Whether the headlines are about a director’s latest film or argument on set, one element stands out: the director is commonly a man. In fact,Vanity Fairreports: “There are about 23.8 male directors for every female director, a statistic that sharply drops for black female and Asian female directors. Out of the 57 black directors included, only three were female, and out of the 34 Asian directors, only three were female. Just one director was Latina.” These abysmal numbers come from a study conducted by USC’s Annenberg that looked at director inclusivity over 1000 films released between 2007 and 2016.
In 2019,Time’s Up!, a not-for-profit organization responded to the study.Actress Tessa Thompsonstepped up as the spokesperson for the 4% Challenge, a joint project between USC Annenberg and Time’s Up! The goal of the challenge, according toWomen and Hollywood, is to increase the percentage of inclusivity among directors within an 18-month period.
Time’s Up! Foundation
Actresses receive plenty of praise for their advocacy, especially when they bring feminist issues front and center in awards acceptance speeches or on social media. Of course, being an advocate doesn’t necessarily make one an activist. An advocate is someone who speaks on behalf of a group or person, whereas an activist is an individual who works to change the politics and social narratives and laws. Time’s Up! is an advocacy organization created in 2017 with the support of 300 women across the entertainment industry like actress Ashley Nicole Black,comedian Chelsea Handler, and actress/model Yara Shahidi. According to Time’s Up!’s website, they have three goals: safety, equity, and power for women across industries. Advocacy organizations like Time’s Up! often inspire others to move into activist roles.
Related:8 Must-Watch Movies From Women Directors
4% Challenge: Vows and Follow Through
In response to USC’s study, Time’s Up! and several actors and studios vowed to work with a woman director between the winter of 2019 and summer 2020. While the pandemic put a pause on much of Hollywood,actress Brie Larson, director Jordan Peele, and various studios vowed to work with women directors.IndieWire, in fact, compiled a complete list of studio releases, like Reed Morano’sThe Rhythm Sectionand Ry Russo-Young’sThe Sun is Also a Star, that were directed by women and came out in 2019 and 2020. Larson herself worked with Anna Boden onCaptain Marvel, and Peele centered his thrillerUson a Black woman named Adelaide (Lupita Nyong’o). Significantly, Universal Studios/Focus Features released eight titles directed by women, more than any other studio in that year.
Pioneering Women Filmmakers
The significance of the 4% Challenge is that, in theory, the gap between women directors and their male counterparts becomes nonexistent. Efforts like these are not recent, but started back in the earliest days of film. Considered the first woman director in history, Alice Guy-Blanché directed the 1895 filmThe Cabbage Fairy, which inspired fellow filmmakers like The Lumière Brothers, asFar Outreports. The next “firsts” among women directors was lesbian filmmaker Dorothy Arzner whose debut filmFashions for Womenwas in 1927; she has the most titles of any woman director.
A whole decade later, Esther Eng or Ng Kam-Ha, became the first Chinese woman director with her 1937 filmMin zu nv ying xiong. Today, Eng is considered an unsung hero among Chinese directors. Practically 40 years flew by between Eng’s debut and Alanis Obomsawin’s documentaryChristmas at Moose Factory. The 1971 film is considered the first film directed by a member of the Abeniki nation that brought Indigenous culture to the forefront of Canadian discussion.
A mere four years between Obomsawin’s debut and Euzhan Palcy’s TV movie,The Messengerpremiered. Palcy is considered the first Black woman director to not only work with a major studio, but the only woman director Marlon Brando (A Dry White Season) worked with. Every call for representation is a reminder that the gap between the first woman director and the first Black woman director was 80 years.
Related:Coming to Theaters: Upcoming Films Directed by Women
The Female Gaze
When films are directed by women, they amplify the echo into a scream of “I see you too!”Women directors oftenbuild cities on dirt roads. They create new avenues by bringing empathy front and center through creative endeavors. For her filmLittle Woods, starring Tessa Thomspon, director Nia DaCosta revealed that she left New York to write in rural North Dakota in an interview with ReMezcla: “You know, the more research you do for anything, the more you actually feel the people who live in these places and who live the lives you are trying to portray, the more real your film and your characters become.”
Actors often receive praise for making villains likable. When men write and direct women, they walk the line of praise and exploiting the characters. Even with the best of intentions, very few male directors are able to portray their full complexity — they lack the lived experience, after all. Women behind the camera allow for character and narrative nuances to shine through in ways that don’t necessarily come across when men are in charge.
