Every Body, the new documentary film from Academy Award-nominated director Julie Cohen, is full of compassion and understanding, as well as frustration, as it gives audiences a fascinating look into an often ignored subset of the world’s population – intersex people (defined as a person born with a combination of male and female biological traits).
Crafted into a powerful story, Every Body is a revelatory investigation of the lives of intersex people and follows three individuals who have moved from childhoods marked by shame, secrecy, and non-consensual surgeries to thriving adulthoods after each decided to set aside medical advice to keep their bodies a secret and instead came out as their authentic selves.
The film’s subjects, actor and screenwriter River Gallo (they/them), political consultant Alicia Roth Weigel (she/they), and Ph.D. student Sean Saifa Wall (he/him), are now leaders in a fast-growing global movement advocating for greater understanding of the intersex community and an end to unnecessary surgeries. Woven into the project is a stranger-than-fiction case of medical abuse, featuring exclusive footage from the NBC News archives, which helps explain the modern-day treatment of intersex people.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the film “leaves you with the sense that, with greater awareness and collective action, the future for the intersex community can be powerful and bright.”
Cohen, who has tackled subjects from Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg to cooking legend Julia Child, brings a profound sense of fascination and joy for her topics, and that same enthusiasm can be seen in Every Body. While the experiences of the film’s three stars have not always been easy, Cohen demonstrates how inspiring their lives ultimately are.
Every Body is now playing in theaters, and Instinct had the opportunity to chat more about it with Cohen, Gallo, Wigel, Wall, and producer Tommy Nguyen. Check out the full video interviews below.
Julie Cohen & Tommy Nguyen…
River Gallo, Alicia Roth Weigel, and Sean Saifa Wall…
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