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The fashionable feminist movement is not an ambiguous, shapeless haze that has acted of its own volition for decades. It’s made up of people. Women and their allies, whose courage, determination, and willingness to resist, organize, seek, protest, and unreservedly demand the right to equality and justice, cannot in fact be captured in a few hours.
But the filmmakers proved it anyway.
There are a limited number of mainstream films that portray those who have been at the forefront of the fight for women’s equality, but, in fact, some have been made that are perfect. From young Ruth Bader From Ginsburg’s lawsuit in court over sex discrimination, to the factory workers’ strike that replaced hard work legislation in the U. K. , to the women who rocked NASA, the fight for women’s equality is full of cinematic moments that deserve to be revered on screen in wonderful detail.
Although those films depict or are encouraged through real-life characters and key moments of antiquity, the fight continues and the movement toward equality for all women before the law remains plagued by blind spots. There are some serious paintings to be done about intersectional representation, for example. , and that applies to the stories Hollywood has traditionally chosen to tell. There’s no denying that the vast majority of films about trailblazers who paved the way for women’s equality take center stage in the narrative around cis white women, marginalizing or excluding the roles played by women of color, trans women, and other nonbinary people in the same movement. Usually, it’s documentaries that tell those stories, and there are a lot of wonderful ones, but come on, Hollywood.
However, those solid story-driven films (and some very clever documentaries), presented in no specific order, shed interpretive light on the stories of genuine women: mothers, daughters, sisters, everyday revolutionaries, who paid immense private sums. Fight for our right to live similarly before the law. Taking a few hours to learn about their stories, appreciating their struggle, triumph and sacrifice is the least we can do.
Based on the book by Margot Lee Shetterly, Hidden Figures has shed light on three black women who played very important roles in NASA’s space race in the 1960s. The film stars Taraji P. Henson as mathematician Katherine Johnson, whose calculations led to good luck for the Mercury-Atlas 6 orbital mission, which marks a turning point in the race between the United States and the Soviet Union. It also stars Janelle Monáe as Mary Jackson, NASA’s first black female aeronautical engineer; and Octavia Spencer as Dorothy Vaughan, a mathematician and NASA’s first black supervisor.
All three women reached their position amid blatant sexism and racism while segregation was still legal (though the film particularly downplays racism in the movements of the white main characters). They also used their platforms to help other women gain an advantage, even when they were targeted through white colleagues in the process.
As Johnson concludes in an elegant line from the film in response to a sexist comment about his work: “So yes, they allow women to do certain things at NASA, Mr. Johnson, and it’s not because we wear skirts, but because we wear glasses. “Have a wonderful day. ” —Shannon Connellan, British editor
How to watch: Hidden Figures is now streaming on Disney and fuboTV in the U. S. In the U. S. , at Disney in the U. K. and Australia.
Based on the beginnings and career of former Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, On the Basis of Sex focuses on the landmark case that would set a precedent for sex discrimination and put Ginsburg on track to become its leading gender rights lawyer. .
Set in the ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s, decades before she became the second woman to serve on the U. S. Supreme Court, the film follows Ginsburg as a determined lawyer, as she and her husband Marty take on Moritz. Opposed to the Commissioner, the first federal case to assert that sex discrimination is unconstitutional. Felicity Jones is incredibly brilliant as the young RBG, demolishing the formula to the letter in the midst of endemic and institutionalized sexism from the lecture halls of Harvard Law School to the U. S. Court of Appeals. —S. C.
How to watch: On The Basis of Sex is available to rent/buy on Amazon or Apple TV in the US. It is available in the US and the UK, and streams on Netflix in Australia.
