The new documentary The Janes, which has been playing festivals and will start on HBO this Wednesday, is about the underground cadre of activists who helped women have safe abortions in pre-Roe v. Wade Chicago.

My review is at Eyes Wide Open:

A transmission from a foreign-feeling past that could yet also auger what is to come, The Janes is a disarmingly cool and matter-of-fact yet utterly crucial documentary about some of the most daring, radical, and largely unsung heroes ever put onscreen. Many books, movies, and articles have been produced about late 1960s and ’70s breed of grand-standing activists: the Weathermen’s amateur bomb-makers, Yippie pranksters, the Black Panthers’ parading fist-pumpers, and various would-be guerrilla cells staging bank robberies and kidnappings in a haphazard war on the Establishment. But while those theatrics dominated the headlines, the women activists of the Chicago-based Jane Collective pursued a quieter yet likely more impactful campaign for change…

Here’s the trailer: