What Girls Learn
Two teenage girls must come to terms with their stepfather when their mother is struck by illness.
Delphyne
Delphyne (meaning ‘womb’) discusses the stigma around menstruation. Addressing shame and acceptance, taboos around menstrual blood are told through a fabric-themed metaphor, and the conflict between a mother-daughter relationship; to find a shared unity and language to beat the conflict which projects itself in the shame metaphor that they’ve unwound and removed from their life. The historical connotations of staining, feminine purity and the divide between private and public space as well as ownership of the body come into play. The coming of age theme is reflected in reference to her struggle with the self (alter-ego), struggle with the ‘other’ (male influence) and struggle with the home (her Mother).
I am Leo
Wide meadows, romping in the woods and building cabins. Leo (12) spends the autumn holidays with big sister Noémie and cousin Emil on Grandma Marlies' farm. However when Leo is surprised by what Grandma Marlies calls big news, Leo faces an identity crisis. "I am Leo" immerses itself into the emotional world of a child who is on the way to discover their gender identity. A film about expectations that overwhelm, about thoughts that restrict and about the courage to find yourself.
Bloody Hell
Sam’s period arrives just moments before an important visitor knocks at her door. Her frantic attempt to get ready derails into a blood-soaked nightmare.
Without You
A young girl gets her first menstrual period.
Hot Dog
Hannah wasn't always happy about the existence of her 'Vajayjay'. She talks about how she used to imagine having sex would be like a Céline Dion song and how she discovered masturbation thanks to her PlayStation controller. She's in a love-hate relationship with her vagina and chronicles how her feelings towards her sexuality have changed over time.
Growing Girls
After several farmyard analogies featuring chicks and calves, the well-spoken narrator and director of the film, Winifred Holmes, considers the subject of girls and how they reach adulthood and readiness for the 'important job of motherhood.
Girls’ Stories
Jagoda and Zuzia giggle in the opening scenes in the way that only 11-year-old girls can. Together they are the center of their own changing world. On the face of it, not much happens in the lives of these Polish best friends, but big changes are on the way. The end of primary school is in sight, and the girls are impatiently awaiting first love, budding breasts and first periods.
Silent Cycle
A 12-year-old girl must take a stand against her conservative grandmother after being excluded from a family ritual upon getting her first period.
The Boogeywoman
While roller-skating, Sam, a sensitive teenage girl, hears about her small town's local legend: the Boogeywoman.
Linda's Film on Menstruation
This is an educational short released by the Los Angeles Public Library explaining what to expect when you get your first period.
Lily Bleeds
Lily copes with heat strokes and irregular menstruation, while waiting for a phone call from a doctor that may fracture her identity and expectations of the future. This leads her to reflect upon her place in this world.
Pothos
Ivy gets her first period during her first communion.
Gris
Dawn breaks over Caracas. From a pile of cardboard beside an ATM emerges Irene, a young girl living on the streets. Her days unfold between the struggle to survive, childhood games, and the power of imagination, until the unexpected arrival of her first menstruation abruptly marks the end of childhood and the beginning of a new stage in her life.
Diva
The Johnsons
According to an ancient Indian tale a giant monster embryo residing in a crystal vase is predetermined to fertilize a blue-eyed woman. She will give birth to something evil to unleash horror and destruction upon human kind. Ugly septuplet brothers reproduced within the framework of mysterious genetic experiments terrorize a young innocent girl who seems to be chosen for the sinister predestination.
Her Grandmother's Gift
A grandmother discusses past and present attitudes toward menstruation.
Clumsy Little Acts of Tenderness
A weekend father wants to bond with his teenage daughter by taking her with him to the carwash. They end up on a life-changing adventure in the supermarket, at the endless sanitary towel aisle. They get "help" from an older lady who shares intimate stories of her experience, some about menstruation, some on wildly different topics.
La regla de Gala
Gala is preparing for the firefighter exam when she gets her period accompanied by severe menstrual pain. Together with her father Alfonso, they must figure out how to manage the situation.
Tagos ng Dugo
A young Pina was traumatized when her family was murdered while she had her first menstruation. She grows up into a serial killer transforming herself to different personalities as she seduced one man at a time grossly killing them while in the act of sexual pleasure.