Set in 1912, Suffragette (itself a less unusual term in the United Kingdom than in the United States, where “suffragettes” are more acceptable) tells the story of an organization of women runners who joined, organized, and fought for women’s suffrage. movement in the UK, and that they were arrested, fired, beaten and died for it. The movement’s leader, Emmeline Pankhurst (played fiercely by Meryl Streep), has called for a national civil disobedience crusade after decades of nonviolent voting rights protests that have been ignored. We get a glimpse of the struggle thanks to the washerwoman and mother Maud Watts (a fictional character played by Carey Mulligan), who endures brutal racing situations and discovers her position in the local movement. for example, Maud meets activist Emily Davison (Natalie Press) in prison, whose sacrifice for the movement made headlines and caused a stir around the world.
Written by Abi Morgan and directed by Sarah Gavron, Suffragette offers a look at the tactics with which women secretly organized and drew attention for their rights after a peaceful crusade for 50 years, from hunger movements to barracks bombings. One vital thing the film does is provide the cruelty and harassment suffered by suffragettes, not only through law enforcement, but also through their families, husbands, neighbors, and co-workers. And it’s worth noting that the film’s marketing crusade has been criticized, reopening conversations about opposing racism. women of color in the motion and the exclusion of women of color from the film. —S. C.
How to watch: Suffragette streams on Kanopy and can be rented/purchased on Amazon in the US. Disney in the U. K. , and Stan in Australia.
Four actors – Julianne Moore, Alicia Vikander, Lulu Wilson and Ryan Kiera Armstrong – portray other incarnations of feminist icon, journalist and activist Gloria Steinem in the surreal Julie Taymor biopic The Glorias. Based on Steinem’s iconic memoir, My Life on the Road, the film chronicles her adventure in a very turbulent life as a champion of women’s liberation and a leading figure in the feminist movement in the ’60s, ’70s and beyond.
Steinem’s paintings have passed through iconic feminist leaders leading an intersectional movement, many of whom appear in the film. There’s the activist and co-founder of the magazine, Mrs. Dorothy Pitman Hughes (Janelle Monáe); lawyer, activist and wife Florynce “Flo” Kennedy (Lorraine Toussaint); the first female leader and activist of the Cherokee Nation, Wilma Mankiller (Kimberly Guerrero); trade union activist Dolores Huerta (Mónica Sánchez); and MP and lawyer Bella Abzug (Bette Midler), among others. -S. C.
How to watch: The Glorias now airs on Freevee (with ads) in the U. S. In the US, NOW in the UK and SBS On Demand in Australia.
In 1968, 187 female employees at the Ford Motor Company’s Dagenham plant in London led a strike to reform the law, which was not easy to eradicate sex discrimination in the workplace. After quitting their jobs as sewing machinists due to a “reclassification” of their point ability (and salary) relative to their male colleagues, car production came to a halt. The strike attracted the kind of public attention that led to the passage of the Equal Pay Act in 1970.
In Nigel Cole’s 2010 film, Sally Hawkins of The Shape of Water brilliantly leads the pace as the fictional Rita O’Grady, a protagonist encouraged by the real whose fight for an equivalent salary for her paintings would replace the history of running in the UK. The cast includes Rosamund Pike, Andrea Riseborough, Miranda Richardson, and Bob Hoskins. —S. C.
How to watch: Made in Dagenham can be rented/purchased on Amazon and Apple TV in the US. It’s not available to watch online in the UK (interestingly) lately.
Emma Stone is a tennis star as tennis legend and gender equality activist Billie Jean King in The Battle of the Sexes. Written by Simon Beaufoy and co-directed by Valerie Faris and Jonathan Dayton, this 2017 film focuses on the famous 1973 tennis match between King and the unabashedly sexist Bobvia Riggs (played all too charmingly by Steve Carell). If you can get through the argument in this movie without hitting a wall, do it right.
At the center of the film is the reiterated sexist concept that female and male players are unequal in terms of tennis skill or audience interest, an unsubstantiated claim made by the most sensible dogs of the American Tennis Association. Riggs echoes this attitude by boasting that she can beat any woman on the field, even at 55. King eventually agreed to confront Riggs to refute his claims in the iconic “Battle of the Sexes” match.
How to watch: Battle of the Sexes can be rented/purchased on Amazon and Apple TV in the US. It airs on Disney in the U. K. and Australia.
