This week I’m recommending one new streaming film, two documentaries, two under-seen dramas from the mid-2010s, the DYI masterworks of Sarah Jacobson, and a French gem from the 1980s.
This was the first week of the year without many new releases to highlight, likely because of SXSW, but there is new film: the German rom-com Faraway from director Vanessa Jopp. In the film, overworked wife and mother Zeynep (Naomi Krauss) flees to a Croatian island and a house left to her by her late mother. There she begins to find the joy of life again — and possibly kindle a new romance. I liked what saw in the trailer, although I haven’t had a chance to watch this yet. It seems a bit like Shirley Valentine with a dash of Under The Tuscan Sun, which sounds you good to me. You can stream it now on Netflix.
This Women Writers Week at RogerEbert.com I wrote about how the work and history of the many pioneering women from the silent era has been restored to the collective consciousness through the work of scholars, researchers, archivists, preservationists, curators, and programmers. So of course I have to recommend Pamela B. Green’s excellent documentary Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché.
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