Lisa Cholodenko

"I was painstaking about casting. I thought, if this isn't spot on, it isn't going to work. When I was talking to my casting director [about a particular actor], I would say, has she had work? And if they told me 'maybe', I would say, in that case, no. I wanted the film to say this is what a 52-year-old woman looks like and she's still sexy. It took me so long to cast....The problem is that most of them [Hollywood actresses] have had work and it's just horrible! There's no way you can say that they don't look different. They don't even look younger – they just look weird. They say, oh, my eyes are drooping. But is it really any better to have them so high to your forehead?" 

Above is a quote from an article where Lisa Cholodenko talks about her film, The Kids Are Alright, as well as women directors in Hollywood. 

The Auteur Theory definitely played a role for Lisa Cholodenko in her film, The Kids Are Alright. The film is about two children conceived by artificial insemination, who then want to bring their birth father into their family life.  "Cholodenko and her co-writer, Stuart Blumberg, began working on their script in 2004. But the delay in getting the film made wasn't only to do with the laborious process of financing. In 2006, Cholodenko and her partner, Wendy Melvoin, had a baby by a sperm donor themselves and though the project had by then been given the green light, she put work on hold while she was pregnant. The film, then, deals with something that Cholodenko might one day have to cope with herself, though unlike Nic and Jules, the characters in her film, Cholodenko did not use an anonymous donor. I had worried that she would want to separate her life and the film quite decisively, but she is delightfully straightforward when it comes to it."(The Guardian/The Observer)


With films that have woman in them and focus on those woman, it would be nice to have a female director or producers perspective instead of a males perspective. In "Auther/Auetor" on page 11 the author states "What I am suggesting is that feminist literary theory can offer some strategically useful tools for feminist film study. Feminist literary critics have already made a firm decision that gender shapes signature and that there is an aesthetic difference in the way in which gendered signatures write...As Josephine Donovan optimistically claims this kind of gynocriticism can provide a validating social witness that will enable women today and in the future to see, to express, to name their own truths' because as Antonia points out, if there is no heaven 'this is the only dance we dance'." I think it is important to understand and notice this while watching movies and from that look at ourselves and at society as a whole. What are these movies, the ones directed, written or produced by men about women all have in common? They are from a male perspective. 

In The Kids Are Alright, Lisa shows that every family has their issues but regardless of how different we all look and the circumstances we are in, we can all somehow relate. Lisa is well aware that is hard out there for a woman director in Hollywood. The Screen Daily put out an article in January explaining that the "Percentage of women directors in Hollywood declining." In the article it states that "women account for just 5% of directors working in Hollywood, representing a 2% decrease from 2012." How can we look at films about women or any other "relatable" film for women, if it is mostly directed and written by a man? "Filmmaking has become more of a business, the studios have become more interested in minimizing their risk." 


Below is a personal interview, where Lisa Cholodenko is asked questions about her film and her relationship to it as well as other important topics, such as bullying. 

Citations: 

The Guardian/The Observer: Lisa Cholodenko: 'I wanted to make a film that was not sanctimonious or sentimental'
http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2010/oct/03/lisa-cholodenko-independent-women-directors

Screendaily.com 
http://www.screendaily.com/news/production/percentage-of-women-directors-in-hollywood-declining/5036871.article


Author/Auteur: Feminist Literary Theory And Feminist Film