{"id":14932,"date":"2017-03-22T09:38:07","date_gmt":"2017-03-22T17:38:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/independentlens\/?post_type=blog&#038;p=14932"},"modified":"2020-02-28T10:20:59","modified_gmt":"2020-02-28T18:20:59","slug":"9-great-documentaries-about-women-activists","status":"publish","type":"blog","link":"https:\/\/dipsy.pbs.org\/independentlens\/blog\/9-great-documentaries-about-women-activists\/","title":{"rendered":"Nine Great Documentaries About Women Activists"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As Women\u2019s History Month continues, we\u2019re shining the spotlight on women activists who faced down injustice, pioneered paths for other women and girls, or have fought heroically trying to save the world.<\/p>\n<p>Although the women on this list focused on different arenas, in the end they\u2019re all inevitably linked. As feminist icon <a href=\"http:\/\/msmagazine.com\/blog\/2014\/02\/27\/gloria-steinem-why-our-revolution-has-just-begun\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Gloria Steinem wrote<\/a> in 2014, \u201cRacism and sexism are intertwined, and must be fought together, always.\u201d And as oceanographer Sylvia Earle said, everything is connected: \u201cIf the oceans die, we die.\u201d<!--more--><\/p>\n<p><strong><em>He Named Me Malala<\/em><\/strong> (2014) (On Amazon, YouTube, GooglePlay, Vudu and iTunes)<\/p>\n<p>The shooting of 15-year-old Pakistani Malala Yousafzai in 2012 shocked the world. As the Taliban\u2019s repression grew, the family of the outspoken advocate for educating girls never dreamed the terror group would go so far as to shoot a child. Malala not only survived being shot in the head, she became a globally recognized activist who became the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize in history. This documentary examines not just her extraordinary courage, but the unusually supportive upbringing she had from her father.<\/p>\n<p>When director Davis Guggenheim (<em>An Inconvenient Truth<\/em>)\u00a0asks Malala if her father naming her after a famous female warrior shaped her life, she smiles and says no. \u201cMy father only gave me the name Malala, he didn\u2019t <em>make me<\/em> Malala. I chose this life. It was not forced on me. I chose this life and now I must continue it.\u201d<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u201cThere\u2019s a moment where you have to choose whether to be silent or to stand up,\u201d says the wiser-than-her-years teenager, who now lives in England. \u201cOne book, one child, one pen can change the world.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"HE NAMED ME MALALA: In Theaters Everywhere October 9\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/W-qKkZePe6E?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pbs.org\/pov\/americanrevolutionary\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong><em>American Revolutionary: The Evolution of Grace Lee Boggs<\/em><\/strong><\/a> (2013) (On Amazon; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.shoppbs.org\/product\/index.jsp?productId=37832966\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">PBS Home Video<\/a> DVD)<\/p>\n<p>Angela Davis says of the Chinese American activist, \u201cGrace has made more contributions to the African American struggle than most black people have.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Grace got a\u00a0PhD in philosophy in 1940 from Bryn Mawr and found that no one would hire \u201cOrientals,\u201d but found a job at the philosophy library in Chicago. The only housing she could afford was in a rat-infested building \u2014 when she met fellow neighbors protesting the deplorable conditions: \u201cThat brought me in contact with the black community for the first time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>She relocated to Detroit and, with her African American husband Jimmy Boggs, became two of the most influential leaders of the Black Power movement: Both had a thick FBI file. After the Detroit riots of 1967, she decided that &#8220;rebellion&#8221; and &#8220;revolution&#8221; were not the same thing: Rebellion was an \u201coutburst of violence,&#8221; and revolution was an \u201cevolution toward something much grander.\u201d Her radical idea: \u201cYou have to change yourself in order to change the world. We are responsible for the evolution of the human species. You begin with the protests, but you have to move on from there\u2026 just being angry does not constitute<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u201cYou have to change yourself in order to change the world. We are responsible for the evolution of the human species. You begin with the protests, but you have to move on from there\u2026 just being angry does not constitute revolution.