Adapted from an article by The Sunday Times.
If you’re on the lookout for some great films to add to your watchlist, here’s a selection of 15 great films by women that were recently suggested by The Sunday Times.
The Souvenir (2019)
Joanna Hogg
The British director moved from mainstream television to a niche all her own: semi-autobiographical, spare yet affecting. The Souvenir replays her youth, mired in an affair with an upper-crust addict (wonderfully portrayed by Tom Burke), but discovering cinema along the way; Hogg started with Unrelated, an unsparing tale of the middle classes behaving badly abroad.
Girlhood (2014)
Céline Sciamma
Before her simmering Portrait of a Lady on Fire became a hit recently, the French director made this film about a girl gang in Paris on a fast track to nowhere in particular. An impressively confident portrait of teenagers on the loose.
Booksmart (2019)
Olivia Wilde
Another actress turned director, Wilde creates a sparky comedy around two smart high schoolers who embark on a night of every excess they can find before they graduate. Beanie Feldstein and Kaitlyn Dever are the ideal odd couple.
Orlando (1992)
Sally Potter
Virginia Woolf’s strange 1928 novel is beautifully realised by Potter, thanks in part to an amazing performance from Tilda Swinton, travelling across centuries and genders as the Elizabethan nobleman who finds himself becoming Lady Orlando 400 years later.
Enough Said (2013)
Nicole Holofcener
Holofcener is adept at bittersweet stories such as 2001’s Lovely & Amazing. In Enough Said James Gandolfini displays his nuanced acting style as a quiet, solitary divorcee in a relationship with a gabby masseuse (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) who begins to question her feelings for him.
Dig! (2004)
Ondi Timoner
Timoner tracked the relationship between the bands the Dandy Warhols and the Brian Jonestown Massacre for seven years as their career paths diverged and the mental health of the BJM leader imploded. A fascinating music business documentary with hardly any music.
An Education (2009)
Lone Scherfig
The account by the journalist Lynn Barber of her affair with an older man while still at school is transferred to the screen by Nick Hornby with its social and emotional map pleasingly intact.
Your Sister’s Sister (2011)
Lynn Shelton
Shelton died this year at 54. Her enviable legacy ranges from “mumblecore” Humpday to the glossy TV series Little Fires Everywhere. Her best is this funny, sweet rom-com of sorts, with Emily Blunt.
Happy as Lazzaro (2018)
Alice Rohrwacher
Set in the Italian countryside, Rohrwacher’s Martin Scorsese-backed film looks lush and terrific — but that just hides a darkness, as a kind peasant is exploited by the rich.
The Assistant (2019)
Kitty Green
Green’s debut is a low-key knockout about a young woman (Julia Garner) working antisocial hours in a New York film producer’s office who slowly spots the slime beneath the stardust. Matthew Macfadyen is perfect as the snake in HR.
Whale Rider (2002)
Niki Caro
Caro is feeling the heat for Mulan, but her early work reminds you why she was so sought after. A tender light is shed on the often neglected Maori tradition.
Away from Her (2006)
Sarah Polley
The Canadian actress moves her sensitive touch to directing here. Michael Murphy is a husband who has to lose his wife (Julie Christie) both to Alzheimer’s and to a fellow patient.
Clueless (1995)
Amy Heckerling
Heckerling had form with high school flicks — Fast Times at Ridgemont High — so it’s no surprise how smart this hugely quotable LA take on Emma was, with Alicia Silverstone on a career high.
Fish Tank (2009)
Andrea Arnold
Katie Jarvis, discovered by Arnold, shines as a dance-mad Essex teenager whose mother brings home a confusing new boyfriend (Michael Fassbender). Arnold also captured an American underclass in 2016’s American Honey, about gangs of hustling magazine sellers.
Leave No Trace (2018)
Debra Granik
Granik is rural America’s great but melancholy poet. She directed Jennifer Lawrence’s striking debut, 2010’s Winter’s Bone. In the lovely Leave No Trace a father tries to hide his daughter from the authorities by camping in the forest.