The Surrogate (2020) Without any preachiness or melodrama, writer-director Jeremy Hersh’s first feature asks tough questions about prenatal testing, eugenics, reproductive rights, parenting, special-needs children and abortion. This lucid ethical drama is propelled by a performance of stunning psychological insight and raw feeling from Jasmine Batchelor as a single woman who has volunteered to be […]

Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019) The slow-burn chemistry between an artist (Noémie Merlant) and her initially unwilling subject (Adèle Haenel) — who’s also a reluctant bride-to-be — ignites this sensuous and exquisitely measured period piece. Set in late 18th century France, Céline Sciamma’s drama is a lesbian love story, but its true subject […]

Plan B (2021) Buddy comedy meets road trip movie in Natalie Morales’ charming film about two South Dakotan teens’ panicked, chaotic search for the morning-after pill. After a condom falls out of her vagina the morning after losing her virginity, and after being denied access to Plan B by a morally opposed pharmacist — citing […]

One Sings, the Other Doesn’t (1977) Agnès Varda’s ode to female friendship and women’s liberation traces the bond between two young women over a dozen years, beginning in 1962. That bond is forged when Apple (Valérie Mairesse), a 17-year-old with a fiercely independent streak, secures the money needed for her new friend Suzanne (Thérèse Liotard), […]

Never Rarely Sometimes Always (2020) A transfixing account of a small-town teenager dealing with an unplanned pregnancy, Eliza Hittman’s Never Rarely Sometimes Always, offers candid contemplation of abortion as a choice based not on hand-wringing but on sobering pragmatism. Autumn (Sidney Flanigan) and Skylar (Talia Ryder), her steadfast cousin, embark on an unsettling odyssey from […]