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Boggs passed away in 2015, but not before inspiring generations of activists and community builders.<\/p>\n<p>The film aired on <em>POV<\/em> on PBS and was directed by Grace Lee, who first met Boggs while filming the Sundance Channel doc <em>The Grace Lee Project.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=KOPzMnTdAH0<\/p>\n<p><strong><em>What Happened, Miss Simone?<\/em><\/strong> (2015) (On Netflix)<\/p>\n<p>In 1964, the legendary blues singer wrote the politically charged song \u201cMississippi Goddam\u201d \u2014 a song few radio stations dared to play \u2014 after the killing of Civil Rights activist Medgar Evers and the Birmingham church bombing.<\/p>\n<p>Her daughter Lisa Simone Kelly, who exec-produced the Oscar-nominated film, shares, \u201cMy mother said that after she sang that song, she got so angry that her voice broke and from then on, it never\u00a0returned to its former octave. But I think Mom\u2019s anger is what sustained her. The creativity and the passion of those days is really what kept her going.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Simone became a fixture at Civil Rights events, including the Selma March in March 1965. \u201cIt was extremely dangerous. The federal marshals were called in,\u201d recalls Kelly.<\/p>\n<p>Despite criticism from her at-times abusive manager\/husband and the public, Simone said, \u201cI don\u2019t think you can be an artist and not reflect the times.\u201d Being so politically active was just one reason her career suffered, but Simone felt she had no choice:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u201cI think that the artists who don\u2019t get involved in preaching messages are probably happier, but you see, I have to live with me, and that is difficult.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The film was nominated for an Oscar\u00a0and directed by Liz Garbus, who also made\u00a0<em>Bobby Fischer Against the World<\/em> and the Academy Award-nominated short doc <em>Killing in the Name<\/em>.<\/p>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Nina Simone - What Happened, Miss Simone? - Trailer\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/z7jIOawq8y8?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<p><strong><em>The Battle of amfAR<\/em><\/strong> (on HBO Go)<\/p>\n<p>Everyone knows actress Elizabeth Taylor, the more famous co-founder of amFar (The American Foundation for AIDS Research), but much lesser known is the woman she co-founded the organization with, in 1983: research scientist Mathilde Krim.<\/p>\n<p>In this film by multi-award-winning filmmakers Jeffrey Friedman and Rob Epstein, Swiss-born Krim recalls receiving the &#8220;shock of her life&#8221; as a teenager when she saw newsreels of Allies freeing emaciated concentration camp victims. She vowed, &#8220;I&#8217;m going to replace all the stupidities with facts, with real knowledge, so after the war, I became a research scientist.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>She began hearing about a \u201cgay cancer\u201d in the early \u201880s and decided to make it her focus. But no federal funding was available for what was then considered a gay-only scourge. President Reagan refused to even acknowledge the disease.<\/p>\n<p>Krim approached Elizabeth Taylor, who was outspoken in her support of AIDS-afflicted friend Rock Hudson, and the two formed the far-reaching amfAR. The organization has funded $450 million\u00a0in research leading to breakthroughs that meant HIV\/AIDS was no longer an automatic death sentence.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Says Krim: \u201cMost people think, &#8216;I&#8217;m only a little guy, I can&#8217;t have an effect on public policy.\u2019 It\u2019s not so. Everybody can do something.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"THE BATTLE OF AMFAR Trailer\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/t1IRZhs_8Fg?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<p><strong><em>Gloria: In Her Own Words<\/em> (2011) (on <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hbo.com\/documentaries\/gloria-in-her-own-words\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">HBO Go<\/a>)<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Gloria Steinem, feminist icon and founder of <em>Ms. Magazine<\/em>,\u00a0says the instinct to rebel \u201cstarts out as a little child who says, \u2018It&#8217;s not fair.\u2019 And \u2018You are not the boss of me.\u2019 And it ends up being a worldview that questions hierarchy altogether.