Leonor Will Never Die
Women's Work: Essential Films by Female Filmmakers
•
1h 39m
Directed by Martika Ramirez Escobar | 100 mins | 2022
A festival favorite, Escobar’s debut feature offers a surreal, self-reflexive tribute to Filipino action cinema. Retired screenwriter Leonor Reyes (Sheila Francisco) lays comatose in a hospital after a collision between her skull and a television set—but while her body doesn’t move, in her mind she’s been transported into one of her own unfinished films, confronted with the larger-than-life heroes and villains of her invention, as well as the unhappy memories of their real-life inspirations. An ingeniously layered narrative with serious insights into Pinoy pop movies, that’s also seriously funny.
Up Next in Women's Work: Essential Films by Female Filmmakers
-
Once a Moth
Directed by Lupita Aquino-Kashiwahara | 110 mins | 1976
Groundbreaking in its critical depiction of the American military presence in the Philippines, Aquino-Kashiwahara’s incendiary political drama tells the story of a young lower middle-class couple (Aunor and Jay Ilagan) and their immediate fa... -
Ornette: Made in America
Directed by Shirley Clarke | 85 mins | 1985
“Discovering the work of filmmaker and the Film-Makers' Cooperative co-founder, Shirley Clarke made me aware of the wide range of cinema’s possibilities. This 1985 documentary shot in collaboration with the late Ornette Coleman, using a diverse array of... -
Portrait of Jason
Directed by Shirley Clarke | 107 mins | 1967
A distillation of a single 12-hour interview in a room at the Chelsea Hotel with the charismatic Jason Holliday (“real” name Aaron Payne), a gay, African American cabaret dancer, part-time hustler, and full-time raconteur, Portrait of Jason grows from ...