The fact that no one has yet made a film about Marsha P. Johnson is outrageous, which is why this is one of the few documentaries included in this list. The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson follows activist Victoria Cruz’s relentless quest for justice as she investigates the transgender icon’s suspicious death in 1992, as part of a broader look at the LGBTQ rights movement in New York City.
Directed by David France, the documentary examines the pivotal roles Johnson and iconic activist Sylvia Rivera played in campaigning for trans rights, adding to the formation of STAR (Street Travestites Action Revolutionaries) in 1970. Cruz’s tireless work loses light in deserted or half-researched films. . Cases of violence against trans women are at the heart of this film, and it’s a war she’s yet to win.
It should be noted that author, filmmaker and activist Tourmaline claimed that director David France appropriated her studios for his film. Her short film, Happy Birthday, Martha!, can be rented or purchased on Amazon. It stars Mya Taylor as Johnson and Eve Lindley as Rivera. —S. C.
How to watch: The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson is now streaming on Netflix.
Selma focuses on the 1965 Voting Rights Marches from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, organized and led by Martin Luther King Jr. , James Bevel, John Lewis, and Hosea Williams, and those icons, portrayed by David Oyelowo, Common, Stephan James. Wendell Pierce – they’re completely deserved. However, it earned a spot on this specific list because of how writer-director Ava DuVernay specifically refocuses on the pioneers who overcame them and laid the groundwork for this pivotal moment in the civil rights movement.
There’s Tessa Thompson as Diane Nash, Oprah Winfrey as Annie Lee Cooper, Carmen Ejogo as Coretta Scott King, Lorraine Toussaint as Amelia Bounton, and many others who peacefully protest, strategize, and call for voting in the face of fearsome, violent, and institutionalized political racism. —S. C.
How to watch: Selma now streams on Paramount, MGM, and Amazon Prime in the U. S. It’s available in the US, on BBC iPlayer in the UK and is praiseworthy on Fetch in Australia.
Based on the true story of mining company Lois Jenson and the landmark case that replaced the sexual harassment law in the United States, Niki Caro’s North Country is a brutal and inspiring adventure of resilience. In 1998, Jenson and her colleagues filed a lawsuit opposing their employer Eveleth Mines after enduring decades of rampant abuse and harassment; It is the first sexual harassment lawsuit filed in federal court and set a precedent for others to follow.
With a script inspired by Clara Bingham and Laura Leedy Gansler’s 2002 book about the case, North Country stars Charlize Theron as a fictionalized version of Jenson named Josey Aimes, who is transforming women’s history in America at immense personal cost. The impressive cast includes Frances McDormand, Sean Bean, Richard Jenkins, Woody Harrelson, and Sissy Spacek. He also earned nominations for Theron (fresh off his win at 2003’s Monster) and McDormand. -S. C.
How to watch: North Country is available to rent/buy on Amazon Prime and Apple TV in the US. US, UK and Australia.
As has been demonstrated time and time again, the legality of abortion has no effect on lifestyles or the frequency of abortions, but only on their safety. Without access to legal reproductive health services, desperate women in 1960s Chicago turned so much to regimen medical care that hospitals had separate septic abortion rooms designated to deal with the consequences. Tia Lessin and Emma Pildes’ moving documentary, The Janes, tells the story of an organization of fearless women who decided to do anything about this serious health crisis.
Through minimalist advertisements in underground newspapers, Jane Collective was able to provide more than 11,000 illegal and absolutely safe abortions to needy women in the city from 1968 to Roe v. Wade. Wade in 1973. Through interviews with the Janes, former abortion providers, and even the police officers who arrested them, we have a first-hand account of a world that, just a few years ago, would have seemed far away. Prepare to be moved through the Janes’ radical empathy for their customers, their main point of interest. emotional and physical care, and the big humanitarian business they have introduced at their own peril. A very good film whose message resonates especially today, when women in many states have had their hard-won reproductive rights senselessly revoked. —Kristina Grosspietsch, freelance contributor
How to watch: The Janes now airs on Max in the U. S. Binge in the U. S. , NOW in the U. K. , and Binge in Australia.
