By Adrian Pennington
During the spectacular Opening Ceremony of the 2024 Olympics in Paris, before the performances of Celine Dion and after Lady Gaga, ten superwomen were on parade along the banks of the Seine. Tributes to heroines of French cultural and sporting life took the form of golden effigies rising from the river as the Marseillaise trumpeted from the roof of the Grand Palais.
The figures included Alice Milliat, who lobbied the Olympic movement to include more female athletes, philosopher and feminist activist Simone de Beauvoir, and Alice Guy-Blach , the world's first female director. Blach might not have been recognized at all were it not for the recent award-winning documentary by Pamela B Green, Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blach .
I started getting these crazy text messages urging me to watch the Opening Ceremony, says Green who produced, co-wrote and directed the documentary. I was so happy for Alice and so happy for the other woman as well.
Notably absent from cinema's history, Guy-Blach (1873-1968) was one of the firsts to create narrative films in the history of cinema. At Gaumont, she experimented with sync-sound and with color-tinting, interracial casting, and special effects. In New Jersey, she founded her own company Solax where she directed and managed all aspects of production. Following a two-decade career in two countries (from 1896 to 1922) during which she made a thousand short and feature length films she all but disappeared from the annals of filmmaking - until Green's film, which made its official debut at the Cannes Film Festival, brought her international acclaim. Now she's embraced as a national and international treasure which is always what I wanted.
Green had spent ten years struggling to get the film made and distributed. She was greeted with skepticism at almost every step even in France, where Green spent her childhood and is a fluent French speaker. Many were trying to discredit her. I found myself having to convince archivists and funders how significant she was.
When I showed them what I had discovered you could see their minds starting to open up, but this was not instant, and it didn't happen with everyone. Nor was this just in France, it was a worldwide issue.
I remember going to the Academy Library and asking if I could see the papers of Louella Parsons, who was a widely read journalist of the time. And they quizzed me as to why I would want to do that? When I finally got access, I found all these articles about Alice Guy-Blach that I put into the film. The people at the academy were shocked that Parsons would have mentioned Guy-Blach .
Green didn't go to film school but worked her way up in post-production as creative director of title sequences and graphic sequences. In 2005, she co-founded PIC Collective, an entertainment and motion design studio. There, she creative-directed and produced main titles and marketing campaigns for numerous titles including The Kingdom, Twilight, the Bourne film series as well as TV show packages for the Academy Awards, the Critics' Choice Awards, and the mini-documentary sequences for VH1 s Soul Divas: History of Soul Music. She took those skills into becoming a filmmaker. She also served as co-producer on the Emmy nominated 2010 documentary Bhutto.
Yet people questioned whether I could make a documentary. But not Jodie Foster, who signed on as the film's narrator, and both she and Robert Redford backed the film as executive producers, she says.
The film was a critical and commercial success. Green was nominated for an Emmy, a Peabody and a Critics Choice award among others. Many of her films were restored and preserved as a result of Be Natural, a pillar in her name is featured at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures and, last year, the French postal service issued a special stamp celebrating Alice Guy's 150th birthday. A biopic project about Guy Blach is in the works which Green is producing. I'm very excited by the approach we are taking because of the unique research we have in hand and the many findings we have discovered.. In the meantime, Alice Guy Blach has risen as a heroine from the banks of the Seine, in front of a massive global audience.
What's next?
Green is at work on her first dramatic feature. Ask the Question is a biopic of Ben Barres, a transgender scientist who revolutionized neuroscience and fought for women, LGBTQ+, and the disadvantaged in STEM.
Ben's story is about a visionary scientist who played a key role in trailblazing research on an overlooked, yet crucially significant, part of the brain: glial cells Glia cells are paving the way for the prevention and cure of neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, multiple sclerosis, and Lou Gehrig's disease.
As a trans man who previously experienced prejudice as a woman scientist-who was an acclaimed pioneer in the field of brain structure and function he became an outspoken, and fierce advocate who single-handedly and successfully confronted STEM institutions' discrimination against women, LGBTQ+, and other marginalized students and faculty.
Green describes Ask the Question as a brew of Oppenheimer, Milk and The Imitation Game. It brings to life the story of an incredible scientist, activist, mentor, and friend. He rose to the heights of scientific success while fighting for the rights of women, LGBTQ_+ and others who were disadvantaged in STEM fields-namely, science, technology, engineering, and mathematics Above all, Ben believed difference was a great advantage. As Green says, Ben has left an amazing legacy behind as a scientist but It's his infinite kindness and empathy that got me hooked.
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By Adrian Pennington
