Girlfriends

A photographer and her girlfriend are roommates. She is stuck with small-change shooting jobs and dreams of success. When her roommate decides to get married and leave, she feels hurt and has to learn how to deal with living alone.

Rating: 12A
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Director: Claudia Weill
Stars: Melanie Mayron, Eli Wallach, Adam Cohen

Faith in Film is a new curation service by Dan Levy and Darren Richman dedicated to showcasing the best in cult Jewish cinema.

We have a broad understanding of what it means to be a Jew, and our programming reflects that. Our church is broad, our 'cinegogue' wide.

Each film we show will be situated alongside exclusive talks and Q&As. Screening movies, as faithfully as possible. 

Joining us for a live Zoom Q&A after the film will be director Claudia Weill and screenwriter Vicki Polon.

Follow us here: @faith.in.films

Claudia Weill is a film, television, and theatre director. Having co-directed the Academy Award nominated documentary feature The Other Half of the Sky: A China Memoir (1975), Weill went on to direct Girlfriends (1978), her feature film debut. Upon its release, Stanley Kubrick praised the film, saying it “was one of the very rare American films that I would compare with the serious, intelligent, sensitive writing and filmmaking that you find in the best directors in Europe”.

The film has since become a cult classic. Its many contemporary admirers include Lena Dunham, who went on to ask Weill to direct an episode of her seminal TV series Girls (2013). Weill’s other TV work includes directing episodes of the Emmy award winning Thirtysomething (1987-89) and Once and Again (1999-2001). Her second and most recent feature film, It’s My Turn (1980), won her the Donatello (European Oscar) for Best New Director.

In recent years, Weill has turned her focus to theatre. Perhaps most notably, she directed the West Coast Premiere of Pulitzer Prize winner Doubt by John Patrick Shanley.

She has also guest taught directing for film, television and theatre at various institutions across America, including Columbia, Harvard, and NYU. She is currently working on a documentary exploring the art and craft of directing. 

Vicki Polon is a screenwriter and producer. After workshopping the story with friend and collaborator Claudia Weill, Polon went on to write the screenplay for Girlfriends. Since then, she has gone on to produce two further features, Imposters (1979) and Mr. Wonderful (1993), for which she also co-wrote the screenplay. The film boasts an incredible cast that features Matt Dillon, William Hurt, Luiz Guzman, and the late James Gandolfini.