While this list focuses on feature films, it does include a few documentaries, because neglecting women in their middle age would be blatantly oversight, and that equates to twice as much for the Nobel laureate, Oxford graduate, activist, author, and fierce advocate for girls. • Education. Malala Yousafzai.
Directed by David Guggenheim of An Inconvenient Truth, He Called Me Malala takes a look at the life of an intrepid young Pakistani activist who, at the age of 15, was shot dead by the Taliban for improving the status of women and their right to education. In addition, the film interviews young women and women about Yousafzai’s influence and features striking animations. —S. C.
How to watch: He Named Me Malala is now streaming on Hoopla in the U. S. It is available in the U. S. and can be rented/purchased on Amazon, Apple TV, and Google Play in the U. S. The U. S. , the U. K. , and Australia.
Dolores Huerta is a force of nature. Co-founder of the United Farm Workers of America, along with Cesar Chavez, Huerta is a strong advocate for justice. And after experiencing sexism and discrimination within her own organization, she pledged to make sure this justice is extended to everyone, regardless of gender. , race, or sexuality.
Dolores is an exceptionally engaging documentary about a pivotal figure in the history of the American employee who is left too far out of the conversation. In addition, Huerta understood in detail that women’s rights are rights of hard work. They go hand in hand; You can’t boost one without supporting the other. She was there, fighting intelligent combat with an exclusive intersectional lens, years before the word “intersectional” entered the mainstream.
How to watch: Dolores is available to buy/rent on Apple TV and Amazon Prime, in the US. It airs on U. S. , U. K. , and Australia, and airs on PBS in the U. S. U. S.
Through an anachronistic soundtrack from the early 2000s, Katja von Garnier’s film Iron Jawed Angels (2004) examines the women’s suffrage movement in the United States in the 1910s, during World War I.
Hilary Swank and Frances O’Connor play suffrage leaders Alice Paul and Lucy Burns, who joined the American National Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) at a time when tensions were emerging between established members like Carrie Chapman Catt (the inimitable Anjelica Huston) and new blood. in strategy. Paul and Burns championed the call for a constitutional amendment that would give certain women the right to vote through demonstrations that attracted the press, such as organizing the first women’s suffrage parade in Washington in 1913. The old guard, however, intended to continue campaigning state by state.
The film seems dated 2020 and there’s an unnecessarily irritating romantic narrative, but it’s still a life story. In particular, the suffrage movement did not include all women, and racism was widespread. Despite a lighter view of the time, thank you. With an anachronistic soundtrack from the early 2000s, Angels addresses this lack of intersectionality with a dramatized scene featuring women’s rights activist and civil rights leader, Ida B. Wells (Adilah Barnes). In this scene, Paul asked black women to march to the back of the segregated parade to bow to Southern suffrage groups. Wells rejected this instruction, challenging Paul and Burns’ commitment to women-only equality. Later we see Wells marching with his state. delegation. ” I’ll walk with my companions or I won’t walk,” he says. —S. C.
How to watch: Iron Jawed Angels is now streaming on Max and Hulu in the U. S. U. S.
In 1991, Anita Hill testified before Congress, accusing Clarence Thomas, a potential Supreme Court nominee, her former supervisor, of sexual harassment. This is history. ” Many other people who attended the hearings did not even realize that sexual harassment was an issue that can simply be prosecuted and for which they can simply file a complaint. They had no idea what the Array concept meant,” Hill told the New York Times on the movement #MeToo decades later. So we were at a very different point. Decades since the hearings, that’s changed. “
The confirmation recreates this hearing and the events surrounding it, with Kerry Washington offering a false interpretation as Hill along with Wendell Pierce as Thomas. As the Times reports, in the year since Hill’s testimony, court cases filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission for sexual harassment have risen to 73 percent. The courage it took Hill to pull through is unimaginable, but the effect of his movements on others is immeasurable.
