No Mercy

“Women make the harsher films,” said Kira Muratova to her admirer Isa Willinger, who visited the Soviet (and later Ukrainian) director in Odesa at the end of Muratova’s film career and the beginning of her own. Having faced repeated censorship and various working bans from the Soviet Politburo, Muratova was a tough cookie herself. Muratova’s work struck more just a chord with Willinger, who subsequently set out to explore the alleged harshness of female filmmaking. What does “harshness” mean both in cinema and in reality? What defines female filmmaking? Do women see the world differently? And what about the much debated (and misused) “female gaze”? Through interviews with over a dozen directors—including Catherine Breillat, Virginie Despentes, Monika Treut, Ana Lily Amirpour, Alice Diop and Nina Menkes, NO MERCY weaves together a tapestry of personal narratives, including accounts of real-life violence, which intertwine with professional reflections on power structures and how women carve out spaces to establish distinct cinematic languages or whole new qualities of harshness. Interview excerpts and film clips are assembled like pearls on a string and held together by Willinger’s own voiceover commentary and reflections. (Anna Katharina Laggner)

In the presence of Isa Willinger.

Isa Willinger (selection): PORNOPROTOKOLLE (2009), FORT VON ALLEN SONNEN (2013), HI, AI. LIEBESGESCHICHTEN AUS DER ZUKUNFT (2019), PLASTIC FANTASTIC (2023)