Read our most recent issue with stories that validate, inspire, and change the way we see— and make — film.
I had the honor of speaking with Emmy-winning writer and executive producer Simran Baidwan, who has helped shape The Pitt...
Upending an audience’s expectations has become one of the most joyous experiences to have in a movie theater, especially when...
Some films seem to find you when you’re finally ready for them. In 2023, I spoke with filmmaker and writer...
This is a living record of underrepresented brilliance in film. Dive into our archive of stories and hear from bold voices that paving the industry forward.
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by Rebecca Martin
December 23, 2018
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by Alison Marcotte
December 21, 2018
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by Marjorie H. Morgan
November 16, 2018
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by cinemafemme
November 10, 2018
Thank you all who came out last tonight to our launch at the Music Box Theatre! Here are some photos for the event. If you have any photos you took
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by Rebecca Martin
November 9, 2018
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by Rebecca Martin
November 9, 2018
Statistics about Female Film Critics A September 2018 report from Dr. Stacy L. Smith and the USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative (and conducted with Time’s Up Entertainment) used reviews of 300 top-grossing
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by Amy Wasney
November 8, 2018
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by Rebecca Martin
November 8, 2018
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by Rebecca Martin
November 8, 2018
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by Rebecca Martin
November 12, 2025
Sophia Dunn-Walker’s creative world hums with contrast — elegance laced with rebellion, discipline infused with punk energy. A director, producer, and actor, Dunn-Walker’s work traverses film, music, and visual art
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by Matt Fagerholm
November 4, 2025
I went into David Michôd’s biopic “Christy” knowing nothing about its titular boxer. I knew I would be interviewing the film’s real-life subject, Christy Salters Martin, the following morning, and
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by Anna Pattison
November 1, 2025
When a laid-off sex worker falls for a mail carrier in a world frozen by pandemic unknowns, it will take the help of an astrologer, cinema guru, cam model, retired dungeon owner,
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by Rebecca Martin
October 31, 2025
Italian filmmaker Carolina Cavalli has quickly emerged as one of the most original voices in contemporary cinema. Born in Milan, Cavalli made her feature debut with “Amanda” (2022), which premiered
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by Matt Fagerholm
October 25, 2025
With the 61st Chicago International Film Festival nearly in the rearview mirror, there are so many memories from the past several days that I know I will be cherishing for
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by Rebecca Martin
October 24, 2025
Set against the vivid backdrop of 1931 French-colonized Martinique, “Sugar Cane Alley” (“Rue Cases-Nègres”) stands as one of cinema’s most tender and politically charged coming-of-age stories. The film follows eleven-year-old
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by Rebecca Martin
October 20, 2025
Mary Bronstein is a writer/director based in New York City, known for her raw style, auteurist approach, and unflinching focus on stories about complicated women. Her best-known work, the cult-classic
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by Rebecca Martin
October 18, 2025
In 2018, filmmaker Emily Mkrtichian began work on what she envisioned as a quiet, contemplative documentary—a portrait of women in Artsakh, the ethnically Armenian region nestled in the South Caucasus,
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by Anna Pattison
October 3, 2025
We sat down with award-winning filmmaker Nancy Schwartzman—best known for her powerful documentaries “Roll Red Roll,” “Victim/Suspect,” and “Sasha Reid” and the “Midnight Order”—to talk about her latest project, “Death
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by Matt Fagerholm
January 28, 2026
Sundance has always been a festival I had admired at a distance. How Robert Redford had gone about using his platform to launch the careers of countless filmmakers for over
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by Matt Fagerholm
November 17, 2025
As I sat in my favorite movie palace, the Music Box Theatre, waiting for my wife—Cinema Femme founder Rebecca Martin—to arrive for that evening’s eagerly awaited Chicago International Film Festival
14 min read
by Anna Pattison
November 1, 2025
When a laid-off sex worker falls for a mail carrier in a world frozen by pandemic unknowns, it will take the help of an astrologer, cinema guru, cam model, retired dungeon owner,
14 min read
by Matt Fagerholm
October 25, 2025
With the 61st Chicago International Film Festival nearly in the rearview mirror, there are so many memories from the past several days that I know I will be cherishing for
20 min read
by Veronica Miles
October 10, 2025
In 2019, I crashed the Cannes Film Festival. Well — not really. I went legitimately with a pass I applied for (if you work in the film industry, you usually
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by Matt Fagerholm
September 30, 2025
“If you can’t play with the language, you are not reinventing the language.” This is what Argentine director Gaspar Noé told me when I interviewed him fifteen years ago about
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by Matt Fagerholm
July 8, 2025
I was ten years old when Danny DeVito’s euphoric screen adaptation of Roald Dahl’s 1988 novel Matilda arrived in theaters. I had read the book so many times that the
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by Matt Fagerholm
June 24, 2025
As annoyed as I was about Barry Jenkins, one of the greatest filmmakers working today, recently helming a prequel to the worst Disney remake in history, the Oscar-winning director of
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by Matt Fagerholm
May 23, 2025
It’s difficult to put into words the gratitude I have for Sabrina S. Sutherland. The collaborations she forged with filmmaker David Lynch, particularly over the last decade, have transformed my
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by Rebecca Martin
August 26, 2023
“I feel like we’ve watched so many male anti-hero stories, whether they’re comedies or dramas or mysteries, and it’s crazy that in 2023, we’re still so hungry for shitty, flawed
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by Rebecca Martin
August 1, 2023
