52 Films By Women: Luchadoras (2021)

By Andrea Thompson

There’s no doubt that co-directors Paola Calvo and Patrick Jasim wanted to make a powerful statement with their documentary “Luchadoras,” currently streaming as a part of Milwaukee Film’s Hispanic Heritage Month, which follows three female wrestlers struggling to make a better life in Ciudad Juárez, which has seen so many of its residents disappear it’s come to be known as Murder City.

The roots of such a brutally infamous moniker can be blamed on a familiar culprit - the vicious force we quaintly refer to as global capitalism. It makes the most twisted kind of sense, then, that many of the disappeared are women who worked at assembly factories, which are themselves the result of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). All three of the documentary’s subjects, who mostly go by their wrestling alter egos of Lady Candy, Baby Star, and Mini Sirenita, see wrestling both as a source of income and empowerment, a way to fight for a better life in and out of the ring.

They all have many things in common, most of which involve how they cope with the gender limitations in their work and daily lives. The stories, the jokes, the memories they all share, with each other and those around them, are no less horrifying for being normalized. They speak of their memories of women screaming for help who they were too afraid to assist, of others who were abducted and raped by bus drivers, the discovery of mutilated bodies in the desert, and the police corruption and incompetence that enables it all. 

Their personal lives are about as healthy as you can expect, as many recount stories of the toxic men in their lives, from those in the ring to their families and their partners, many of whom forbade them from working, and who were generally a source of emotional and physical violence. 

The truly remarkable thing is how determined each of them are to have the last word. They may be under siege, but the women in “Luchadoras” have reached the stage where they’ve become very aware that they’re under siege together. Such solidarity, born of their brutal circumstances, has led them to become activists fighting for change in their communities and personal lives, from teaching self defense classes in the ring to using it as a platform to organize and protest against femicide. 

No, there are no mere victims here, and no one is helpless by any means. Lady Candy, Baby Star, and Mini Sirenita are pushing back as best as they can, living their lives, and trying to make them better. All of them pin their hopes on their wrestling careers despite the very real dangers, and attempt to provide more stability, for themselves and their families.

Given all that, it’s sometimes frustrating how little context Calvo and Jasim provide, even if their reasoning is obvious. They have a great deal of trust in their audience, and centering their subjects above all, even at the expense of that audience at times, is how they avoid reducing this remarkable trio to victims or invulnerable superwomen. 

Candy, the youngest, may have the most painful story of all, one whose twists and turns beg for a little outside guidance. She is the one who works in a funeral home and is grappling most directly with the consequences of not just economics but how the system is stacked against potential immigrants. Candy left her husband due to domestic violence, but he’s still able to keep her children from her in the safety and prosperity of El Paso, Texas, despite the fact that the two cities are separated by a mere fence. To see them, Candy must attempt to get a visa, in spite of the bureaucratic hurdles, and the fact that fewer of them are being granted.

If only Calvo and Jasim were willing to assert themselves into the film, or just more information outside of what people are willing to say aloud, “Luchadoras” would practically be a textbook example of how the unfettered, unchecked, so-called free market wreaks havoc, especially among populations of color. But then, the filmmakers clearly aren’t interested in arguing, merely showing how those who should be helpless can and do resist, even under constant pressure.

52 Films By Women: Writing With Fire (2021)

By Andrea Thompson

I might be accused of bias in my appreciation for the remarkable documentary “Writing With Fire,” especially given that Film Girl Film is a Community Partner for it via the Milwaukee Film Festival, where it’s currently streaming.

But I had absolutely no problem enjoying “Writing With Fire” during my first viewing when it premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, and audiences and jurors seemed to agree, with the doc winning both the Audience Award and a Special Jury Award for Impact for Change. 

The magnitude of just what directors Sushmit Ghosh and Rintu Thomas accomplish is partly a testament to the power of timing. They began following Khabar Lahariya, the only newspaper in India which is run entirely by women, just as they were shifting to digital, and more chillingly, as nationalism and religious extremism was rising to greater heights.

The pen is mightier than the sword it’s been said, and the power of the written, or for our modern context, the typed word is allowing the female journalists behind Khabar Lahariya to write their way out of a prison imposed on them by gender, tradition, and most suffocatingly, caste. Many, if not all, of the women are Dalits, or untouchables, who are entirely excluded from the caste system in India, and thus barred from participation in many aspects of life. Most have husbands and families who are less than supportive, and pressure them to quit working.

And yet they persist, to use a newish cliche, despite not only this opposition, but the fact that many of them have barely touched a smartphone, have never used email, and a few don’t even have electricity in their homes.  

Why they persist in the face of such obstacles isn’t exactly explored, but shown, as many experience a newfound sense of confidence in shaping not only their own destinies, but helping to change the lives of others for the better. And “Writing With Fire” wastes little time answering just what drives them, opening with chief reporter Meera interviewing a traumatized woman who has been repeatedly raped, then confronting police about why they have done virtually nothing to prevent these attacks or punish the perpetrators.

She and her colleagues also confront other powerful entrenched interests, such as mining groups running dangerous and illegal mining operations, and spotlight families who have yet to benefit from promised government reforms. And their efforts make a real difference, with rapists being arrested and charged, electricity and infrastructure being brought to some villages without it, and the women themselves outright refusing to be patronized by not only police and government officials, but male journalists.

