Five Women Critics You Should Know

This week we've partnered with Cinema Femme to promote their event with CherryPicks! "Female Film Critics Are More Important Than Ever" is a diverse group discussing being a female film critic in our current era, while exploring how the pandemic has affected the demand for and focus of their work.

	Tasha Robinson Tasha Robinson is the film and television editor at Polygon, Vox Media’s entertainment and culture website. She was previously a writer and editor at The A.V. Club, Pitchfork’s movie website The Dissolve, and Vox’s tech site The Verge. She has written about film, books, and culture for NPR Books, io9, the SyFy Channel, a Star Wars traveling costume exhibit, and even less reputable places. She lives in Chicago with her husband, three cats, and a secret closet stash of YA novels, stacked hip-high.
Claudia Puig Claudia Puig is the president of the Los Angeles Film Critics Association and a longtime critic on NPR’s Film Week. She teaches a college class on Diversity in the Media and is in demand in as a moderator and speaker on film-related panels. She is currently Senior Programmer for AFI Fest and program director for the Mendocino Film Festival. In addition, Claudia has a film consulting business specializing in cultural consulting. Previously, she was USA Today’s film critic for 15 years. During that time, she also hosted The Screening Room video series and wrote film reviews and analytical articles about the film industry. Before that, she was a staff writer at the Los Angeles Times for 11 years covering city government, courts and the entertainment industry. While at the LA Times she was part of a team of journalists who won the Pulitzer for spot news reporting of the 1992 Los Angeles uprising. She has been a speechwriter and diversity consultant for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and program director for the Napa Valley Film Festival. A native Spanish speaker, Claudia has a B.A. in Communication Studies from UCLA and an M.A. in Communications Management from USC. She also studied at the Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico City and at Cambridge University in England. In 2020 Puig won the Excellence in Entertainment Journalism award from the National Association of Latino Independent Producers (NALIP) and in 2017 she was the recipient of the Roger Ebert Award for Excellence in Film Criticism from the African-American Critics Association (AAFCA). She was recently featured in the Los Angeles Times as one of the 14 film critics making media more inclusive and in Indiewire as one of 20 Latin Americans making a difference in American independent film.
	Inkoo Kang Inkoo Kang is a critic at The Hollywood Reporter, where she writes about film and television.
Aramide A. Tinubu Aramide A. Tinubu is a film critic, consultant, and entertainment editor. As a journalist, her work has been published in EBONY, JET, ESSENCE, Bustle, The Daily Mail, IndieWire, and Blavity. She currently writes for Showbiz Cheatsheet, Indiewire, NBC Think, and Essence. She wrote her master’s thesis on Black Girlhood and Parental Loss in Contemporary Black American Cinema. She’s a cinephile, bookworm, blogger, and NYU + Columbia University alum. You can find her reviews on Rotten Tomatoes or A Word With Aramide or tweet her @wordwitharamide.
	Kathia Woods Kathia Woods is a movie critic/entertainment journalist out of Philadelphia, PA and the creator of CupofSoulShow. CupofSoulShow is an online outlet that covers minority creatives in film, television, and music. She is also a contributor to Mark and Denise in The Morning on 860 A.M WWDBAM.Com. Sundance, SXSW, Tribeca, and The Philadelphia Film Festival are some of the events that she has covered through her brand. Kathia was born in Munich Germany but is of Brazilian descent. She is fluent in 5 languages and a graduate of Temple University, where she obtained a Bachelor of Arts. Kathia is a member of several great organizations amongst them AAFCA, AWFJ, Critics Choice, NABJ, NAHJ, and LEJA. Her most important title, however, is wife to Kevin and mother to Katharina. In her spare time, she likes to read, travel, and cook.

Cinema Femme is a platform for emerging female-identifying and non-binary filmmakers. To support these filmmakers we showcase their short films, provide education through features with womxn and non-binary in film, and offer mentorship between seasoned and emerging filmmakers. We are vocal about the need for women, women of color and LGBTQ representation onscreen and behind the lens. We believe that together we can change the industry for the better.

In 2018, co-founders Miranda Bailey and Rebecca Odes decided enough was enough with very little to no representation of the female and non-binary critical voice. So they started CherryPicks...we’re now known as the best place to find out what womxn think about movies and television. Our community is built on not only reviews & recommendations for what to watch, but also new talent, directors, and writers to look out for. Furthermore, CherryPicks provides a safe space for ideas and communication. Our unique scores are based on reviews solely from womxn and non-binary critics.