A recent dip in female-led theatrical releases in the UK - back to 2018 levels of 26% reminds us that our work is far from over; that we cannot be complacent.
Below you can read about the research we conduct into gender representation in film and the wider industry, tracking the release landscape to present an accurate picture of investment in films by filmmakers of marginalised genders.
Here you can also find out about news and opportunities at Reclaim The Frame, along with curated film recommendations, filmmaker interviews, and creative responses.
Please introduce yourself and tell us how you became involved in the film industry?
I’m Mia Bays and I’ve been working in film for 27 years, since I was 19. I’ve got 13 credits as producer or production executive, I’ve made four shorts including an Oscar winner (Six Shooter by Martin McDonagh 2005), garnered two BAFTA, and multiple BIFA nominations for films I’ve produced. I’ve worked on over 70 features as a distributor or sales agent. I now run the film charity Birds’ Eye View, so my producing career is on pause to focus on gender equality in film, which is my current passion.
Film is incredibly important to me – it’s my family, my life. It provides a guide to how I live and it’s my favourite art form. My life and work are symbiotically connected – in a positive healthy way, I think. I do work very hard to attain that.
Tell us a little about Birds’ Eye View and one of your latest projects/events Reclaim the Frame?
I’m the director-at-large of Birds’ Eye View Film which is a 15-year-old charity whose mission is to bring ever larger audiences to films by women. We started as a film festival of films by women for over a decade, and now we are a year-round campaign for change with three pillars of focus: promoting films by women to audiences; getting more female filmmakers and female executives in meaningful positions through training and advocacy; and data and research on equality in film.
Reclaim The Frame is a BFI-backed pilot scheme to build a movement: namely a network of influencers in five cities that promote four new films by women in six cinemas in order to help them succeed commercially. We hold events around each film in each cinema and the influencers get a free ticket but have to bring at least one person with them who buys a ticket. It’s a “pay it forward” process and aligns conscious consumerism with film-going as the underlying message is: “if you care about equality and film, we can make a difference together.”
The films selected are as wide and intersectional a mix as we could find that were being released in cinemas in our pilot period which is May to September 2018. We care about representation, we care about not centring only white straight able-bodied stories, and we balance that with an eye on commerciality and how to help the films we support break out and become hits. Because the more films by women work commercially, the more they will be made.
What do you think about the current UK film Industry and the “Me too” movement?
The industry is healthy in terms of production and the numbers of films shooting here. The box office is up in 2017 – £1.379 billion ($1.8bn) a 3.7% increase from 2016. But there are too many films. We need a production slowdown. More focus on releasing not just creating….What’s difficult is the squeeze on smaller films – distribution is really tough. Add in issues like fine weather and other current distractions for audience attention (football, TV, other cultural endeavours) and it’s a rough environment for specialised film right now.
I think the #MeToo moment we had in film in 2017-18 has been a very positive shift in focus from blaming victims, endorsing secrecy and protecting toxic power bases into a healthier more transparent space that is suddenly much more aware of unhealthy power balances, and of the lack of inclusive practice, and there’s a drive to shift this. Which is something we welcome as we’ve been plugging away at that for some time. We have to keep the focus and not let it slip off the agenda, so it’s not just a moment but a movement that carries change with it.
What was it like to work on Microwave films such as Lilting, Shifty and Ill Manors?
Rewarding and humbling. It’s challenging to make good work – especially with ultra low budgets when it’s your first time on a feature. I’m proud of the amount of people from underrepresented spaces and disadvantaged backgrounds whose work we made or whose careers the work helped – Riz Ahmed being the stand-out. I’m less proud of only making one film out of eight written and directed by a woman. We thought we tried hard but it wasn’t hard enough. This lack was a big motivator for what I do now.
What are you currently working on? And, how can people support Reclaim the Frame?
I’m working on driving Birds’ Eye View forward – fundraising, business plan and budget writing, building up the board and generally figuring out 2019-2020.
