Directed By Women: The Marvels (2023)

Marvel Studios

By Andrea Thompson

Just when I thought I was out, Disney pulls me back in.

I thought the superhero fatigue was real for me, so much so that I completely opted out of “Blue Beetle.” But Disney does what it does, and since it insists on continuing its now sprawling universe, I couldn’t help but be intrigued by “The Marvels.”

How could it be otherwise? “The Marvels” is a concept that’s still relatively rare for a Marvel Cinematic Universe offering that doesn’t go straight to streaming - it’s about a superheroine who gets backup from not just one, but two others in supporting roles, each with their own rich history and complexities. 

Teyonah Parris gets some needed development as Monica Rambeau, who finally gets to sort things out with Captain Marvel, aka Carol Danvers (Brie Larson), currently hanging out in space with Nick Fury (a very much missed from the big screen Samuel L. Jackson). 

But one of the most radical turns “The Marvels” takes is to make their story a continuation Kamala Khan’s (Iman Vellani), who has only recently taken up the Ms. Marvel moniker. Her miniseries of the same name is what is required viewing, not to mention the first Marvel product in a while to make me not only tear up, but reminisce at what it’s still possible to accomplish within corporate guidelines.

The Marvels” actually picks up where “Ms. Marvel” left off, with Carol finding herself transported to Kamala’s room, much to her confusion. This development is both central premise and running gag, with Carol, Kamala, and Monica switching places with each other whenever one of them uses their powers, which is justified by the sciencey explanation that it’s all because each of their abilities make use of light.

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Either way, Iman Vellani is a standout, with her fangirling over Captain Marvel proving to be even more adorable than when Tom Holland’s Spider-Man first met Iron Man. In a time where the Marvel universe and multiverse and prequels and sequels seem to be on the verge of becoming an exhaustive, never-ending sprawl, Vellani might prove to be its savior. 

She is already its heart, since the movie is aware that Kamala is a package deal, with her family already proven to be so central that matriarch Muneeba Khan (Zenobia Shroff) is the one who creates her daughter’s on-screen superhero look, and patriarch Yusuf Khan (Mohan Kapur) is the inspiration behind his daughter’s decision to choose an alias that fuses her history and hero worship.

The Khans are the ones who emphasize how the simple act of trashing a house has serious consequences in a movie about traversing space and different realities. When Captain Marvel shows up, one of their first questions is whether she’s pressuring their daughter, and they are a centering influence even when they’re whisked from Earth to Fury’s base of operations.

So who cares that the actual plot of “The Marvels” is actually kind of a mess, with a premise that could be lifted straight from “Spaceballs”? With very few exceptions, it’s the heroes that are icons in this franchise, so Dar-Benn (Zawe Ashton) follows the usual pattern of being rather lackluster in comparison to the good guys, plotting to steal the atmosphere and suns of other worlds in order to revive her homeworld, which has been stripped of much of its wealth and resources. It’s so old school that the only development which veers slightly into originality is the climax involves a big beam of light in space rather than the plain ol’ sky. 

Thing is though, “The Marvels” is also old school in another, more unfortunate way, sticking to a thin veneer of heteronormativity to the point that Monica’s admission that she was just a kid who wanted her…aunt brings the kinds of tears that we can all see for what they really are. Because right, Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune were cousins, and Xena and Gabrielle were merely best friends. 😉

Marvel Studios

You wouldn’t think such pretense would be necessary in these times, but Captain Marvel is a heroine so queer-coded she brings her cat into space with her. Hell, “The Marvels” might actually be the closest thing the MCU has gotten to a queer party, with Tessa Thompson showing up for a Valkyrie cameo fabulously attired in a suit, and the central trio journeying to another planet where the language is based in song, and sees Carol dancing with a gorgeously androgynous prince.

If it seems like the movie ricochets in all kinds of directions, that’s because it does, and the result is a gorgeous mess that never loses its sense of fun. In that sense, it bears a passing resemblance to “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania,” which saw communing with ants as the key to saving the universe. But that has nothing on one of the later developments of this movie, where otherworldly kittens prove to be the key to saving lives. Whoever thought of that particular development was either high, a genius, or possibly a combination of the two.