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>As a young newspaper staffer, she was often working without a byline or forced to undertake fluffy freelance assignments. Her male editor would give her a choice: Mail his letters on the way out or go with him to a hotel. &#8220;There was no word for sexual harassment,&#8221; she says. &#8220;It was just called life. So you had to find your own, individual way around it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Her famous undercover assignment working as a Playboy Bunny was like &#8220;being hung on a meat hook,\u201d she says in the documentary. It put her at the forefront of the women\u2019s movement, but it also saddled her with the lifelong accusations that she was merely exploiting her looks for attention.<\/p>\n<p>She started her speaking career when she couldn\u2019t find outlets that would publish her writing about the women&#8217;s movement. &#8220;At the beginning, it was treated with humor, but as it began to penetrate the mainstream of society, it became a threat.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>She founded <em>Ms. Magazine<\/em> for the same reason: No one else was publishing articles <em>by<\/em> women <em>for<\/em> women about their own movement. Newsman Harry Reasoner predicted the magazine wouldn\u2019t last five issues, saying that after the first issue they would have used up everything there was to say about being a woman. He later apologized when proven wrong.<\/p>\n<p>The neutral-marital-status coinage of \u201cMs.\u201d entered not only pop culture, but official government forms.<\/p>\n<p>The clips in this Emmy-nominated film of men freaking out on talk shows because women want to \u201ctake over,\u201d when Steinem is merely asking for \u201c50\/50,\u201d are still all-too timely.<\/p>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"HBO Documentary Films: Summer Series - Gloria Trailer (HBO)\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/G5ke2Adqqr4?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<p><strong><em>Maya Angelou and Still I Rise<\/em><\/strong> (2016) (on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">PBS.org<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p>The first documentary about beloved poet-author-actress-singer and activist Maya Angelou\u00a0traces her path from her hardscrabble childhood in the Depression-era South to reading at the 1993 Inauguration of President Bill Clinton.<\/p>\n<p>Her landmark autobiography, <em>I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings<\/em>, has inspired countless artists, including Oprah Winfrey, Alfre Woodard, and director John Singleton.\u00a0She was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize, a Tony award and won numerous Grammys.<\/p>\n<p>In the film (co-directed by Bob Hercules &amp; Rita Coburn Whack), her son says, &#8220;My mother taught me her love of justice. She said, &#8216;If you really have something to protest, you should be on the streets.'&#8221; He recounts when she refused to yield to a mounted policeman during a protest for black rights. &#8220;In those days, they would trample you and leave your body in the street.\u201d He recalls urging her to get on the sidewalk, but she wouldn&#8217;t budge, saying, &#8220;One person standing on the word of God is the majority.&#8221;\u00a0It was the police who moved that day, not the protestors.<\/p>\n<p>Angelou, who passed away in 2014, said,<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u201cWe may encounter many defeats, but we must not be defeated. In fact, it may be necessary to encounter defeats, so we can know who the hell we are.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"AMERICAN MASTERS | Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise Trailer | PBS\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/oX02IRsrtYg?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<p><strong><em>Mission Blue<\/em><\/strong> (2014) (on Netflix)<\/p>\n<p>Director James Cameron called Sylvia Earle \u201cThe Joan of Arc of the oceans\u201d and <em>The New Yorker<\/em> and <em>The New York Times<\/em> both have referred to this passionate conservationist as \u201cHer Deepness.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf I seem like a radical, it may be because I see things that others do not,\u201d says the oceanographer and biologist in this documentary, which was co-directed by Fisher Stevens (an actor who also co-produced <em>The Cove<\/em>). Earle grew up deep-sea diving off the Gulf of Mexico and has been devastated over the drastic decline in ocean life.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u201cI think if others had the opportunity to see what I have seen in my lifetime\u2026 I may not seem like a radical at all.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Inspired by her hero Jacques Cousteau, she and her father were two of the first to try his new invention, the Aqua-Lung, which let divers spend significantly more time underwater. \u201cWhen I first began exploring the ocean 20 years ago, no one imagined that you could do anything to harm it, but now we\u2019re facing paradise lost,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n<p>Although now 81, Earle still travels the globe speaking on behalf of the oceans. \u201cIf they die, we die,\u201d she says simply. She urgently reminds law- and policy-makers: \u201cWe have a chance to fix things.