1. Criterion One
Why is directing perceived to be a male pursuit?
In March 2011, an article in the main section of the Observer had the headline, “Where are all the women film
directors?” The writer of the article, actress Kerry Fox, explained, “I think it is a lack of confidence that stops
women directing, the need for a strong sense of self and an innate sense of the right to be a director.” Nicola
Lees of Women in Film and Television (WFTV) agrees. She runs a mentoring programme for women, set up
when Skillset research in 2009revealed5000 women had left UK media industry employment since the
recession, compared to just 750 men. The research also confirmed that women were over-qualified,
overworked and underpaid in comparison to their male counterparts. Nicola says the number of women
leaving the industry in their early 30s and the shortage of female directors is often attributed to childcare
but that‟s not always the case. “I have 20 women on the WFTV mentoring scheme. Some have children. Some
don‟t. It‟s about women lacking confidence. Women need to look at their achievements and experience. Men
don‟t feel that they don‟t deserve to be there.”
Skillset‟s UK findings are reflected in the research of Professor Martha Lauzen of San Diego State University.
She carries out an annual “Celluloid Ceiling” study of women working behind the scenes on the top 250
domestic grossing films. Her 2010 findings show women comprised 16% of all directors, executive producers,
producers, writers, cinematographers and editors. Women accounted for just 7% of directors in 2010, the
same percentage as in 2009 and a decline of two percentage points from 1998. Lauzen has also cited
confidence as a reason. She says reporters have told her that, “when they talk to the guys, they can‟t shut
„em up. But when they talk to the women, it‟s like pulling teeth…. Women have to promote themselves, but
when they do, it‟s seen as being unfeminine.” (quoted in KiraCohrane article)
The idea that behaviour is either „feminine‟ or „masculine‟ can be linked to how people have come to see the
role of the director on a film set. The director is considered to be the boss and when the boss is male it
seems very natural that he should lead. In her 1992 speech for Women in Film Crystal Awards, Barbara
Streisand made reference to the inequalities in the industry and in particular how language is used to
transform traits seen as positive in a male director into negatives when displayed by his female counterpart.
She says for example a male is “uncompromising” while a femaleis a “ball breaker”, a man is “assertive” yet
a female is “aggressive” and when a male is said to have demonstrated “great leadership” a female will be
described as “controlling.” (We are the Girlz in the Hood, Premier…..1993)

2. Also consider for example the coverage given to the winner of the Oscar for Best Director in 2010, Kathyrn
Bigelow. It is quite a challenge to find press coverage whichdoesn‟t mention her gender yet we don‟t hear or
read about the „male director‟ because the role of the director is gendered as male. Streisand was
presenting the award for Best Director at the Oscars in 2010 and her first sentence was, “From among the
five gifted nominees tonight, the winner could be, for the first time, a woman.” On opening the envelope she
announced, “Well the time has come. Kathryn Bigelow!” Bigelow does not refer to gender in her acceptance
speech and instead said, “I think the secret to directing is collaborating and I had truly an extraordinary
group of collaborators.” This comment is of particular interest when compared to the comments made by
Brad Pitt about Quentin Tarantino as part of his nomination clip. Pitt said, “It‟s a director‟s medium. It starts
with the director and ends with the director. The set is church, he is God and no heretics allowed.”
Pitt‟s comments reflect the idea of the director as „author‟ of a film. Film is one of the few art forms which is
not the work of a single author but the result of the collaborative efforts of a very large team. As the main
collaborators, the scriptwriter, producer and the director of photography are often given some credit in
Oscar acceptance speeches and during a film‟s promotion but it is the director to whom authorship is
attributed. This idea of director as author can be traced back to the French film critics of the late 1940s and
50s and their debates in French and later British and American magazines about the artistic value of cinema.
Critic Peter Graham suggests that an article by AlexandreAstruc, „The birth of a new avant- garde: La
caméra-stylo‟ (ÉcranFrançais 144, 1948), is the first to suggest that the director should be the author and the
artist. Astruc writes, “Direction is no longer a means of illustrating or presenting a scene, but a true act of
writing. The film-maker/author writes with his camera and as a writer writes with his pen.” (Graham (ed),
The New Wave, p.15.)
This idea was taken up by the young French film critics writing for the magazine Cahiers du Cinema as a way
to revive French mainstream cinema which they felt had become stale and uncinematic. They enjoyed the
films of Alfred Hitchcock, Howard Hawks and John Ford and used these directors as examples of artists who
could achieve a distinct personal style while working within the constraints of a studio system. The idea was
first referred to as a theory by American film critic Andrew Sarris in 1962. In his article, “Notes on the
Auteur Theory”, he sets down the criteria for the auteur. A director had to possess a certain degree of
technical competence, a personal style and what Sarris termed an interior meaning or „subtext‟ to qualify as
an auteur. These criteria laid the foundations for what would be one of the most debated theories in the
academic study of film for the next few decades. The issue for young women now is that female directors

3. were excluded from these debates. They were not discussed as auteurs and as a result of not being part of
the most debated theory as film studies as an academic discipline developed; they were hardly discussed at
all.
This presents a problem in 2011 because young women seem to have no femalesin the history of film to look to
for inspiration. They seem to accept that directing is a job for men and personally I‟ve never heard a female
student say, “I want to be a director.” They are influenced by the statistics because they see the industry as
male dominated and as Lees and Lauzen stated, they lack the confidence to visualise themselves in that role
and buck the trend. They need roles models and they need to know they have the qualities and the skills
needed to make it as a director. As Kate Kinninmont of WFTV says, “Films should be made about people and
the best person should be doing the job whether a man or a woman. It doesn‟t make sense that only a fraction
of women are good enough to be at the top – look at school and college results.”
The artefact I produce will introduce the statistics for female directors and will suggest a link between these
statistics and auteur theory. The main point I want them to take away is that there have been and there are
female film directors, they just don‟t know about them. I also want them to see the connection between the
exclusion of females in the development of auteur theory and the perception of directing as a job for men.
The artefact must be limited to making this one point even though the topic is vast and has many possibilities
for exploration. This artefact aims to be a conversation starter for students and while primarily aimed at a
female audience I believe young females will also benefit from male students being part of the audience
because as the title of this essay suggests, it is all about perception. They need to see women as equals when
it comes to leadership roles in the industry. This is also why I‟ve chosen to feature the Oscar win of Kathryn
Bigeow in the film. She is only one of a number of great female directors but she will stand out for students
because she has directed successful films in the action genre as opposed to drama or romantic comedy.
While equality can only really ever be achieved when female directors are no longer referred to as female
directors, it‟s fairly impossible to make a shift in the perception of young people without an exploration of the
past. That is what this artefact sets out to do.
References here……