We are also deep into the Reclaim The Frame programme and touring with our second film Pin Cushion which is a debut by the British writer/director Deborah Haywood. It’s fantastic. Very powerful and unique. Then we have Faces Places by Agnes Varda and JR and The Rider by Chloe Zhaou from August to October. We tour each film to six cinemas in five cities. We build events around them and do everything we can to promote the films, to our 30k followers and beyond.
What advice would you give to young professionals wanting to get involved in the industry?
I would say be dedicated, maintain focus, pay attention, develop as many skills as you can – soak up experience like a sponge. Decide what your specialisms might be – pick an angle or two.
Also decide what is unique about your perspective and why it might be valuable and think about how you use that to your advantage. I come from a single parent family, grew up on benefits, didn’t go to private school or University or film school. I learnt everything on the job. I knew film was my passion and I made it work for me. It’s as much my mistress as I am hers! Anything is possible, I do believe that.
For other Mandy news click here
“The tool of every self-portrait is the mirror. You see yourself in it. Turn it the other way, and you see the world” Agnès Varda
Revered for her bold political and autobiographically inspired work, Agnès Varda is a seminal feminist filmmaker and matriarch of the French New Wave. Her influential career began in the 1950s with La Pointe Courte – often considered the unofficial first film of the New Wave – and continues seven decades later, as in 2017 she became the first female director to be awarded an honorary Oscar.
LA POINTE COURTE (1955) – 86 mins
Anticipating the style and attitude of the New Wave, Agnès Varda’s directorial debut remains as fresh and original as the day it was made.
Set in a declining Mediterranean fishing village, the film portrays both the complex relationship between a married couple, exceptionally played by Silvia Monfort and Philippe Noiret, and the economic difficulties facing the wider community.
Remarkably assured and insightful, the film bears the realist approach, social comment and filmmaking flair that would become Varda’s hallmarks.
CLEO FROM 5 TO 7 (1962) – 90 mins
Agnès Varda’s skilfully captures Paris at the height of the 60s in this intriguing tale expertly presented in real time about a singer whose life is in turmoil as she awaits a test result from a biopsy.
As Cléo readies herself to meet with her doctor she meets several friends and strangers, and grapples with her idea of her own mortality.
LE BONHEUR (1965) – 118 mins
In one of Agnès Varda’s more provocative films, she presents us with the dilemma faced by husband and father Francois (Jean-Claude Drouot) who finds himself falling in love with an attractive postal worker.
What follows is a detailed study of adult fidelity and happiness, which will ultimately end with major repercussions for all parties involved.
ONE SINGS, THE OTHER DOESN’T (original title: L’une chante, l’autre pas) (1977) – 116 mins
Agnès Varda focuses on the intertwined lives of two women brought together during the struggle of the women’s movement in 1970s France.
This subject that remains all too familiar with Varda who was personally involved with the movement.
VAGABOND (1985) – 105 mins
Sandrine Bonnaire won a Best Actress César for her portrayal as Mona – a young and defiant drifter in this tragic story.
Using a largely non-professional cast, Agnès Varda’s splintered portrait of the enigmatic woman is told through flashbacks of those who encountered her.
JACQUOT DE NANTES (1991) – 118 mins
Jacquot de Nantes tells the story of a child and his obsession of pursuing his dream to become a filmmaker.
How he buys his first camera, shoots his first amateur film which marks the beginning of one of the most prestigious careers of any French director: Jacques Demy.
THE GLEANERS AND I (2000) – 82 mins
An 1867 painting by Jean-Francois Millet inspired septuagenarian documentarian Agnes Varda to cross the French countryside to videotape people who scavenge. Taking everything from surplus in the fields, to rubbish in trashcans, to oysters washed up after a storm, the “gleaners” range from those sadly in need to those hoping to recreate the community activity of centuries past, and still others who use whatever they find to cobble together a rough art. Highlighted by Varda’s amusing narration.
THE BEACHES OF AGNÈS (2008) – 110 mins
In this autobiographical documentary, celebrated French filmmaker Agnes Varda provides a window into her eventful life as she revisits various locales that have been important to her. Interspersed between these trips are interviews with Varda’s collaborators and family members, as well as archive footage and still photographs. This eclectic mix provides both a history of the subject and an illuminating tour of an artist’s mind and creative process.
