Cinema and the Second Sex: Women’s Filmmaking in France in the 1980s and 1990s

Women’s film-making in France is a source of both delight and despair. On the one hand, the numbers are impressive–during the period in question, over 250 feature-length films were made by over 100 women directors in France. On the other hand, despite the heritage of French feminism, French women directors characteristically disclaim their gender as a sigificant factor in their filmaking.This incisive study provides an informative, critical guide to this major body of work, exploring the boundaries between personal films (intimate psychological dramas relating to key stages in life) and genre films (which demonstrate women’s ability to appropriate and rework popular genres). It analyzes the effects of “postfeminism,” women’s desire to enter the mainstream, and the recent impact of a new generation of filmakers. It thus enables readers for the first time to take stock of the wealth and diversity of women’s contribution to French cinema during the 1980s and 1990s.