Subscribe to watch - 14-day free trial, then £4.99 a month
Sophia Loren: Reshaping Femininity
Exclusive to BFI Player, a video essay exploring Sophia Loren’s 60s and 70s filmography, and how her work shook up Italian gender roles.
Director: Maha Albadrawi
Overview
An icon of continental glamour, Sophia Loren's films helped portray post-war Italy as a land of exotic sexuality and permissiveness. Yet Loren's characters - in films such as Boccaccio '70, Marriage, Italian Style and Yesterday, Tomorrow and Today - represent a more nuanced take on womens' lives and desires than the stereotype of the "shapely star" allowed.
In this video essay - made exclusively for BFI Player - filmmaker Maha Al-Badrawi explains how Loren's 60s and 70s filmography both represented post-war Catholic Italy's expectations and subverted them. Her work challenged a social context that held women up as saintly or sexy, shook up Italian gender roles and showed Loren to a cultural export that truly represented the complexity of her country.
Related
Emotion Pictures: Yearning and Repressed Desire in Melodrama Emotion Pictures: Yearning and Repressed Desire in Melodrama
Short documentary 2025 19 mins Director: Maha Albadrawi and Henry Barnes
Writer Nadia M Oliva tracks the development of the melodrama genre and how it plays out across film, TV and online.
Rhianna Dhillon's favourite Coming of Age films Rhianna Dhillon's favourite Coming of Age films
Short documentary 2025 11 mins Director: Maha Albadrawi and Henry Barnes
Rhianna Dhillon selects her favourite Coming of Age films available now on BFI Player.
How to Film... a Swimming Pool How to Film... a Swimming Pool
Short documentary 2025 17 mins
Cinema history demonstrates swimming pools are awash with symbolic possibility – artist Justin Anderson shares some tips on how to film them
Michael Haneke: The Humanity Behind the Horror Michael Haneke: The Humanity Behind the Horror
Short documentary 2025 11 mins Director: Mike Muncer
In this film, podcast host Michael Muncer argues that the stereotype of Haneke as a director interested only in suffering misses the point.
No Home But Cinema: The Spaces of Chantal Akerman No Home But Cinema: The Spaces of Chantal Akerman
Short documentary 2025 14 mins Director: Jessica McGoff
This new video essay by writer and critic Jessica McGoff, traces the restless movement in the works of Chantal Akerman, where the concept of home is always slipping just out of reach.
Visions, Dreams and Magic: The Unmade Films of Michael Powell Visions, Dreams and Magic: The Unmade Films of Michael Powell
Short documentary 2024 41 mins Director: Nic Wassell
Discover the unrealised visions and passion projects of revered British filmmaker Michael Powell, in this fascinating documentary featuring Oscar-winning editor Thelma Schoonmaker.
Emotion Pictures: Yearning and Repressed Desire in Melodrama Emotion Pictures: Yearning and Repressed Desire in Melodrama
Short documentary 2025 19 mins Director: Maha Albadrawi and Henry Barnes
Writer Nadia M Oliva tracks the development of the melodrama genre and how it plays out across film, TV and online.
Rhianna Dhillon's favourite Coming of Age films Rhianna Dhillon's favourite Coming of Age films
Short documentary 2025 11 mins Director: Maha Albadrawi and Henry Barnes
Rhianna Dhillon selects her favourite Coming of Age films available now on BFI Player.
Pharaoh Pharaoh
Historical drama 1965 146 mins Director: Jerzy Kawalerowicz
Dazzling epic, in which the young Pharaoh Ramses XIII clashes with Egypt's clergy over influence on the affairs of the state and its coffers.
Je t'aime, je t'aime Je t'aime, je t'aime
Drama 1968 95 mins Director: Alain Resnais
A mysterious time-travel experiment becomes a warped voyage through memory, in this mesmerising sci-fi from acclaimed director Alain Resnais.
Desire: The Carl Craig Story Desire: The Carl Craig Story
Documentary 2024 91 mins Director: Jean-Cosme Delaloye
An intimate portrait of legendary techno producer, DJ and record label creator Carl Craig and an ode to his beloved city, Detroit.
La Reine Margot La Reine Margot
Historical drama 1994 158 mins Director: Patrice Chéreau
Sumptuous historical drama starring Isabelle Adjani and Daniel Auteuil; a thunderous yarn full of dastardly plots, familial hatred and perverse desire
Scrubbers Scrubbers
Drama 1982 93 mins Director: Mai Zetterling
1980s borstal drama – billed as the female Scum – featuring Amanda York and Kathy Burke as inmates in a ruthless women’s prison.
Mona Lisa Mona Lisa
Gangster 1986 100 mins Director: Neil Jordan
An ungainly cockney chauffeur navigates the seedy streets of London, gradually falling for the elegant and mysterious prostitute who is his passenger.