Born in Flames

Born in Flames is a 1983 American dystopian docufiction drama film directed, produced and co-written by radical intersectional feminist Lizzie Borden that explores racism, classism, sexism and heterosexism in an alternate socialist democratic United States. The title comes from the song "Born in Flames" written by a member of Art & Language, Mayo Thompson of the band Red Krayola.

Plot
The plot concerns two feminist groups in New York City, each voicing their concerns to the public by pirate radio. One group, led by an outspoken white lesbian, Isabel, operates Radio Ragazza. The other group, led by a soft-spoken African-American, Honey, operates Phoenix Radio. The local community is stimulated into action after a world-traveling political activist, Adelaide Norris, is arrested upon arriving at a New York City airport, and suspiciously dies while in police custody. Simultaneously, a Women's Army led by Hilary Hurst and advised by Zella is taking direct action in the city. Initially, both Honey and Isabel refuse to join. This group, along with Norris and the radio stations, are under investigation by a callous FBI agent. Their progress is tracked by three editors for a socialist newspaper, whose persistent and opinionated journalism ultimately gets them fired.

The story involves several different women coming from different perspectives and attempts to show several examples of how sexism plays out on the street and how it can be combatted. In an example scene, two men attack a woman on the street, forcing her to the ground. Before they can cause further harm, dozens of women on bicycles with whistles come to chase the men away and offer the woman support. The movie shows women, despite their various differences, organizing in meetings, doing radio shows, creating art, wheatpasting, putting a condom on a penis, wrapping raw chicken at a processing plant, etc. The film portrays a world rife with violence against women, high female unemployment, and government oppression. The women in the film start to come together to make a bigger impact, by means that some would call terrorism.

Ultimately, after both radio stations are suspiciously burned down, Honey and Isabel team up and broadcast Phoenix Ragazza Radio from stolen U-Haul vans. They also join the Women's Army, which sends a group of terrorists to interrupt a broadcast of the president of the United States proposing that women be paid to do housework. The film ends with the women taking one more action to bomb the antenna on top of the World Trade Center to hinder further destructive messages from the mainstream.

Cast

 * Honey as Honey, host of the Phoenix Radio
 * Adele Bertei as Isabel, host of the Radio Ragazza
 * Jean Satterfield as Adelaide Norris
 * Florynce Kennedy (credited as "Flo Kennedy") as Zella Wylie
 * Becky Johnston as Becky Dunlop, newspaper editor
 * Pat Murphy as Pat Crosby, newspaper editor
 * Kathryn Bigelow as Kathy Larson, newspaper editor
 * Hillary Hurst as the leader of Women's Army
 * Sheila McLaughlin as other leader
 * Marty Pottenger as other leader/woman at site
 * Bell Chevigny as Belle Gayle, the talk show host
 * Joel Kovel as the talk show guest
 * Ron Vawter as FBI Agent
 * John Coplans as chief
 * John Rudolph as TV newscaster
 * Warner Schreiner as TV newscaster
 * Valerie Smaldone as TV newscaster
 * Hal Miller as detective
 * Bill Tatum as Mayor Zubrinsky
 * Mark Boone Junior as man in subway harassing woman
 * Donna Allegra, woman at site

Civil rights activist Florynce Kennedy, and former star athlete, Jean Satterfield appear in the film. This film also marks the first screen appearance of Eric Bogosian; he plays a technician at a TV station who is forced at gunpoint to run a videotape on the network feed. The movie also features a rare acting appearance by Academy Award-winning film director Kathryn Bigelow. Story contributor Ed Bowes portrays the head of the socialist newspaper that ultimately fires the female journalists.

Accolades
In 1983, the film won the Reader Jury prize at the Berlin International Film Festival and the Grand Prix at the Créteil International Women's Film Festival.

Reception and legacy
Rotten Tomatoes reports an 88% approval rating based on 32 reviews, with an average rating of 6.8/10.

Variety wrote that it has "all the advantages and the disadvantages of a home movie". The Guardian in 2021 described the film as a zero-budget underground film with all the hallmarks of guerilla filmmaking, writing that "Borden is filming on the real New York streets, also using real news footage of real demos and real police violence" and that the "anarchic spirit of agitprop pulses from this scrappy, smart, subversive film." In an interview, Borden herself said, "I could only shoot once a month, when I had $200,...I would gather everyone in this old Lincoln Continental I kept parked in front of my loft, go somewhere and shoot, and then I'd spend the interim just editing."

Janet Maslin of The New York Times wrote "Only those who already share Miss Borden's ideas are apt to find her film persuasive." Marjorie Baumgarten of The Austin Chronicle wrote "Beautifully made, courageously edited, and swift-moving, this challenging, provocative film is a work that is both humanist and revolutionary." Frances Dickinson of Time Out London wrote that Borden "[handles] her story with audacity and make[s] even the driest argument crackle with humour, while the more poignant moments burn with a fierce white heat." TV Guide rated it 2/4 stars and wrote "This feminist film wins laurels for close attention to detail in a radical filmmaking effort." Greg Baise of the Metro Times called it "an early '80s landmark of indie and queer cinema". In 2022, the film was ranked joint 243rd in Sight & Sound 's Greatest Films of All Time poll, tied for the distinction along with 21 other films, including A Clockwork Orange, Annie Hall, and Possession.

Influence
The film is discussed in Christina Lane's book Feminist Hollywood: From "Born in Flames" to "Point Break".

A “graphic translation” of the movie made by artist Kaisa Lassinaro, which contains an interview of Lizzie Borden, was published by Occasional Papers in 2011. The book is a collage composition made of screencaps with a selection of dialogues from the movie.

In 2013, a dossier on the film was published as a special issue of Women & Performance: A Journal of Feminist Theory. With an introduction from Craig Willse and Dean Spade, the dossier includes a number of essays that address race, queerness, intersectionality, radicalism, violence, and feminism in the film.

The film has experienced something of a renaissance after the 35mm restoration print premiered in 2016 at the Anthology Film Archives. followed by promotion by the Criterion Channel and a re-release that took Borden to screenings around the world. Richard Brody of The New Yorker wrote "the free, ardent, spontaneous creativity of Born in Flames emerges as an indispensable mode of radical change—one that many contemporary filmmakers with political intentions have yet to assimilate." He also wrote "Borden's exhilarating collage-like story stages news reports, documentary sequences, and surveillance footage alongside tough action scenes and musical numbers; her violent vision is both ideologically complex and chilling." Melissa Anderson of The Village Voice wrote "this unruly, unclassifiable film — perhaps the sole entry in the hybrid genre of radical-lesbian-feminist sci-fi vérité — premiered two years into the Reagan regime, but its fury proves as bracing today as it was back when this country began its inexorable shift to the right." Borden was invited to show the new 35mm print in Brussels, Barcelona, Madrid, San Sebastián, Milan, Toronto, the Edinburgh Film Festival, London Film Festival, along with screenings in Detroit, Rochester, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.