Film Appreciation Class

Spring 2026

"Four Bold and Unconventional Films by Female Directors"

The Spring 2026 Film Appreciation series showcases four outstanding but often overlooked films by female directors.  The films provide unflinching examinations of tragedy, war, personal growth, power dynamics, the choices for self and family made by female protagonists, and their consequences. The films are frank and sometimes controversial. All of them represent a female creative viewpoint. 

Register Now

The Films

Week 1: SORRY, BABY (2025), directed by Eva Victor, starring Eva Victor, Naomi Ackie, Lucas Hedges. 103 minutes. 

Agnes was sexually assaulted by her professor during graduate school.  The film follows her journey to the present day and explores how the assault shaped the protagonist's relationships with others, her career as a literature professor, and her hope for a better future.

Winner: Best Directorial Debut from the National Board of Review
Nominated: Best Original Screenplay at the Critic’s Choice Awards

Week 2: QUO VADIS, AIDA? (2020), directed by Jasmila Zbanic, starring Jasna Djuricic. 101 minutes.

Nominated: Best International Feature Film at the 93rd Academy Awards
Nominated: 2 BAFTA Awards
Winner:  4 European Film Awards, including Best Film

Schoolteacher Aida works as a translator between Dutch UN Peacekeepers and the Mayor of Srebenica, a small enclave in the Serb Republic designated by the UN as a safe zone during the Bosnian War.   Aida tries to keep her family safe as it becomes clear that the UN force will fail to protect the Bosnian Muslim citizens of Srebenica.   

Week 3: WANDA (1970), directed by Barbara Loden, starring Barbara Loden and Michael Higgins. 102 minutes.

Winner: Venice International Film Festival Pasinetti Award for Best Foreign Film 
Selected:  USA Library of Congress  National Film Registry for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

A rural Pennsylvania woman, unhappy with the conventional family and career choices availabile available to her and with no financial resources, drifts aimlessly through a series of relationships after a divorce.  In a desparate bid to escape her situation, she is entrapped by and yields to the domination of a succession of abusive men.  

Week 4: THE DIARY OF A TEENAGE GIRL (2015), directed by Marielle Heller, starring Bel Powley, Alexander Skarsgard and Kristen Wiig. 102 minutes.

Highly-rated by critics and viewers, this comedic drama film earned a 95% approval rating on Rotton Tomatoes, 5-star review from The Guardian, and numerous other accolades.

15-year-old Minnie keeps an audio diary as she discovers her own sexuality, initiating and navigating a sexual relationship with her mother's boyfriend and encounters with schoolmates in an emotionally complex and volatile journey that ultimately leads her to a fuller acceptance of self, social empowerment, and ownership of her life narrative.  

 

Instructor

Dale M. Pollock has produced 13 feature films, including "Set It Off," "Mrs. Winterbourne," "A Midnight Clear," "The Beast" and "Blaze." His films have received four Academy Award nominations and have won several awards, including Best Film at the Cleveland and Houston film festivals.

He was chief film reviewer for Daily Variety, chief film reporter for the Los Angeles Times (where he was a Pulitzer Prize nominee) and author of “Skywalking: The Life and Films of George Lucas,” first published in 1984 with more than 150,000 copies in print. He is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences; the Producers Guild; the Writers Guild of America, West; and frequently speaks at film festivals and conferences.