In only two directorial outings, Karlovy Vary Film Festival honoree Maggie Gyllenhaal has managed to subvert more than 100 years of cinematic female stereotypes — “The Lost Daughter” acknowledged the darker aspects of motherhood and what’s expected of women, while “The Bride” gave the Bride of Frankenstein agency and autonomy.
Gyllenhaal received the President’s Award on Friday at the festival’s opening night ceremony, and talked to the international press on Saturday in a suite at the neo-baroque Grand Hotel Pupp in Karlovy Vary.
“For most of the time that people have been making movies, they have been made by men,” she said, noting that while “there have been some fascinating female characters” created by male filmmakers, “I think if you’re living a very different experience fundamentally as a male filmmaker … I don’t see how you have insight into all of a feminine experience, especially the parts of ourselves that we are ashamed of, that we hide that we don’t like to share.”
She said when she read Elena Ferrante’s novel “The Lost Daughter,” “as a mother, I thought, oh, whoa, I can’t. Are you so fucked up? Hold on, I actually relate to what you’re saying. And then a kind of comfort washes over you, like, wow, somebody else has said out loud something that I’ve never heard said aloud before.”
