This heartfelt, lyrical documentary focuses on four young adults who, like an estimated 0.5 to 1.7 percent of people, were born with variations in their sex characteristics that made it difficult for Western medicine to impose classifications on them. Intersex has typically been treated as a pathology that must be treated — a problem to be “fixed” as infants are hastily assigned a gender and operated on — often, the gender chosen is female. As they mature, intersex children must undergo further invasive surgeries and hormone therapy, solely so that their bodies conform to their assigned gender.

The brave intersex people in No Box for Me are seeking, in different ways, to re-appropriate their bodies and explore their identities, revealing the error in a binary understanding of gender, as well as the physical and psychological harm of these unnecessary medical treatments forced on intersex children. This documentary adds voices to a growing chorus of intersex people, their loved ones, and medical professionals who are advocating to remove the stigma of intersex — not only allowing intersex people to make their own decisions about their bodies but also reframing how society understands gender.