How to watch: Confirmation is now streaming on Max in the U. S. Binge in the U. S. , NOW in the U. K. , and Binge in Australia.
In Switzerland, women did not gain the right to vote until 1971. What is the reason for the delay? The Swiss formula of direct democracy ensured that a mandatory referendum for constitutional reform – and that only men could vote in a referendum. Petra Volpe’s The Divine Order examines the Swiss suffragette movement through Nora, a fictional housewife and local ruler of the city (played by Marie Leuenberger). It’s a lighter, even comical, look at the crusade for equality and the strength of the small acts that make up a revolution. —S. C.
How to watch: The Divine Order is available to rent/purchase on Prime Video in the US and Australia.
This adorable and enjoyable biopic tells the story of Australian singer-songwriter Helen Reddy, whose song “I Am Woman” was the unofficial anthem of the Women’s Liberation Movement in the ’70s.
Written by Emma Jensen, directed by Unjoo Moon, and starring Tilda Cobham-Hervey, Danielle Macdonald, and Evan Peters, I Am Woman deftly depicts Reddy’s rise alongside the early early moments of the women’s movement of the time. It’s to underestimate the impact it had. The song, an innovative birthday party for femininity, had on listeners at the time. In a sea of feminist films that concentrate on female trauma, I Am Woman is a lovely feel-good film that will motivate you and perhaps ask you how you too can put on your own abilities.
How to watch: I Am Woman is now streaming on Netflix and Freevee (with ads) in the U. S. In the US, Prime Video in the UK, and Stan in Australia.
Although it came to light too soon (the trials against Weinstein were still ongoing and the public was exhausted), it is clear that the She Said issue represents a pivotal moment in the history of modern women. Zoe Kazan and Carey Mulligan play Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist whose groundbreaking New York Times story led directly to the downfall of Harvey Weinstein. With sensitivity, respect, and focus on the survivors, She Said follows Kantor and Twohey’s investigation into one of Hollywood’s toughest and most predatory characters. men.
Thankfully, the film helps keep its narrative centered on the brave women who made the decision to speak out or go public with their experiences, preventing She Said from crumbling under the weight of its own harrowing content. It can be a little too bright at times, it’s still a poignant access to a singular moment in the recent fight for women’s equality. Now that Weinstein is languishing safely in jail, maybe it’s finally time to keep an eye on him. *-KG.
How to watch: She Said is now streaming on Peacock and can be purchased/rented on Amazon Prime and Apple TV in the US. U. S. It is also streaming NOW in the UK and on Netflix in Australia.
If you love women’s rights but don’t seem to champion your first, second, and third wave feminisms, then you want She’s Beautiful When She’s Angry. A fantastic advent to the Women’s Liberation Movement, this poignant and informative documentary features archival footage and interviews with all the heavyweights of the 1960s and 1970s. From The Feminine Mystique to Our Bodies, Ourselves, the National Organization for Women, and the Women’s Strike for Equality, I ended this film with a profound wisdom of the turbulent times that fundamentally repositioned American women’s position in society. Directed through Mary Dore, She’s Beautiful When She’s Angry will actually leave you in awe of the courage of those social pioneers and encouraged to continue the fight for equal finishes today.
How to watch: She’s Beautiful When She’s Angry can be purchased or rented on Amazon Prime and Apple TV in the US. US, UK and Australia.
* indicates that this blurb gave the impression of being on an earlier Mashable list.
Want more stories of women who have made history and encouraged women who are making history today?Check out Mashable’s History Becomes Her podcast, hosted by Editor-in-Chief Rachel Thompson.
Shannon Connellan is the UK editor of Mashable in London, formerly the editor of Mashable in Australia, but emotionally lives in Creel House. Shannon, a Tomatometer-approved critic, writes about everything (though not anything) in the fields of entertainment, technology, social good, and science. , and Culture.