David Farnor | On 11, Apr 2020

Mark Cousins’ new film is headed to BFI Player this May.

Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema follows in the footsteps of Mark Cousins’ earlier opus, The Story of Film: An Odyssey (2011). An epic 14-hour long documentary, five years in the making, it is a guided tour of the art and craft of filmmaking covered in 40 themed chapters, illustrated with almost 1,000 film extracts from 183 women filmmakers from around the world. Some are well-established but others little-known, under-appreciated or even forgotten. The narrators, who are also seen on screen, are Tilda Swinton, Jane Fonda, Adjoa Andoh, Sharmila Tagore, Kerry Fox, Thandie Newton and Debra Winger.

It had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2019 and screened at the Dublin Film Festival and Glasgow Film Festival in February/March. The film was scheduled to have a theatrical release ‪on 8th May‬ alongside a BFI Southbank season highlighting the work of some of the women featured in it. The season and a screening of the film will now take place at BFI Southbank later in the year, with BFI Player to release the film digitally instead.

BFI Player’s Subscription service will release the film in 5 chronological episodes, ‪beginning on 18th May‬ and ‪ending on 15th June‬. Other platforms including Curzon Home Cinema, iTunes and Amazon Prime will release it ‪on 18th May‬ for rental and purchase. A 4-disc Blu-ray box set will be released by the BFI on the same day with special features including The Making of WOMEN MAKE FILM (2020), a new video essay by Mark Cousins in which he discusses his influences, motivations and methodology, and a Q&A with documentary maker Barbara Kopple that took place at TIFF in September 2019. In support of the film’s May release, Mark will also curate a collection of a dozen films on BFI Player all made by women.

Here’s a trailer:

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