It is January 21, 2017. We are crammed into a standing-room-only train car with dozens of other people bound for midtown Atlanta to attend the Women’s March. John Lewis will speak. Looking around, I see friends, mothers, daughters, all carrying signs made at the kitchen table this morning. It’s raining, and we’re all soaked. Even still, there is a festive but resolute atmosphere among the crowd. My friend’s 12-year-old daughter and her friend are excited to be joining in this historic outing. We could not have known then that this was only the first of many calls to be heard and seen standing against the casually corrupt tyranny that was about to grip and divide the nation.
The worldwide Women’s March on January 21, 2017, the day after the inauguration of President Donald Trump, seems like a very long time ago now. It’s only, in fact, just shy of four years since then, but a lot of water has gone under the bridge, stretching out the time from the sheer density of horrific acts we’ve witnessed.
“…six stories of frontline warriors in the fight for women’s rights and equality.”
Director Cheryl Jacobs Crim’s documentary, Resisterhood, begins at the 2017 Women’s March, introducing us to six stories of frontline warriors in the fight for women’s rights and equality. We meet Dr. Jean Gearon, Ph.D., who is a powerful organizer. Margaret Morrison is a grandmother who makes a point to attend all the marches. Former Representative from Illinois Luis Gutiérrez, joins his wife in campaigning for his daughter Jessica Gutiérrez, as she runs for Chicago City Council. Motivation comes from self-styled “Rainbow Warrior,” Joanna Lohman, a professional soccer player with the Washington Spirit and nuclear reactor generating waves of energetic uplift wherever she speaks. Rounding out the documentary subjects is Egyptian immigrant Mimi Hassanein, who intends to make her voice heard, and does so by running for a county office in Montgomery Co, Maryland.
The film follows these timelines in a chronology of events since the 2016 election, measured in organizing, campaigning, and protest. Crim force marches the viewer through the long days of this administration, up to the mid-term elections in 2018.
"…reminds us that good people are still out, there swinging for the fences."
