Marielle Heller - Diary of a Teenage Girl
A 15-year-old girl loses her virginity to her mother’s boyfriend. What is going on in her mind in the middle of that awakening? In her feature film debut, Heller explores her protagonist’s colorful inner life with empathetic curiosity as she navigates the tricky years of teenage sexuality. Through her careful observations of character interactions as well as soliloquies, she makes it clear that she is not interested in lewd details but in the minutiae of that time and space that crafts one’s personality. With a highly specific realization of its milieu, the film comes to life in embracing the unpredictable rhythms of the protagonist’s life. Scenes shift between humorous and moving within moments. Heller shows that sometimes, the most cinematically thrilling thing to do is to just commit to honesty, however that may look. Streaming on HBO Max.

Afia Serena Nathaniel - Dukhtar
In this gripping mother-daughter drama, Nathaniel depicts the perilous race to freedom of a mother and her 10-year-old daughter as they try to evade a child from a tribal leader. Nathaniel rests the potency of her storytelling in two aspects. First is the tension between the perspectives of the mother, one of protective instincts and unpacked trauma, and the child, one of innocence. Those two diverge and clash in vivid ways, effectively demonstrating the different layers of patriarchy that these women had to deal with. The second one is the escape itself, depicted with gripping leanness. Nathaniel is not interested in glamorizing the act, but through framing, movement, and pacing, we realize the life-and-death significance of their fight.  Available to rent on iTunes, Google Play, and YouTube.

Celine Sciamma - Girlhood
Gender, race, and economic status are the main forces in Sciamma’s complex take on female adolescence. With her 16-year-old protagonist, she makes it clear that her journey is not just of self-discovery but also of survival. The camera is not one to detach from that viewpoint: we see her move within that frame as we see how she negotiates her place. Not only that but also her inability to make such negotiations; oppressive forces either push her aside or hold her in the center like in an intervention. But the film breaks that by also showing her attempts to gain agency. As her gang dances to Rihanna’s “Diamonds”, we witness them try to live aspirations but with our brutal understanding that it would most likely remain to be elusive. Streaming on fuboTV, Showtime, Hoopla, The Criterion Channel, Kanopy, and DirecTV.

Deniz Gamze Ergüven - Mustang
In a small town in Northern Turkey, five young girls are prohibited to go out of their house after they played with boys after class. Since then, they are just waiting until they are married off. Ergüven investigates the cruelty of such circumstances through the lens of their battle for liberation, however small their victories may be. She makes it a point to capture the central characters with vibrant energy, one that pulsates with the simmering penchant for rebellion. Ergüven manages to balance the focus on the five girls with incisive precision. And us, as viewers, feel that continuous build-up until we reach the tumultuous finale. There is no need to embellish the film’s stylistic choices; her decision to just be direct makes for an even more brutally realistic depiction of misogyny. Available to rent on iTunes, Amazon Video, and Google Play.

Crystal Moselle - The Wolfpack
Moselle transports us into an apartment in Manhattan to tell the story of the Angulo family, living in enforced seclusion by their patriarch. While the premise is ripe for exploiting the peculiarity of the subjects’ lifestyle, Moselle focuses on the ecosystem that the family has created inside their apartment. She goes back and forth between archival and present-day footage in her quest to understand the choice the parents made. Moselle does not shoot scenes as an intruder but as a welcomed guest, one that understands the dynamic of being detached but with the sincere desire to grasp their ways. As the brothers recreate scenes from their favorite films, Moselle turns the camera into a kaleidoscope, focusing on the beauty that has come out of a situation without fetishizing the subject matter. Streaming on HBO Max, YouTube, Hoopla, Kanopy, DirecTV, and Pluto TV.

HONORABLE MENTIONS
Angelina Jolie - By the Sea
Mia Hansen-Løve - Eden
Veronika Franz & Severin Fiala - Goodnight Mommy
Aren Perdeci & Ela Alyamac - Lost Birds
Ivona Juka - You Carry Me

What would your dream ballot look like?