Even as the profile of Khabar Lahariya begins to rise, with support, views, and impact increasing, the film also doesn’t-and can’t-ignore the other, more regressive forces that are also growing (partly thanks to populist support and social media), that of nationalist and religious extremists who are not only thriving, but winning elections. 

The questions the women routinely ask (and far too many media outlets don’t), such as why these men and their lackeys focus so much on protecting Hinduism rather than education, healthcare, and employment seem extremely prescient now given the horrifically botched response of many of India’s leaders to the COVID crisis (although they’re certainly not alone in that), and Meera and many of her colleagues clearly see journalism as a means to get answers and hold leaders accountable. This documentary might just be a part of that process for them, with the filmmakers being granted access to not just the end results, but the journey, which includes editorial meetings, work retreats, and the home lives of many subjects, where they must often continually justify themselves to husbands and parents.

Needless to say, none of these women are victims, but the directors also ensure that none of them fall into the Strong Female Character trope, with many freely admitting their weariness and even giving in to pressure occasionally and marrying to shield their families from the social consequences of having an unwed daughter.

If “Writing With Fire” leaves out many details, such as just how the paper was founded and the impetus behind it, what it does share is a testament to just what the journey to empowerment looks like, exhausting late nights and all.

52 Films By Women: Shirley (2020)

By Andrea Thompson

Do we really want to know how the sausage is made? Of course we do. If it were made humanely, it wouldn't be nearly as fun. Take the creative process for instance. How much more do we enjoy watching from afar as our favorite artists gloriously destroy in the name of our most beloved works of art? Conflict is, after all, the beating heart of so many of our favorite stories, and if our artistic heroes turn out to be jackasses, so much the better. Provided we ourselves can keep a safe distance.

The question in the film “Shirley” is what happens if this terrible artist happens to be a woman. In this case, she's horror writer Shirley Jackson (Elisabeth Moss), who is as formidable as the stories she wrote. How could this supposedly frail woman not be, given her disinterest in everything the conformist 1950s demands of her? She's everything her gender is told to reject: prickly, difficult, paranoid, agoraphobic, and merciless about prying into the lives of those around her, probing for their most vulnerable points. Even her body, wracked by depression, anxiety, and mental illness, resists being stifled by the rigid demands of the period, nearly bursting out of the attire that tries and fails to mold her into gentility.

Needless to say, newlyweds Fred (Logan Lerman) and Rose (Odessa Young) don't stand a chance. They have the kind of happiness that depends on innocence, and above all, ignorance. When they arrive in town to visit Shirley and her college professor husband Stanley (Michael Stuhlbarg), they come off as intelligently as the people who willingly walk in the creepy woods the locals avoid. Then again, these locals they're benevolently smiling at look as though they'd shove them right in.

If their arrival at Stanley and Shirley's home feels like a soothing balm, filled with laughter, debate, and intellectualism, it's quickly revealed to be a Venus flytrap. Rose is a fan of Shirley's who is fascinated, then unsettled by the off-putting writer, who has little taste for social niceties and less use for another adoring fan. It makes Rose reluctant when she's recruited by the husbands to live in the Shirley's home, basically as an unpaid servant, allowing Fred to fulfill his teaching ambitions at the college, and Stanley to have another watchful eye on his unstable wife, who is struggling with writer's block on her latest novel.

But if nice girls don't say no, neither do good wives, and Rose is under more pressure than most women in her situation. Not only is she pregnant, Fred married her even though his parents disowned him for it. Guilt can go a long way in silencing women, and it leaves Rose especially vulnerable to Shirley's manipulations. In another time, their friendship might have become a nourishing love affair, but part of the gendered horror of the film is the knowledge that for the few women who managed to rise above it all and find happiness, there were so many more who fell through the cracks. The missing college girl who inspired the manuscript Shirley is struggling with is merely one example. Cruelty and madness take many forms, many of them far more subdued.

Films like “In The Cut” explored the outright violence of everyday sexism when taken to extremes, but “Shirley” more subtly, psychologically explores how women are united and divided by their oppression. Shirley may at first be envious of Rose's youth, beauty, and supposed happiness, but Rose gazes upon the even younger, lithe college coeds who cluster adoringly around both husbands with much of the same envy for them and the carefree life she's already beyond. In such ways do men create monsters.

Rose is drawn to Shirley for much the same reason these girls are drawn to their husbands, but of course there's far more to it. For all her suffering and dysfunction, Shirley represents a kind of freedom, a rejection of the social mores Rose finds so suffocating but feels powerless to fight. As their friendship intensifies, so does the void in Rose's life, as she's forced to realize how much she isn't seen, by her husband or anyone. Shirley is the one who creates a meaning that is entirely hers, and she ultimately can't respect anyone who derives all the meaning in their life from someone else's work.

If writer Sarah Gubbins nimbly navigates the slow psychological terror of women on verge of a nervous breakdown, director Josephine Decker is her partner in crime, bringing the same splintered, manic energy that was so spellbinding in “Madeline's Madeline.” That their focus is insular is to be expected, but it outright refuses to address the fact that in reality, Shirley Jackson had four children and wrote irreverent stories on the topic when the image of the perfectly coiffed, smiling housewife was at its height.

What it might come down to is simply a disinterest in family life. Tortured artists may have always been all the rage, but seldom have they been as gloriously unhinged and female, or as capable of being understood without being excused. That “Shirley” ends with its title character's triumphant laughter and confidence that her latest book will be a smash hit says just as much about us as it does about her. It came about at much personal expense, but after all, the film posits, wasn't it all in the name of art?