Catherine Called Birdy

Catherine Called Birdy is set in England in 1290, where Lady Catherine, known to everyone as Birdy, lives with her parents at Stonebridge Manor. The estate has seen better days, and her father, Lord Rollo, sees his youngest daughter as the way out of the family's financial troubles: he intends to marry her off to a wealthy man in exchange for money and land. Birdy is spirited, clever and adventurous, and she has no wish to be traded away. She sets about turning away every suitor who comes calling, in increasingly inventive ways, which strains her relationship with her parents. The situation reaches a new stage when the most unpleasant of all the prospective husbands arrives to claim her hand.

Lena Dunham directed the film and wrote the screenplay, placing it third in the sequence of her features after Tiny Furniture and 100 Years, in the same year as Sharp Stick. Bella Ramsey plays Birdy, with Billie Piper as Lady Aislinn and Andrew Scott as Lord Rollo; Lesley Sharp, Joe Alwyn and Sophie Okonedo also appear. The production was a British and American co-production.

The film was released in September 2022 and runs 108 minutes. The critical response was more favourable than the general audience reaction: critics gave it 7.2 out of 10 across 132 reviews, while viewers rated it 6.6 on IMDb from around 9,500 votes and 6.1 on TMDB from a much smaller base of 147 votes.