You’ll just have to see it to believe it, and it’s a kick to see a movie that proves Nia DaCosta is still the director of the excellent, woefully underseen “Little Woods” after the dismal experience that was the new “Candyman,” with “The Marvels” also written by women. It shows, and it also explains the exhaustively predictable backlash this one is earning. If you do give it a watch though, you might just get excited about what the MCU has in store for the first time in a very long time.

Directed By Women: The People's Joker (2022)

By Andrea Thompson

Ah, autumn. For others, it means leaves changing, pumpkin spice lattes, spooky fun, and sweaters. For film critics, it means a whole lot of film festivals that we insist on running ourselves ragged for. Why should that change? For those afflicted with cinephilia, it’s a fantastic way to experience films that wouldn’t otherwise be discoverable, even in our supposedly stuffed-with-options streaming content era. 

Personally, I have immersed myself in the Chicago Underground Film Festival, the Reeling International Film Festival, and am now turning my attention to the Chicago International Film Festival, which features an absolute beauty of a lineup this year. And one particular offering seemed to almost beg for a place in this recently revamped Directed By Women column: “The People’s Joker”. 

Like last week’s focus, “T Blockers,” “The People’s Joker” is a trans film, and there’s a whole lot of horror contained in it without its characters being reduced to their oppression. But where “T Blockers” is a Gen Z anthem of defiance made by a budding artist just on the cusp of what will hopefully be a long and promising career, Vera Drew’s “The People’s Joker” is a millennial tale full of hard-lived wisdom and steeped in meta.

It’s also an incredibly low budget movie that’s equal parts queer coming-of-age story, extremely unauthorized superhero parody, and love letter to queer creatives. And filmed in a style that I can only describe as mixed media dystopian zine fused with pure camp. 

If that sounds baffling, that’s nothing against you or me, it’s merely part of the gleefully deranged, utterly fearless experience that is viewing this movie. IP doesn’t generally lend itself to much creativity in our incredibly corporatized environs, but Drew, who not only directs, but co-writes and stars as the lead, a trans girl who eventually blooms into her true identity as Joker the Harlequin, makes gleeful use of beloved fan favorites of the DC universe, as well as her many inspirations.

Batman’s problematic nature has been discussed and dissected long before this, but in “The People’s Joker” he’s not only a corporate fascist who’s unleashed a vicious army of drones onto Gotham, he’s also a predatory closeted gay man who grooms and exploits the penniless orphans he takes in. When Joker arrives in Gotham to pursue a comedy career after a harrowing childhood in Smallville - the kind only sunny Midwestern repression can dish out - she meets and falls for one of them, Jason Todd (Kane Distler), a young queer boy who has since refashioned himself into a Leto-esque Joker.

This isn’t only a setup for a toxic relationship that the older, wiser Joker the Harlequin uses as a guide for how to recognize abuse, it’s also a way for Drew to throw a whole lot of shade, with much of her ire reserved for Lorne Michaels and his toxic stranglehold on the state of comedy itself. He may be the catalyst for Harlequin’s rebellion and subsequently forming her own anti-comedy troupe that becomes her found family of recognizable DC villains, but Drew isn’t about to allow her own story to become subsumed in any sense.

And what a story, which doesn’t only incorporate fan conspiracy theories, Michelle Pfeiffer’s legendary Catwoman transformation, but shout-outs to “Goodfellas,” with Harlequin proclaiming she “always wanted to be a Joker,” and bringing in the Necronomicon itself for a cameo.

It’s a lot for a tight, 92 minute runtime that’s also a sincere laugh riot in the way stories from those who have not only survived but thrived tend to be. Drew’s most important inspirations get their due right away however. The film is dedicated to “Mom and Joel Schumacher.”

52 Films By Women: Wonder Woman (2017)

By Andrea Thompson

Since Film Girl Film will be helping to host a 70mm screening of “Wonder Woman” for International Women's Day, it seems only fitting that today's column would be about the 2017 film adaptation, which against all odds, did the character justice.

