How do filmmakers and storytellers reshape the act of looking? Look / See: The Female Gaze in Cinema challenges, subverts, and reclaims the gaze in film, offering a bold reimagining of subjectivity, desire, and agency. In celebration of International Women’s Day in March, this 13-film programme presents perspectives that fracture and fragment dominant narratives, interrogate power dynamics, and expand the ways we see women and men in Western and Asian cinema. From intimate portraits of girlhood and communal solidarity to confrontations with patriarchal structures and radical cinematic experiments, Look / See celebrates the female voices that transcend a gendered gaze, reclaiming cinema as a space of resistance and reinvention.

Marking its 50th anniversary, Chantal Akerman’s seminal Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles screens alongside Peter Weir’s enigmatic Picnic at Hanging Rock (screening under AFA’s Restored series)—two defining works that continue to shape feminist film discourse. The programme also features the newly restored version of Yvonne Rainer’s Film About a Woman Who…, a rarely seen landmark avant-garde work by the pioneering choreographer and filmmaker making its Singapore premiere.

A special segment, “The Cross-Cultural Gaze: Films of Kimi Takesue,” spotlights acclaimed Asian American filmmaker in her first mid-career retrospective in Asia with three of her feature films—Where Are You Taking Me?, 95 and 6 to Go, and her latest, ONLOOKERS. Beyond conventional documentary storytelling, Takesue’s works blend ethnographic and autobiographical sensibilities, revealing profound emotional undercurrents through quiet observational cross-cultural and intergenerational encounters.

Screenings of Look/See: The Female Gaze in Cinema will run from 7 – 30 March 2025 at Oldham Theatre.

Programme 

Film About a Woman Who… (1974, Yvonne Rainer, USA) *4K Restoration*
Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (1975, Chantal Akerman, Belgium/France) *2K Restoration*
Wadjda (2012, Haifaa Al-Mansour, Saudi Arabia)
Missing Johnny (2017, Huang Xi, Taiwan)
The Wonders (Le Meraviglie, 2014, Alice Rohrwacher, Italy/Switzerland/Germany)
Archaeology of Love (사랑의 고고학, 2022, Lee Wanmin, South Korea) (with post-screening online Q&A session)
Saint Omer (2022, Alice Diop, France)
Mother and Daughter, or the Night is Never Complete (2023, Lana Gogoberidze, Georgia/France)
Smoke Sauna Sisterhood (2023, Anna Hints, Estonia/France/Iceland)
Santosh (2024, Sandhya Suri, India/UK)

The Cross-Cultural Gaze: Films of Kimi Takesue
(all screenings with in-person filmmaker introduction and post-screening Q&A sessions)
Where Are You Taking Me? (2010, Kimi Takesue)
95 and 6 to Go (2016, Kimi Takesue)
Onlookers (2023, Kimi Takesue)

Tickets for the programme will go on sale from Thursday, 20 February 2025. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and select the film of your choice to purchase tickets.

Friends of AFA members, please read the membership guide on how to purchase your discounted tickets and redeem your complimentary tickets.

Oldham Theatre’s opening hours

For further assistance, please contact us at ticketing@asianfilmarchive.org 

Important Notice:

Do note that Oldham Theatre operates on a free seating arrangement. Doors will open 10-20 minutes before showtime so arrive early to choose a seat and avoid disrupting the screenings as AFA does not play ads and screenings will start promptly.

All patrons are encouraged to purchase your tickets online. If you choose to purchase tickets or merchandise at Oldham Theatre’s box office, cashless payment is preferred.

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T&Cs
Concession tickets apply to Students (Local & Overseas), Full-time National Servicemen (NSF), Senior Citizens (55 years and above) only.

Please check film ratings before purchase of tickets. Please note that you may be asked to present your ID at the door (this applies to concession tickets as well). Only physical photographic identification is allowed, digital copies of identification are not allowed. AFA reserves the right to turn away any members of the public without physical photographic identification.

Upon confirmation of your order for Tickets, no exchange of Tickets will be made under any circumstances and Tickets are not transferable. No refund on Tickets will be made under any circumstances except due to cancellation of the event. The resale of Tickets at any price is prohibited.