The BBC recently released a list of the 100 best American films of all time as chosen by 62 international film critics. Ninety-eight of the films were directed by men, while two had female co-directors. I’m disappointed, but not surprised.
Currently, women make up only 6 per cent of film directors . While other arts and creative industries – theatre, visual art, literature, music – are also male dominated, the film industry is in a sexist class of its own. It’s like that drunken uncle who tells your friends they have nice tits: so blatant and embarrassing that no one knows what to say, and it seems easiest to ignore it.
So ignore it we do. We look at cinema listings and are willfully blind to the fact that every single film showing at our local multi- screen is directed by a man. That’s just what’s on the menu, and we want to eat. But by ignoring it we have insured that the number of women directing films in Hollywood has not changed in 20 years.
As Sarah Mirk's podcast for Bitch magazine explains, there's no shortage of women with the skill and will to make films, but even award-winning female filmmakers are not hired by studios. This problem frustrated filmmaker Destri Martino so much that she created The Director's List – a database of accomplished female directors searchable by country, genre, and medium. In Mirk's podcast, Martino outlines reasons that women are not hired to direct Hollywood films, including sexism and erroneous beliefs that women can't direct certain genres, such as action or sci-fi. Martino calls these things "mythology," but we might call them discrimination.
World view
The fictions we consume matter. They shape our world views and our aspirations for ourselves. They condition our understanding of how women and men behave and how they should be valued. Film and TV are the most influential modes of fiction in the 21st century.
Isn’t it worrying, then, that in the top 100 grossing films last year, only 12 per cent of protagonists were female, and women accounted for only 29 per cent of major characters? I don’t think it’s controversial to suggest that the sexist content of Hollywood film reflects a sexist industry: in an almost exclusively male-authored art form, women will be sidelined, sexualised, and stereotyped.
There's an easy feminist action to take here: for every film you watch directed by a man, watch one by a woman. Show the industry that films by women will be supported at the box office and on general release. There's a huge number of gifted women making independent films: seek them out. Bitch mag , Mediascape, and Indiewire have great lists to chomp through.
My partner and I have been on a lady director kick for months. It's been fun finding female-authored work together, and eye-opening too. Gender looks so different through a female lens. Instead of simply sexy, women can be flawed, multifaceted, fleshy, anti-heroic. Many of the sexist tropes I've come to expect from Hollywood are challenged by women's work. I've discovered directors I consider geniuses – Deepa Mehta; Chantal Akerman; Claire Denis; Mira Nair; Catherine Breillat – and films which nest now comfortably amongst my favourites. All my life, I realise, I'd been watching the screen with one eye shut. So indulge in some activism without leaving the couch – support women's film. Here's a few of my recent discoveries to get you started:
Down in the Delta (1998), Maya Angelou Did you know that Maya Angelou made a film? She did! And it's lovely. The tale of a drug-addicted Chicago woman who spends a summer with her estranged relatives in rural Mississippi, the film is a town mouse, country mouse story which delves into the complexities of America's racial present and past. Straightforward camera work keeps the focus on beautiful performances. In 2015, it feels more relevant than ever.
I Shot Andy Warhol (1996), Mary Harron Before making American Psycho, Harron directed this fascinating piece about Valerie Solanas, the woman who shot Andy Warhol and wrote the SCUM Manifesto. Visually exciting in its evocation of Warhol's factory studio and its eccentric sycophants, and nuanced in its handling of Solanas, an intellectually gifted and mentally-ill victim of homophobia and misogyny, this film is strange, difficult, and continues to haunt me. The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2012), Mira Nair Mohsin Hamid's clever book was a parable about a young Pakistani man, Changez (who goes through changes), abandoning his dream of loving Erica (who represents Am-Erica). Nair's adaptation gives the story blood and muscle. Erica is transformed from an insipid, fragile cipher of nation into a fiery artist played with passion by Kate Hudson. Changez's love for her feels real, and the metaphor is richer.
The Countess (2009), Julie Delpy Delpy's quirky directorial debut, 2 Days in Paris, won her critical acclaim, while applause was muted for The Countess. But I love this creepy-ass film about a real-life vampire, Elizabeth Báthory, who, in 16th-century Hungary, bathed in the blood of virgins to keep her youth. Part gothic horror, part historical fiction, Delpy's film gives us the heart behind the monster, producing a love story you have to watch through your fingers. And perhaps fetishisation of feminine youth seemed an urgent topic to Delpy, as a veteran of an industry where women over 40 account for only 30 per cent of female characters.
Electrick Children (2012), Rebecca Thomas Rachel is raised in an isolated Mormon sect and becomes pregnant by listening to a tape of forbidden rock music. She sets off to find the man whose voice she loves. Thomas gives us just enough magic and humanity to make something miraculous from the abject.