We need authentic stories, even in the rom-com genre. New Zealand filmmaker Anna Rose Duckworth agrees with this! She beautifully paints the line between romantic comedy and elevating humanity within
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by Rebecca Martin
June 23, 2023
Trauma and pleasure. Two things that are different, yet when it comes to sex, the one sometimes can bring shame to the other. One is not our fault, the trauma
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by Rebecca Martin
May 23, 2023
I had the opportunity to speak with Lillah Halla (she/her/them) about her beautiful film “Levante,” which centers on a promising 17-year-old volleyball player named Sofia, who is faced with an
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by Rebecca Martin
November 15, 2022
Last week Chicago’s Asian Pop-Up Cinema Film Festival wrapped up its 15th season showing eight Hong Kong productions. I was fortunate to interview one of the filmmakers behind one of
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by Rebecca Martin
October 11, 2022
Buy your tickets: https://www.chicagofilmfestival.com/film/art-and-pep/ Cinema Femme kicks off its 2022 ChiFilmFest coverage by speaking with filmmaker Mercedes Kane about her doc “Art and Pep”. We talked about why
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by Matt Fagerholm
August 11, 2022
Bringing back our Sundance interview for the film’s theater release today. One of my favorite movies I’ve seen at this year’s Sundance Film Festival is easily the Finnish coming-of-age drama,
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by Rebecca Martin
May 20, 2022
As I watched the films for Short Block 3 at our virtual film festival a few weeks ago, we just finished Heidi Neff’s “The Long Goodbye”, an animated short film
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by Rebecca Martin
May 6, 2022
With the recent news of the Supreme Court leak detailing their plan to overturn Roe vs. Wade, we wanted to bring back our interview with Kelly O’Sullivan about her film
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by Rebecca Martin
January 31, 2026
Barbara Hammer once said, “If we’re experimenting with our lives and the way we’re going to live, our film and our art should also be experimental. It breaks tradition, and
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by Emily Jacobson
January 30, 2026
When I landed in what would be the last Sundance in Park City, Utah, a notable feeling of gratitude washed over me. My first day was a frenzy of badge
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by Matt Fagerholm
January 28, 2026
Sundance has always been a festival I had admired at a distance. How Robert Redford had gone about using his platform to launch the careers of countless filmmakers for over
7 min read
by Matt Fagerholm
October 21, 2025
The Girl in the Snow One of the great discoveries I made at CIFF ten years ago was the talent of young Galatéa Bellugi. As a pregnant teen in the
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by cinemafemme
April 11, 2025
BEING MARIA – directed by Jessica Palud “I want to be free as an actor to explore where a scene can go, but if it’s going to be a fight
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by Peyton Robinson
February 25, 2025
For my final dispatch of this year’s Sundance Film Festival, I’m covering three films that I watched virtually. Ironically, these films, while not all specifically tailoring their plots to location,
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by Emily Jacobson
February 18, 2025
For my second Sundance dispatch, I exchanged my snow boots for my slippers, and viewed most of the films from the comfort of my couch. While certainly not comparable to
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by Peyton Robinson
February 18, 2025
The endeavors of love and lust can feel like matters of life and death, but the films which compose this dispatch also find the humor in these escapades. I was
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by Emily Jacobson
January 31, 2025
When I was thirteen, I remember scrolling through the movie channels of my parents’ television and finding a film called “Like Crazy,” which was labeled as a “breakout Sundance hit.”
2 min read
by Anna Pattison
November 1, 2025
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I had the honor of speaking with Emmy-winning writer and executive producer Simran Baidwan, who has helped shape The Pitt into one of television’s most
Upending an audience’s expectations has become one of the most joyous experiences to have in a movie theater, especially when so many releases from mainstream
Some films seem to find you when you’re finally ready for them. In 2023, I spoke with filmmaker and writer Guinevere Turner about her memoir,
As a variation on our Femme Filmmaker Friday articles, our contributor Matt Fagerholm is offering his thoughts on three new male-directed films (plus one new
When I first watched “Go Fish,” Rose Troche’s 1994 film, it was in the middle of lockdown during 2020. I was watching at least three
When I sat down with director Nora Kirkpatrick, she described her latest feature, “Couples Weekend,” as “The Breakfast Club for adults.” It’s a comparison she
I had the honor of speaking with Emmy-winning writer and executive producer Simran Baidwan, who has helped shape The Pitt into one of television’s most
Upending an audience’s expectations has become one of the most joyous experiences to have in a movie theater, especially when so many releases from mainstream
Some films seem to find you when you’re finally ready for them. In 2023, I spoke with filmmaker and writer Guinevere Turner about her memoir,
As a variation on our Femme Filmmaker Friday articles, our contributor Matt Fagerholm is offering his thoughts on three new male-directed films (plus one new
When I first watched “Go Fish,” Rose Troche’s 1994 film, it was in the middle of lockdown during 2020. I was watching at least three
When I sat down with director Nora Kirkpatrick, she described her latest feature, “Couples Weekend,” as “The Breakfast Club for adults.” It’s a comparison she
I had the honor of speaking with Emmy-winning writer and executive producer Simran Baidwan, who has helped shape The Pitt into one of television’s most
Upending an audience’s expectations has become one of the most joyous experiences to have in a movie theater, especially when so many releases from mainstream
Some films seem to find you when you’re finally ready for them. In 2023, I spoke with filmmaker and writer Guinevere Turner about her memoir,
As a variation on our Femme Filmmaker Friday articles, our contributor Matt Fagerholm is offering his thoughts on three new male-directed films (plus one new
When I first watched “Go Fish,” Rose Troche’s 1994 film, it was in the middle of lockdown during 2020. I was watching at least three
When I sat down with director Nora Kirkpatrick, she described her latest feature, “Couples Weekend,” as “The Breakfast Club for adults.” It’s a comparison she
