United States 2023, 118 min, English, Hebrew & English subtitles
Shere Hite was a PhD student at Columbia University and made a living as an ad model. After repeatedly encountering misogyny and sexism in academia and advertising, she became a feminist activist, and her research took the necessary turn: she began to study female sexual pleasure. Her landmark work, “The Hite Report,” published in 1976, was a study based on thousands of anonymous survey responses in which women opened up about topics that had, until then, never been openly discussed: masturbation, orgasms, and sexual satisfaction. Hite fiercely advocated for open conversation about sex (for both women and men) and the social construction of sexuality, and became a well-known cultural figure. Yet after a series of bestsellers and public uproars, Hite (and most of her findings) faded from public consciousness almost completely. How did this happen, and why?
Previous Festivals: Sundance, Hot Docs
Arts and Culture Extraordinary Women Portrait The artists: art and architecture docs Treasures of the Archive