Female Filmmaker Friday: Desert Hearts, 1985 (dir. Donna Deitch)
In 2014, I launched a series called Female Filmmaker Friday, where I wrote about a film directed by a woman almost every Friday for almost the entire year. This in part inspired my A Year With Women project where I only watched films directed or co-directed by women for the entirety of 2015. In 2016, Female Filmmaker Friday made a brief comeback as a podcast, though that was also short-lived. Finally, I am excited to announce that I will be bringing Female Filmmaker Friday back as a regular feature on this blog. For its auspicious return I have chosen one of my all-time favorites, one that has become far more readily available in the last few years: Donna Deitch’s Desert Hearts.
52 Films By Women To Stream On Netflix and Amazon Prime
To help people with their 52 Films By Women challenge this year I thought I’d put together a list of some of my favorite films directed by women that are easily accessible on Netflix and Amazon Prime. Keep in mind that this is in no way all of the films directed by women available on these services, but rather a selection of films I have seen and enjoy. There are also many more films available to rent on Amazon Video as well. Think of this as a jumping off point! Also if you have not taken the 52 Films By Women pledge yet you can do so here.
2018 in Films: 365 Days, 654 Films, and a Year Full of Cinema!
2018 was quite a year for me. I travelled a lot for work. I watched a lot of films in festivals. I had some of my lowest film watching months and some of my highest. I got into a bunch of television shows. I met one of my favorite directors of all time (Gillian Armstrong!). I broke down a lot of my 2018 cinematic shenanigans on my 9th blog anniversary post here, you can see my monthly breakdowns here, my Favorite Fifteen Films of 2018 here, and I even broke down my favorite new discoveries here over on Rupert Pupkin Speaks. What does that leave??? After the cut I have all of the films I saw in 2018, plus a breakdown of the films directed by women that I saw for the first time this year.
Cinema Fanatic’s Favorite Fifteen Films of 2018
In 2017 I saw 72 new releases, which I believe was a record number for me. This year I saw 117! I attribute this to several of this year’s new releases being Netflix films (so convenient, if not ideal) and MoviePass. Yes, MoviePass. I saw a few things I may have skipped in previous years because of MoviePass. For awhile I could watch one film a day via MoviePass and then see a second one that I paid for. This led to a lot more double features at the Midtown Art Cinema than in pervious years. Also last year I saw 32 new releases that were directed by women. This year I saw 59 new release films directed by women (170 in total, but I’ll write more about that in tomorrow’s end of the year post), which is half of the new release films I saw this year. I plan to at least keep up that ratio next year, if not do better. You can see all the new release (and festival) films I watched in 2018 and how I ranked them here. After the cut you’ll find my Favorite Fifteen Films, and as always I remind you that this is subjective and in no way should be considered a “best” list.
December 2018 in Films
After last month’s intense Farewell FilmStruck binge, I got a little burned out and so I did not watch as many films this month as I usually do. I did, however, use the month to catch up on a bunch of 2018 releases, both in theaters and rentals. As always, after the cut you can see the films I watched this month plus a few highlighted favorites.
It’s Cinema Fanatic’s 9th Anniversary!
I can’t believe it’s been nearly a decade of writing on this blog! Earlier this year I hit my ten year anniversaries on Tumblr and Twitter, both of which I started using before longform blogging in ernest. Although this blog is mostly updated monthly now (though I have plans to change that in 2019), I update my YouTube channel with reviews almost daily (that may change in 2019 as well). I thought for this blog anniversary I would do a breakdown of some of my film-going shenanigans from 2018.
Noirvember 2018 (Farewell FilmStruck)
As many of you are aware, at the end of October it was announced that FilmStruck was shuttering on November 29th. Thankfully, I still am at TCM (though there were some layoffs). The end of October saw the beginning of my scramble to watch as many films from my queue as possible. This also led to me discovering things that weren’t on my queue but that I desperately had to watch before it was too late. All and all, in the last few days of October and into November I watched 228 shorts and features on the service before it shuttered (plus a handful of films in theaters in November). After the cut you can see everything I watched last month (most of which was on FilmStruck – including almost all of my Noirvember selections). It was a thrilling few weeks and I discovered a lot of things that I had taken for granted. Criterion will be launching The Criterion Channel (which had previous found its home within the FilmStruck service) next year, which I am very grateful for, but I will forever miss my time working on FilmStruck. I’m honored to have been a part of its legacy.
October 2018 in Films
As you will see I watched A LOT of movies in October. The month began with my third trip to Pordenone in Italy for the Pordenone Silent Film Festival. The festival was again jam-packed with amazing film, mostly rarities from film archives and new restorations. I then watched several 2018 films (in theaters and on Netflix). Lastly, the month ended with the news that FilmStruck will be shutting down on November 29th (no worries, I still have a job!), so I have been binge-watching silent films and Japanese cinema. All of this resulted in a lot of cinema consumed. I discovered some new favorite directors and some truly awe-inspiring cinema. As always, you can see everything I watched plus some favorites after the cut.
It’s Gay! September 2018 in Films
September was quite a month for 2018 films. I saw 2 or 3 new releases in theaters each weekend, plus I screened a bunch of films from this year’s Out On Film LGBTQ film festival here in Atlanta. Several of the new release films I saw this month might just make my end of the year list. There’s just so much good cinema all year round! I also hosted a silent film triple feature here at the Plaza Theatre, which was a dream come true. I’m hoping to do more of that in the next few months so if you live in the area do come out. As always, you can see everything I watched last month after the cut, plus I highlight some favorites.
August 2018 in Film
This monthly recap is a few days late because the month changed during DragonCon here in Atlanta and I was just too damn tired to get it written. This year I was on four panels and attended several more featuring my amazing coworkers at TCM/FilmStruck. I also wore five cosplay outfits. It was a lot. But also so so much fun. As for my watching in August, I had intended to watch a lot more Summer Under The Stars films on TCM in August, but somehow only managed to really tackle Barbra Streisand. I did, however, catch up on a ton of films about to expire on FilmStruck and saw several great new releases (including my favorite movie of the year so far). I also found myself finishing up my Downton Abbey binge that I started in July. More thoughts on that to come. As always, you can see everything I watched, a breakdown by year, and some favorites after the cut.
