Why authentic abortion stories in TV and film are a sign of the times in post-Roe era

Hollywood has rich history of abortion storytelling, according to researcher

Jenna Benchetrit · CBC News
Aug 06, 2022

In 2004, a Canadian TV show made headlines for a controversial episode in which a pregnant teenage girl decides, much to her boyfriend's distress, to get an abortion. Her mother drives her to the clinic.

Yes, it was Degrassi: The Next Generation — and the infamous episode, entitled Accidents Will Happen, was postponed for American viewers after a U.S. cable channel decided to pull it before it could air.

Continued: https://www.cbc.ca/news/entertainment/abortion-storytelling-tv-film-1.6543210

How abortion storylines in film and TV have evolved in recent years

by Scottie Andrew, CNN
Thu June 2, 2022

(CNN) During the making of "Obvious Child," director/screenwriter Gillian Robespierre had a few balls in the air.

Would Jenny Slate's Donna, a fledgling stand-up comedian with a penchant for potty humor, end up with Jake Lacy's buttoned-up Max? And would Robespierre find investors who'd trust her to make the movie she wanted as a first-time filmmaker?

https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/02/entertainment/abortion-film-tv-representation-cec/index.html

02.06.2022

movies about abortion

Never Rarely Sometimes Always

‘Silence guarantees nothing will change’: film-makers challenge the anti-abortion movement

Audrey Diwan’s 1960s-set drama Happening is the latest in a wave of films on an issue that is increasingly topical

Rachel Pronger
Fri 22 Apr 2022

When Audrey Diwan first started writing a script about abortion, people would ask her why. Adapting Annie Ernaux’s memoir about the author’s struggle to obtain an illegal abortion as a student in 1960s France, Diwan knew the story was important, but it was difficult to persuade others of its relevance. Fast forward a few years, and no one is asking why. When Happening premiered at the Venice film festival last year, critics were quick to draw connections between the plight of Anne (the character in the film) and the tightening of abortion restrictions around the world. As it lands in UK cinemas this week, this period piece feels timelier than ever.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2022/apr/22/silence-guarantees-nothing-will-change-film-makers-challenge-the-anti-abortion-movement

An Abortion Film That’s Both Topical and Timeless

In the Sundance drama Happening, the hardest part of one woman’s unwanted pregnancy is managing everyone else’s expectations.

By Shirley Li
FEBRUARY 7, 2022

Anne Duchesne, the hero of the film Happening, is an intelligent and serious 23-year-old woman who knows what she wants. It’s 1963 in southwest France, and if her leering university classmates judge her, the daughter of a working-class family, for her literary ambitions and for hooking up with local men, so be it. Played by Anamaria Vartolomei, Anne is economical with her words and her friendships. She rarely switches up her wardrobe or hairstyle. And when she learns that she’s pregnant, she immediately asks her doctor to terminate it. “I’d like a child one day,” she says later, “but not instead of a life.”

Based on the acclaimed author Annie Ernaux’s semi-autobiographical novel, Happening follows Anne as she seeks an illegal abortion. The director, Audrey Diwan, doesn’t indulge in melodrama; she takes a measured and minimalist approach to the story, immersing the audience in Anne’s perspective.

Continued: https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2022/02/happening-film-abortion/621615/

From “Plan B” to “Grandma,” 5 abortion road trip movies that reflect our frustrating reality

From buddy comedies to dramas, movies focused on abortion barriers tell a story that shouldn’t need to be told

By KYLIE CHEUNG
PUBLISHED JUNE 6, 2021

Last week, Hulu's "Plan B" became the latest movie to focus on the complex, stigmatizing and sexist barriers to reproductive care, which are especially difficult for young people. In Natalie Morales' directorial debut, two South Dakota high school students, Sunny (Kuhoo Verma) and Lupe (Victoria Morales) have 24 hours to find emergency contraception after Sunny's first sexual encounter. The problem is, the only pharmacist in their small hometown denies Sunny access to the pill citing the "conscience clause."

To be clear, emergency contraception is entirely different from abortion care, preventing rather than ending a pregnancy that's already underway. But other than that important distinction, "Plan B" continues a growing trend of movies in which seeking abortion or other reproductive care through tremendous cost, geographical and legislative barriers isn't just a subplot — it's the main storyline.

Continued: https://www.salon.com/2021/06/06/abortion-road-trip-movies-plan-b-unpregnant-grandma/

USA – In 2020, TV and film still couldn’t get abortion right

December 29, 2020

Stephanie
Herold and Gretchen Sisson

According to decades of research, abortion is an incredibly common and safe
medical procedure.

