'Diary' tells the story of 15 year old Minnie Goetze, a girl growing up in 1970s San Francisco.

To say that female sexuality is every bit as complicated and desire driven as male sexuality is to state the obvious. Unfortunately, what may be obvious is still clearly not very accepted. Pop culture is awash with stories about men's sexual exploits, with very few negative ramifications attached to their quests for greater carnal knowledge. Entire franchises have been built on the premise of boys endeavouring to lose their virginity and be inducted into the world of men.

Meanwhile, women are still more frequently constructed as sexual gatekeepers rather than fully fledged players in their own right. Society seems intent on keeping alive the false notion that sex is inherently harmful to adolescent girls. The emotional and physical fallout that awaits fictional girls who pursue sex is too often presented as something irreversibly dangerous for them, a risk they can't afford to take no matter how much they might think they're in control of their bodies. Additionally, the idea of women's sexuality being the natural bed partner of men's is all too common. Even in cases where queer female sexuality is depicted, it's rarely done in any kind of realistic way.

Fortunately, there are more and more exceptions appearing to challenge these storytelling tropes. Here are some of the movies we're excited about seeing over the next few months.

1. The Diary of a Teenage Girl


"I don't remember being born. I was a very ugly child. My appearance has not improved so I suppose it was a lucky break when he was attracted by my youthfulness. My name is Minnie Goetze."

These are the opening lines of Phoebe Gloeckner's critically acclaimed semi-autobiographical novel, The Diary of a Teenage Girl: An Account in Words and Pictures. The film recently screened at the Melbourne International Film Festival, where tickets sold out almost instantly.

Diary tells the story of 15 year old Minnie Goetze, a girl growing up in 1970s San Francisco. The book opens with Minnie beginning an affair with her mother's boyfriend (played by Alexander Skarsgard in the film), an interaction which leads to her pursuing sex with all manner of characters in her life. Although the content is pretty dark and frequently confronting, it's unique in that half of the story has been taken directly from Gloeckner's teenage diaries. This is adolescent girlhood direct from the source.

In a review for Deadline, middle aged white man Pete Hammond is cynical about the director's claims that this is an 'honest' portrayal of what it feels like to be a teenage girl, writing, "But I still am not quite sure what the point of all this is meant to be. Is it a scathingly accurate account of teen girls of the period that teen girls of today are supposed to be able to identify with?" His inability to understand 'the point' is reason enough for me to want to see it.

2. Freeheld

Freeheld is based on the real life story of Laurel Hester (Julienne Moore) and her partner Stacie Andree (Ellen Paige), a lesbian couple who challenged legislation that denied workplace pensions to the same-sex partners of the deceased.

Hester was a decorated police officer working in New Jersey sharing joint mortgage payments on the home she shared with Andree when she was diagnosed with cancer. Despite being supported by the Policemen's Benefit Association, their claim was voted down by five Republican county freeholders.

Freeheld tells of the struggle to rectify this injustice, centring Hester and Andree's relationship. Normal and honest portrayals of lesbian relationships are still less common in film than even the presence of gay male relationships, which is part of what makes Freeheld so important. Also, if you managed to watch the trailer for the movie without crying then you officially have no heart and even less soul.

3. Grandma

Any movie featuring Lily Tomlin is a winner in my book, but when it combines reproductive health care rights with comedy then it has to go straight to the top of pile. In Grandma, Tomlin plays the titular character whose granddaughter comes to her seeking help ($680 worth of it) to get an abortion. Sage (Julia Garner) and her grandmother Elle go on a day long adventure trying to come up with the funds to help Sage terminate the pregnancy she doesn't want but which seems almost impossible for her to get.

With an all-star cast headlined by Tomlin, it's highly unlikely that Grandma is going to pull a Juno on us and have Sage decide to go through with the pregnancy. Instead, we can expect a darkly comedic exploration of the way reproductive health-care is denied to women who should be trusted to know what's in their own best interests when it comes to their bodies and parenting.

Bonus: Laverne Cox guest-starring with a mega babing septum piercing.



4. Margarita, With A Straw

Also screening at MIFF this year, Margarita, With A Straw is a coming-of-age story unlike most we've ever seen before. Laila (Kalki Koechlin) moves from India to study at New York University, where she begins to explore her sexuality via a series of crushes on people. Laila also happens to have cerebral palsy (hence requiring a straw to drink her margaritas), a fact which never detracts from her fertile desires and intuitive relationship with her body.

If women's sexuality is rarely explored realistically on screen, the sexuality of disabled women is rendered almost entirely non-existence. None of that gels with the reality of disabled women's lives, who are equally as capable of desire, love, polyamory, queerness and fetishised attractions as able-bods.

The one gripe with Margarita (and unfortunately, it's a massive one) is that Koechlin isn't disabled. This may seem petty to people for whom disability is a secondary or even theoretical premise, but it means a lot to a community of people too used to seeing other people portray their stories. It would have been great to see a woman with direct experience of disability given the chance to portray Laila here.



5. Tangerine

The lead-up to Tangerine's debut was caged in secrecy, although no one knew it at the time. It wasn't until its screening at Sundance that it was revealed the two female sex worker characters navigating the streets of LA were actually trans actresses playing trans women, and that the entire film had been shot using the camera of an iPhone 5s.

Baker took direction from actress Kiki Rodriguez, who insisted that the film not be "downbeat and dramatic" but "hilarious and entertaining for us and the women who are actually working the corner." It was this instruction that Baker says has made the film, "presenting these characters to mainstream audiences in a pop culture way". The result is sure to be a funny, moving and honest portrayal of life for trans sex workers, one of the most marginalised and at-risk groups in the world today and, depressingly, one of the most ignored.

So, if you were beginning to despair about cinema's portrayal of women, worry not. Here are five female-driven, female centred stories which portray women as real people rather than ciphers or supporting props for heroes. Onwards and upwards!