For more information including booking tickets click HERE
Only 16% of working film writers in the UK are female, and only 14% of prime-time TV is written by women. These are just two of the shocking findings in a new, independent report commissioned by WGGB.
The report, Gender Inequality and Screenwriters, was funded by the Authors’ Licensing and Collecting Society (ALCS) and authored by Alexis Kreager with Stephen Follows.
It spans a whole decade and reveals that TV shows and films written by women in the UK have flatlined during that period, with no consistent improvement in gender representation.
WGGB’s Equality Writes campaign aims to tackle the problem. Find out more and pledge your support on the campaign website.
Myth 1. “The data in the Equality Writes report is historical – things are better now, right?”
The report used the available data covering 2000-2016 (2005-2016 for Film) and there is no improving trend in the whole period. Some commissioners are claiming that since 2017 things have improved but we have not seen evidence to support this. Piecemeal efforts by individual commissioners, producers or channels don’t add up to systemic change. We need access to detailed, programme level data to see where these promised improvements are happening.
Myth 2. “There simply aren’t as many women who want to write.”
The figures don’t support this. Our evidence shows that roughly equal numbers start off wanting to enter the profession, but at every career stage there are fewer and fewer women. The hiring process for writers is different from that of most other careers, making it much harder to identify why that is.
Myth 3. “Men are just better writers.”
We know that tastes differ and there is no objective measure of quality. That said, if we look at box office revenue, review scores and viewing figures – these all suggest that projects written by women are more successful and popular.
Myth 4. “Women can’t write comedy”
In comedy, research shows only 11% of UK television comedy is written by women. Panel shows, the biggest employer of comedy writers, have almost exclusively male writing teams. When a woman does get into the room, it’s often a hostile and testosterone driven atmosphere. As for women comedy writers not being funny, how about, Sharon Horgan, Lisa McGee, Daisy May Cooper and Ruth Jones?
Myth 5: “Women don’t write sci-fi”
Despite the fact that women from Mary Shelley to Ursula Le Guin and Margaret Atwood have produced genre-defining works of science fiction, when it comes to writing for the screen even established women writers are rarely trusted with big name shows.
Myth 6. “Women just aren’t pitching to commissioners”.
If this is the case for some commissioners, it is important that they ask themselves why. Producers are often the gate-keepers in the commissioning process and try to guess what a commissioner is interested in. If producers believe that a commissioner is only interested in certain types of writer, that needs to be challenged.
Myth 7. “Women aren’t pushy enough, they need to network like men.”
No, the industry needs to make changes so that a variety of voices can be heard. Commissioning decisions should be made on the quality of the work, not the personality of the writer.
Myth 8. “Women’s caring responsibilities mean they can’t put in the hours.”
Not all women have caring responsibilities and many women can and do balance long hours with other responsibilities. However, if the culture makes the work inaccessible to some groups of workers, then the culture needs to change. Long hours culture is damaging to all workers and everyone is entitled to a family life (however they define it).
Myth 9. “Women prefer writing for daytime and children’s TV”
Research shows that women writers find it much harder to move between programmes than men, even with a great deal of experience. Daytime and Children’s are great but the more prestigious a programme is the less likely women are to be writing for it.
Myth 10. “It’s gone too far the other way. It’s now men that are discriminated against and everything is about women writers”.
While we welcome the new development programmes aimed at women writers and underrepresented groups, the overwhelming majority of films and TV shows (especially large-budget and/or prime-time shows) are still written by men.
We are calling on industry to work with us to effect positive change.
In the short term we are calling for:
• Programme-level TV equality monitoring data to be released.
• Public funders to pledge a 50/50 split between male and female-written films by 2020.
We want equality of opportunity for all under-represented groups, for example BAME writers, LGBT+ writers, writers with disabilities and working-class writers. We believe the release of equality data is essential, so we can broaden out our campaign and ensure that writing is a profession which is fair, equal and free from discrimination.
WGGB’s Equality Writes campaign aims to tackle the problem. Find out more and pledge your support on the campaign website.