But if you learned about abortion only from movies and TV, that’s not the story
you’d see. For the last eight years, we’ve been studying onscreen depictions of
abortion. We’ve found that Hollywood tends to dramatically exaggerate the
medical risks associated with abortion while downplaying real barriers to
access.

Aside from a few exceptions, 2020’s onscreen content continued to reflect
patterns we’d identified in previous years.

https://theconversation.com/in-2020-tv-and-film-still-couldnt-get-abortion-right-152223

29.12.2020

Hollywood and abortion

Hyde Amendment

I May Destroy You

Never Rarely Sometimes Always

How The “Abortion Road Trip” Movie Became An Instant Classic

KAYLA KUMARI UPADHYAYA
OCTOBER 20, 2020

Conversations about abortion have been playing out on the big screen since decades before Roe V. Wade legalized them in the United States in 1973. One of the first known movies that deals with the topic is a 1916 film called Where Are My Children? Perhaps unsurprisingly, given the early year, it was a negative portrayal of abortion.

In recent years, however, depictions of abortion in movies have become more common and somewhat more realistic. In 2020 alone, there have been nine films that depict a character obtaining an abortion, double the number of 2019, according to Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health (ANSIRH)’s Abortion Onscreen Database. Only two of these movies showed an adverse physical outcome as a result of an abortion, and none portray an adverse psychological outcome. Two are comedies.

Continued: https://www.refinery29.com/en-us/2020/10/10015436/abortion-road-trip-movie-trend

‘Life is long, and this is one event’: Films like Saint Frances are finally getting abortion right

As women’s reproductive rights remain under constant threat, Beth Webb speaks to actor and filmmaker Kelly O’Sullivan about the importance of showing abortions on-screen

Beth Webb
July 20, 2020

About 30 minutes into Chicago-set indie comedy Saint Frances, Kelly O’Sullivan’s Bridget undergoes a medical abortion. In-between forcefully vomiting and sitting uncomfortably on the toilet, the 34-year-old waitress spends the day in the arms of her lover, watching nature documentaries and reading chapters from Harry Potter.

“It was very important to me to have a sweet abortion montage,” says O’Sullivan – who drew on her own medical abortion for her screenwriting debut, which is out in the UK now – from her home in Chicago. “Women and girls walk away from watching abortions in film and TV feeling truly scared, and that might impact the way they think about making a choice like that for themselves in the future.”

Continued: https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/features/saint-frances-movie-abortion-kelly-o-sullivan-obvious-child-portrait-lady-on-fire-a9608341.html

Films such as Saint Frances and Obvious Child are showing that the subject need not be depicted with guilt and shame

Steve Rose
Mon 6 Jul 2020

There is nothing funny about the pro-choice v anti-abortion culture war that has been intensifying over the past few years, but comedy is proving to be a powerful weapon in it. To the extent that the phrase “abortion comedy” is no longer an oxymoron. You could well apply it to Alex Thompson’s new indie film Saint Frances, whose subject is a 34-year-old underachiever (Kelly O’Sullivan, who also wrote the movie) who hasn’t got her life together.

Becoming a nanny is a step forward; getting pregnant with a man she barely knows is a step back. She has no trouble getting a termination, but the film deals honestly with the aftermath, both physical (never has a film been less ashamed about menstruation) and emotional (even if her boyfriend has more issues about it than she does, which he writes down in his “feelings journal”). It does not treat the matter lightly, nor does it present a termination as something shocking or shaming or freighted with guilt.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2020/jul/06/saint-frances-how-a-new-wave-of-taboo-busting-comedies-are-tackling-abortion

06.07.2020

Ctrl Alt Delete series

Kelly O’Sullivan

Never Rarely Sometimes Always

Never Rarely Sometimes Always review – profoundly moving abortion drama

Never Rarely Sometimes Always review - profoundly moving abortion drama
Eliza Hittman’s coming-of-age story about a US teenager seeking a termination is heartbreaking and painfully authentic

Mark Kermode
Sun 10 May 2020

From Eliza Hittman, the remarkable writer-director of It Felt Like Love and Beach Rats, comes another drama that manages to blend the gritty authenticity of a documentary with the poetic sensibility of pure cinema. In her impressively measured and beautifully understated third feature, Hittman tells an oft-hidden story of reproductive rights – an age-old issue that has urgent contemporary relevance. Yet Never Rarely Sometimes Always never feels polemical. On the contrary, it is perhaps best described as a perfectly observed portrait of female friendship; a coming-of-age story with road-movie inflections, piercingly honest and deeply affecting.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2020/may/10/never-rarely-sometimes-always-review-profoundly-moving-abortion-drama-eliza-hittman-sidney-flanigan

10.05.2020