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

2. 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)
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-

3. 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 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

4. 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……