Directed by Barbara Loden
After a string of abusive relationships, Wanda abandons her family and seeks solace in the company of a petty criminal.
Barbara Loden Michael Higgins Dorothy Shupenes Peter Shupenes Jerome Thier Marian Thier Valerie Mamches Anthony Rotell M.L. Kennedy Gerald Grippo Milton Gittleman Lila Gittleman Arnold Kanig Joe Dennis Charles Dosinan Jack Ford Rozamond Peck Susan Clark Linda Clark Bill Longworth Frank Jourdano Pete Richman Ed Somavitch
WANDA／ワンダ, WANDA ワンダ, 완다, 旺达, Ванда, 浪蕩天地
Italy Venice Film Festival 
PortugalM/16 
Chile Valdivia International Film Festival 
South Korea Jeonju International Film Festival 
FinlandK-18 
Sweden15 
USAPG USAPG 
Netherlands 
Japan Chile Finland Italy Japan Netherlands Portugal South Korea Sweden USA 
Interesting prequel, you can see why she decided to become a fish.
there’s an acrid authenticity to the character of Wanda: at once submissive, passive, and tenacious — a flickering blue flame, a pilot light ready and aching to burn it all down.
as the first narrative feature ever to be written, directed by and starring the same woman (Barbara Loden), Wanda is undeniably herstoric, without even really trying to be, which is maybe why it succeeds. i know i’ve talked about this before and often, but contemporary studio feminism is so rooted in women being portrayed as physically strong, perfect angels devoid of fatal flaws. Wanda opens with her being late to her own divorce court hearing and eagerly pawning her kids off on her ex-husband. yee-haw! the new hollywood movement is for the girls too!
The crushing, mundane, aimless despair of everyday reality and our understandable but failed attempts to retreat into fantasy. "If you don't have anything then you're nothing. You may as well be dead. You're not even a citizen of the United States."
Saw this years ago so revisiting this film now that it has been restored was like watching the film for the first time. Restoration is fantastic.
Great building of tension and always engaging. Love the 16mm aesthetic and Barbara Loden says so much with so little words in her textured performance.
So sad that Loden didn't direct another feature.
The quintessential movie about realizing that America is shit and that there's nothing on life's horizon but also not knowing how to get out of it. The real Nomadland.
Wanda has such a rough life I'm glad she got to eat an ice cream cone at one point
This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.
It's amazing where this film ends up going, to end in a brothel and to make a cognent statement about society, about the world, whatever you want to call it, and yet begin with such specificity of time and place - Wanda begins almost completely circumstantial, and seems that way for most of its run time until its very final moments. No cinephilia here, no references, no (obvious) influences, - some interesting and unusual faces who are all outsiders - even the bank robber. Wanda is the rare film that feels totally lived-in, experiential, yet speaks about the nature of societies conditions - specifically to a woman from these circumstances, yet by it's end it's made clear that it was…
Achingly depressing. Poor Wanda has been beaten into the earth by life, emotionally abused to the point where her self-esteem is non-existent and she’s destined to be framed in isolated wide shots, strolling aimlessly towards the forever grey horizon. The first half hour is just wonderful in all the worst ways; I’m not sure I’ve ever felt so much instant pity for a character. Wanda’s downbeat life consists of giving up/fucking up everything she loves, though maybe she can’t even feel love anymore. She happily gives her kids away to her ex-husband claiming they’ll be better off with him. There’s a great mini scene where she’s alone in the cinema watching a film, and it reminded me of Karina in…
There are so many oeuvre's of canonical filmmakers that could be disposed of completely if it meant at least one more film from this phenomenally gifted filmmaker. I can think of no film which has such a remarkable sense of place and world-building, yet achieves a level of subjective experience that is in my opinion unparalleled in cinema. If this was the one and only movie I had made, I would die happily. Barbara Loden was supernaturally talented. She is truly one of the greatest.
Another beer, another cigarette. Always a minute away from disappearing completely.
85
A total unified synthesis between actor and performance. Barbara Loden *is* Wanda, rumbling through a observational, harsh reality of structures and concepts destined to ruin lives of those at the bottom of the well. A landmark achievement that flies by like a flash of memory.
"That's the score."
Barbara Loden’s “Wanda” looks, sounds, and feels like a film pieced together from the last scraps of nothing.
The first feature-length movie to be written, directed, and starred in by a woman, “Wanda” is a work that struggles with whether or not it should exist. But ultimately - it, and Loden, decide that the work is nothing less than necessary.
“Wanda” was Loden’s only directorial outing before her young death from breast cancer. The story of a housewife who wanders without place or purpose other than drifting being all she can do, “Wanda” emphasises the unknowability of women’s own souls, desires, and capabilities.
Similar to Agnès Varda’s “Vagabond,” which arrived a decade and a half after “Wanda,” Loden allows little…
