Wanda (1970)

In the organizer's words:

Socio-critical road movie by and with Barbara Loden. A journey back in time to 1970, now at the Tilsiter Lichtspiele cinema.

In her only feature film, WANDA, Barbara Loden tells the story of a woman who wanders seemingly aimlessly through rural Pennsylvania. After leaving her husband and children, Wanda drifts from place to place, from encounter to relationship, through social and emotional fringes. When she joins a petty criminal, she seems to leave her previous existence completely behind her, until a failed bank robbery takes her life in a different direction once again.

Barbara Loden, who directed the film, wrote the screenplay and played the leading role herself, creates a radically open portrait of female existence with an almost documentary-like visual language. Wanda is an anti-heroine beyond victim myths, emancipation fantasies or moral judgments. As a quiet, uncomfortable dissenting voice to male-dominated New Hollywood cinema, WANDA is still astonishingly relevant today and has influenced numerous directors and actors such as Isabelle Huppert, Nan Goldin, Marguerite Duras and Christian Petzold. A timeless piece of cinema about female existence, visibility and radical creative autonomy, from a time when female directors were still the exception.

After a string of abusive relationships, Wanda abandons her family and drifts through mining country until she seeks solace in the company of a petty criminal.

Wanda (1970) - Now at the cinema Tilsiter Lichtspiele