Wonder Woman is an amazing character, but let's face it, it's hard to do a character with a magic lasso justice. And DC Comics didn't exactly have a record of doing right by their other iconic heroes on the big screen. Wonder Woman herself has undergone many changes, which is to be expected from a character who's been around since 1941, but she's mostly remained a strong, capable Amazon warrior of compassion who is devoted to equality for all, especially for women.

This has made Wonder Woman controversial from the start, especially since her creator William Marston never hid the fact that he wanted his hero to stand for a new kind of woman, one who would make an ideal leader, and not only stand against oppression, but against prudery. Marston himself was involved in a polyamorous relationship with his wife and another woman. There was even a film around this time that delved into this relationship and how it affected Wonder Woman's creation, “Professor Marston and the Wonder Women.

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So it makes sense that the 2017 film would also court controversy. It languished in development for years, beginning in 1996, with everyone from Ivan Reitman to Joss Whedon attached to the project. Such a long beginning generally doesn't bode well for a movie's chances, but the movie would become a critical and commercial success, topping many best of 2017 lists, and is also considered one of the best superhero movies ever made, with much of the credit due to Gal Gadot's incredible performance as the lead.

We meet first see Wonder Woman when she's still Diana, a young child on her utopian island Themyscira, populated solely by Amazon women. After some resistance from her mother Hippolyta (Connie Nielsen), she is also trained to be a warrior, which she embraces and excels at. After she completes her training as an adult, she learns of the brutal World War I conflict raging in the outside world when American pilot Steve Trevor (Chris Pine) crash lands on the island. Feeling a strong sense of duty, she decides to leave the island and try to end the war, which she believes the god Ares to be responsible for.

What works about this movie is the fact that we see a rare fusion of the actor and the role. Gadot doesn't just play Wonder Woman, she becomes her, much in the way that we associate Chris Evans with Captain America and Robert Downey Jr. with Iron Man. Similarly, we get to see her journey, and watch her come into her own. Crucially, we also get to see this from her perspective, not from Trevor's which is what Whedon's script originally intended. On that note, Pine also does great work as the man who is essentially not only Wonder Woman's guide to the greater world, but to men in general. He is the first man she meets, and of course he becomes her love interest, one that is respectful of her and has to inform her about how his world works without coming off as mansplaining to the audience. He gets the kind of treatment that all superhero love interests should receive.

Wonder Woman's journey in the film is also deeply engrossing without the usual ingredients that seem required to make heroes, especially women, interesting. Diana is not conflicted about her goals, which are to end war and make the world a better place without forgetting about the civilians who are caught in the middle. This concern is what led to the iconic No Man's Land scene, wherein Diana puts on her superhero garb and steps out onto the battlefield to save the civilians on the other side, despite being warned of the dangers, both to herself and the mission, by Trevor. Director Patty Jenkins had to fight for this scene, and it's hard to imagine the movie having the impact it did without it. I myself was in awe throughout this scene, and have only remained in awe since. To this day, whenever I don't want to do something I know I need to get done, or I have a task that seems impossible, I put this scene on for motivation.

When Diana does become conflicted, it's for a heartbreaking reason. She has so much faith in people that she honestly believes that killing one villain will lead mankind on the road to peace. Her decision to continue the fight even though she becomes aware of the darkness at the core of humanity is genuinely inspiring, especially since it incorporates the stories of the people around her, who are often treated as less than.

While this film was undeniable success, there were those who not only found it too feminist, but not feminist enough. Wonder Woman herself was also criticized for her costume, which some found undermined the feminist message, or thought the movie objectified her. Then there were some of the ridiculous reactions to the women-only screenings, which some men were dumb enough to argue were discriminatory. Makes sense then that they apparently some of the best reactions to the film.

For myself, I find it deeply saddening that how a woman looks or dresses still takes precedence over her actions and any other admirable qualities she may have, even for other women. I myself can think of no better way to celebrate International Women's Day than a screening of a film that wholeheartedly embraces what Wonder Woman has come to stand for, namely, compassion, and the dedication to fighting injustice in whatever form it may take.