Anthology Film Archives

Film Screenings / Programs / Series

WANDERING WOMEN

January 24 – February 9

“I think a lot of people are that way. I think millions of people are that way. Not just women, but men too. They don’t know why they exist and they have no direction in their life. They have no reason for existing. (You see these people like Wanda and Mr. Dennis are not – they are not aware of their condition as maybe better educated people would be. They’re not aware of the situation they’re in.)” –Barbara Loden, on WANDA

“WANDA is a movie about ‘someone’. […] ‘When I say someone, I mean someone who has been isolated, someone who has been considered on himself, separated from social conditions where he is. Like extracted from society and observed by you. I think there is always something in the self, in you, that society cannot reach, something insurmountable, impenetrable and decisive.” –Marguerite Duras, on WANDA

Barbara Loden’s WANDA explores the phenomenon of wandering, which is both the movement of an anonymous identity, without purpose, aimless, seeking something abstract, but which also represents a kind of questioning – not actively critical, but rather a form of existential interrogation of oneself through the environment being traversed. The gender dimension amplifies this questioning. It’s no wonder that the image of a wandering woman should emerge as a major metaphor within the cinema of the 1960s and 70s: in the midst of a cultural and sexual revolution, this figure comes to embody the question of what to do with this newfound “freedom” when women’s role in society remained unresolved and undefined outside of the domestic sphere.

The films in this series track the development of this motif in global cinema from the mid-1960s to the mid-1990s. The protagonists of these films rupture the usual ambivalence between feminine/passive and masculine/active roles. Whether helmed by women (Loden, Chantal Akerman, Ulrike Ottinger, etc) or men (Ken Loach, Ousmane Sembène, Masao Adachi, and so on), their trajectories complicate the “male gaze,” as we as viewers feel intimately connected to them, constantly wondering about their wandering: What do they want? Where would that take them? How do they feel?

These roving women are largely unburdened by possessions, carrying only their child, a hotel room key, a backpack, a handbag that will soon be stolen, or a mask – a relic of a stolen identity. They have too many drinks and meet strangers who they will fall for or forget, fight or befriend, hitch a ride from, or make love with for the sake of the sexual revolution. Yet, they glide like oil on water, sometimes drawing attention but without altering the space, without making history. It’s through this drifting, like a quiet cry for help, that they open a space to reflect on the situation of women, on the experience of inhabiting an indifferent environment – built by men, for men. They testify to our contemporary time of uncertainty, underscoring – like an echo – the mobility of those who have no choice but to be in movement.

“Wandering Women” is guest-programmed by Nina Verneret, who also wrote the introduction and, unless otherwise noted, the individual film descriptions.

Special thanks to Carmen Accaputo (Cineteca di Bologna); Linda Bastide; Brian Belovarac (Janus Films); Bret Berg (AGFA); Annie Bozzola; Chris Chouinard (Park Circus); Eric Di Bernardo (Rialto Pictures); Sam Di Iorio; Reinhild Feldhaus (Ulrike Ottinger Filmproduktion); Carolyn Funk; Julien Gester; Elena Gorfinkel; Ivan Grifi; Jake Perlin (The Film Desk); Nuno Pimentel (Rapid Eye Movies); Gina Telaroli; Todd Wiener & Steven Hill (UCLA Film & Television Archive); and Carsten Zimmer (Arsenal – Institut für Film und Videokunst).

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