The Glorias – A Review

Rating out of 5: ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️.5

My Take: The more things change, the more they remain the same.

Can be watched on: Amazon US

The Glorias – a film about a woman’s story not determined by a time frame but by circumstances that haven’t changed and aren’t going to any time soon. There’s a lot of unnecessary. A lot of shouldn’t-have-beens. But…but… imagine having to fit the entirety of a life well lived into 35mm.

The Glorias tells a tale of the powerhouse that is the woman Gloria Steinem – but through four different versions of her. Straight off the bat you realise it’s going to be slow moving, it’s going to take you back and forth, there’s a lot of relevant ‘blink and you’ll miss it, it will often have you wondering, ‘Weren’t we just somewhere else?’, and it’s going to be messy. You also quickly grasp that Gloria is not like other people and like Florynce Kennedy says, “We’re here to make a revolution. Not dinner.” It’s difficult to not watch this movie through a woman’s lens. But it’s also possible to take off those glasses and see it through a ‘today’ world view. But, and there are a lot of buts in this movie, you cannot deny the very real portrayal of the outrageous depths of depravity, backwardness, and sheer stupidity that man can stoop to.

The depiction of Gloria’s journey from the inside of a Greyhound looking out, with each ‘Gloria’ taking turns to tell the tale, gives the black and white of her inner world and the colour of her outer one, a very Dylanesque feel. She’s on the inside of a Dylan song looking out, while you’re the Dylan song at which she’s looking. And it irritates you at times. Why would such a colourful woman see herself in black and white or shades of grey? And why do some memories take longer to get there, while others need more fleshing out? It seems that it’s often the little, almost insignificant things that turn out to be the turning point in the movie. Scenes that seem inconsequential to most, stand out as moments for the Glorias, which ultimately defined her controversial life.

Director Julie Taymor unravels the extravagant threads that make up the unique fabric that is Gloria Steinem in a telling manner. She and Sarah Ruhl have crafted the dialogues artfully for screen as is seen in the humour, the satire, and in comments written to make your blood simmer. Through Rodrigo Prieto’s cinematography, we see a desaturated colour scheme that feels like a familiar shoebox of photographs filled with black-and-white-toned living.

While it’s not a movie many will enjoy, it does make you sit up. It does make you acknowledge hard truths. It does hold a mirror up to how women and many minorities are treated as second class citizens even today. It paints irony in all its gritty, dirty glory. Having said that, this story is not just another feminist trope. It is not just another woman-centric film. It is a ‘truth that will set you free…but first, it will piss you off.’ Two ideas stand out through the Glorias. Both, for their sense of despair, and for their thrill of optimism. A young Gloria’s, “Are we there yet?” and an adult Gloria’s, “Remember, the Constitution does not begin with, ‘I the President,’ it begins with ‘We the People’.” Both are statements that very much need to echo into the future.

Watch it for:

• Julianne Moore’s transformation into Gloria Steinem
• The mirror it holds up and the shadows it casts
• Florynce Kennedy’s self-depreciating humour
• The cinematography

© Ayesha Dominica