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Feminist Visions

Tracing Feminist Epistemologies in Contemporary Film and Television

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Description

What does feminist filmmaking in the 21st century look like? This book assesses the influence of Western feminist theory on contemporary film and television - nearly fifty years after Claire Johnston and Laura Mulvey called for a feminist counter-cinema - highlighting the cross-fertilization between feminist film theory and practice.

Is there a #Metoo genre? Have traditional Hollywood genres been reframed? How has intersectional feminist film theory been explored on screen? In essays spanning film and television in a broad range of genres from the US, the UK and India, contributors renew definitions of feminist filmmaking since second wave feminist film scholars first grappled with the image of women in film and the role of women in the film industry. Feminist Visions provides an insightful space for discussion of feminist film theory as applied to recent TV series such as Devious Maids (2013-2016), Unbelievable (2019), Greenleaf (2016-2020), I May Destroy You (2020) and Insecure (2016-2021) and films including Maid in Manhattan (2002), Night Moves (2014), Gone Girl (2014), I Care a Lot (2020) and The Discreet Charm of the Savarnas (2020).

Table of Contents

List of Contributors
Introduction – Hélène Charlery and Cristelle Maury
Acknowledgement

Part I. Feminist Tales of Rape: #MeToo Television?
1. Unbelievable (2019): Feminism and Rape – Delphine Letort
2. “Monstrous and Shameless:” Trauma, Control, and Narrative (of) Empowerment in I May Destroy You (2020) – Sabine Aretz

Part II: Postfeminist or Intersectional Television and Cinema
3. Nothing But a “Woke Façade”? Postfeminism Turned Intersectional Feminism in Contemporary Reboots of Female-Centric TV Shows – Audrey Haensler
4. “God Is Good, All the Time”: Womanism and Black Feminism in Service of Christian Hegemony in Greenleaf (OWN, 2016-2020) – Mickaël Toulza
5. Empowering Latina voices: Exploring the figure of the Latina maid in 21st-century independent films - Emilie Cheyroux
6. The Gaze is the Message – Anne Crémieux
Part III: Reclaiming Feminist Film Theory
7. Making Film Noir with a Feminist Gaze in Theory and Practice: the case of Kelly Reichardt's Night Moves - Cristelle Maury
8. Stitching together feminism, genre(s) and couture in The Dressmaker (2015) – Lauren O'Mahony and Kyra Clarke
9. A Feminist Archive of Past Future Sounds: Archiveological Reverberations in Lisa Rovner's Sisters with Transistors (2020) – Samuel Fernández-Pichel
Part IV: Feminist Film/making and Reception
10. “He Doesn't Get to Win”: Twitter, Fan Culture, and Gone Girl – Brenna Sherrill
11. Finding Feminist Filmmaking – Janet Staiger
Index

Product details

Bloomsbury Academic Test
Published 22 Jan 2026
Format Ebook (Epub & Mobi)
Edition 1st
Extent 272
ISBN 9781350417724
Imprint Bloomsbury Academic
Illustrations 30 bw illus
Publisher Bloomsbury Publishing

About the contributors

Anthology Editor

Hélène Charlery

Hélène Charlery is Associate Professor of American…

Anthology Editor

Cristelle Maury

Cristelle Maury is Associate Professor of English…

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