A Free Woman

A cerebral feminist film about a woman trying to find herself and her place in society after a divorce where the father is about to gain custody of their only son. The film represents a cinema of ideas (my favorite sequence is one tracking a series of paintings and the position of women in them), with things to say that apply even today, and, it is suggested, many generations to come. What it lacks is any sort of narrative drive: in the later sections there is a trip to Italy that doesn't really add much, except some Milan sightseeing. Future director Margarethe von Trotta, frequently displaying her thighs of steel, also gives a fine performance in the leading role. **1/2 out of 4.