\u201d<\/p>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Mission Blue | Official Trailer [HD] | Netflix\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/B1wp2MQCsfQ?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<p><strong><em>Free Angela and All Political Prisoners<\/em><\/strong> (2012) (On Amazon)<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s hard to appreciate just how threatening a radical black woman was to the Establishment in 1970, especially one who was also a member of the Communist Party and a close associate of the Blank Panthers.<\/p>\n<p>Angela Davis became an assistant philosophy professor at UCLA in 1969, but her Communism and activism led then-Governor of California Ronald Reagan to try to bar from teaching at any California university.<\/p>\n<p>The documentary by African American filmmaker Shola Lynch (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.pbs.org\/pov\/chisholm\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em>Chisholm &#8217;72<\/em><\/a>) focuses mainly on Davis&#8217;s highly publicized 1970 trial in the shooting death of a judge: It takes its name from a popular slogan that was part of the worldwide wave of support she received while in prison awaiting trial.<\/p>\n<p>Davis was prosecuted on three capital counts for conspiracy, aggravated kidnapping, and first-degree murder. She was found not guilty on all counts by an all-white jury and walked out of the court as she had walked into it, with a Black Power salute \u2014 as potent a symbol of rebellion as revolutionary Ch\u00e9 Guevara.<\/p>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Free Angela and All Political Prisoners - Trailer\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/NeSIwelCiqY?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<p><strong><em>Equal Means Equal<\/em><\/strong> (2016) (On Amazon)<\/p>\n<p>Actress and activist Kamala Lopez\u2019s documentary, which was short-listed for an Oscar, looks at the myriad ways women are still unequal to men in America. She talks to icons of the women\u2019s movement, including Steinem and actress Patricia Arquette, as well as women who have faced discrimination or outright abuse at the hands of the legal and justice system, their significant others, and even their employers.<\/p>\n<p>Lopez zeroes in on one thing that could help women\u2019s fight for equal pay and rights: ratifying the <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Equal_Rights_Amendment\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Equal Rights Amendment<\/a>. The ERA seemed on the verge of passing in the \u201870s and \u201880s, but three states held out. In an age where women\u2019s rights are once being attacked, adding a line in the constitution that women must be treated the same as men would seem the surest\u00a0 \u2014 and possibly only \u2014 way to ensure fair treatment.<\/p>\n<p>One scary statistic Lopez shares: \u201cThe U.S. has more homeless women and children than any other industrialized nation.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t know what it\u2019s going to take,\u201d says Arquette, who faced backlash after citing women\u2019s rights in her Oscar speech. \u201cThese are our girls. This is our country.\u201d<\/p>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Equal Means Equal Movie Trailer 2016\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/V9ygGH-OuYI?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As Women\u2019s History Month continues, we\u2019re shining the spotlight on women activists who faced down injustice, pioneered paths for other women and girls, or have fought heroically trying to save the world. Although the women on this list focused on different arenas, in the end they\u2019re all inevitably linked. As feminist icon Gloria Steinem wrote [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":144,"featured_media":14935,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[939],"tags":[],"topic":[1247,1260,1261,1226,1227],"class_list":["post-14932","blog","type-blog","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lists","topic-cinema","topic-civil-rights-2","topic-human-rights","topic-social-justice","topic-women-and-girls"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>9 Great Docs on Women Activists | PBS | Independent Lens<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"For Women\u2019s History Month: great docs on women activist-from Maya Angelou to Grace Lee Boggs and Sylvia Earle-who faced down injustice and pioneered paths for others\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, 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