage points from 29% in 2017-18 and 32% of writers, up six percentage points from 26% in 2017-18.


The final word. Mark Cousins: “If we'd made a 90-minuter or even a three-hour film, I'm sure we could've got funding. But then what that would do is make this history much smaller than it is. So you just have to go for it and say, ‘No, I'm sorry. This is a big thing.’ And it's far bigger than this film – the history of the great female directors is huge, so we at least had to do something on a reasonably big scale.” The Skinny

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