Throughout October, four female-led films will screen in Los Angeles as part of Women in Entertainment’s bi-annual documentary series. The documentaries featured — The Untold Tales of Armistead Maupin, Girl Unbound: The War to Be Her, Everything Must Change and The S Word — were all directed by women and will be shown on four consecutive Sundays starting Oct. 1.
The series, announced Monday, will take place at the ArcLight theaters in Santa Monica and Hollywood and aims to bring award-winning and festival-favorite documentaries to a wider audience.
“Living in Los Angeles, the epicenter of film, I find myself frustrated that so many of the best documentaries that have debuted at top festivals around the country never have a chance to play in theaters in this city,” curator Marjan Safinia said in a statement. “This series is filling that gap. I’m particularly proud this year to showcase exceptional films with women behind the camera. Documentary is a considerably more level playing field for women directors, and their work is entertaining, moving, intelligent, brave and unwaveringly excellent.”
The Untold Tales of Armistead Maupin, which premiered at SXSW, will kick off the series Oct. 1. The Jennifer Kroot-directed film follows Maupin on his journey from growing up in the South to becoming a gay-rights pioneer through his novels.
Erin Heidenreich’s Girl Unbound: The War to Be Her, fresh from the Toronto International Film Festival, will screen next on Oct. 8 and tells the story of a young girl who rebels against the Taliban, disguising herself as a boy so she can play sports.
Iranian-American filmmaker Mariam Jobrani documents her own journey after being diagnosed with breast cancer in Everything Must Change (co-directed with Kenny Krauss), which will have its world premiere Oct. 15.
The Los Angeles premiere of Lisa Klein’s The S Word, about suicide-attempt survivors, will close out the series Oct. 22.
All films start at 4 p.m. and will be followed by a Q&A with the filmmakers. Everything Must Change will be shown at ArcLight Hollywood, and the other three will screen at ArcLight Santa Monica.
