Running Head: Female Led Films

Female Led Films: Literature Review

Jose D. Junco
University of Texas at El Paso

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Abstract

Hollywood has always been tough for women, especially in the technical aspects
of it; they just dont receive the same treatment as men. This means less job
opportunities, different salaries, and of course significant differences with acting roles.
2014 seems to be the year for women to stand out, thanks to Gone Girl, and Edge of
Tomorrow weve had great female characters on the big screen. Angelina Jolie seems that
will do the same behind the camera. This research paper also introduces the great female
producers inside Hollywood right now, and what does the audience think about femaleled movies.

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Female Led Films: Literature Review

Hollywood has been criticized of not providing women with significant roles
inside the film industry. Whether is it because the script is being written for a male
counterpart, or the female roles are being diminished as secondary non-important
characters. This also applies on the fields of writing, producing, and directing. It doesnt
necessary need to be the acting roles. Women have had a tough time inside the film
industry for quite some time. Theyve been misrepresented and somewhat being left out
of big projects. Some female led films have been released in recent years that have
performed pretty well at the box office. The Hunger Games: Catching Fire and Gravity
being box office monsters just last year proved that film audiences are more than ready
for female led films, and that an actual demand for female led films actually exists.
Despite that women driven films have actually perform well at the box office it
seems Hollywood still has its own doubts about releasing more films like this. This has
made people wonder if Hollywood has always been like this, or that if it has changed in
recent years. Now more than ever audiences are demanding for women driven films, but
it seems they just get a certain amount every year. This situation has certainly increased
through the years and as time passes by it surely will become a bigger issue than it is
now, so through these next four questions the situation will be reviewed:
1. What is the current situation with women in film?
2. Why does Hollywood need more women-driven films?
3. Which female Hollywood producers have had the highest grossing films to
date?
4. Do you care if a female is leading the movie youre watching?

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Question #1: What is the current situation with women in film?

The thriller Gone Girl starring Rosamund Pike, in a powerful female role, and
produced by Reese Witherspoon, was released 3 weeks ago, and it still holding up at the
domestic box office. Being #1 for the first two weeks, and #2 in its third week, it already
surpassed the 100 million mark, and thanks to the audiences word of mouth it will
continue it successful run. In the summer Edge of Tomorrow starring Tom Cruise and
Emily Blunt was released, in yet another powerful female role, clearly resembling the
character of Ripley from the Alien franchise, but unlike Gone Girl, Edge of Tomorrow
didnt perform well at the box office despite being one of this years best films. It barely
crossed the 100 million mark at the domestic box office in its whole theater run proving
to be a disappointment budget wise. A lot of people blame the bad performance on the
marketing rather than on the performances and the people involved. So as you can see
Hollywood is actually releasing quality films being led by females, but sometimes it just
doesnt click and maybe thats why Hollywood has been so cautious. They want the safe
route.
The World War II drama Unbroken, directed and produced by Angelina Jolie, will
be released in Christmas day, there has been talks about Oscar nominations already, this
movie can prove to be the breaking point within the industry, if it performs well of
course, and hopefully will provide an opening for more women to work inside the
industry. Still it isnt good enough. The Executive Director of New York Women in Film
and Television Terry Lawler gave his opinion on an article by the BBC called Where are
the Women in Hollywood, People are angry about it. Women are startlingly
underrepresented in the directing category. Its better in the producing category, but its

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still not where it should be. Women should definitely be filling 50% of the producing
jobs and eventually 50% of the directing jobs.
According to the research The Celluloid Ceiling: Behind the Scenes Employment
of Women on the Top 250 Films of 2013, written by Martha. M. Lauzen, for the last
sixteen years they have been tracking womens employment inside the film industry.
Directors, executive producers, producers, writers, cinematographers, and editors, they all
have been included inside this research. The research is based on the top 250 grossing
films of 2013 in the domestic area. The research is divided into two sections,
comparisons since 1998 through 2013 and 2013 only.
Figure 1. Historical Comparison of Percentages of Women Employed in Key Behind The Scenes
Roles*

*Includes directors, writers, executive producers, producers, editors, and cinematographers. Source:
Lauzen, M. (2014, January 1). The Celluloid Ceiling: Behind-the-Scenes Employment of Women on the
Top

250

Films

of

2013.

Retrieved

October

http://womenintvfilm.sdsu.edu/files/2013_Celluloid_Ceiling_Report.pdf

20,

2014,

from

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As we can see on the figure above, the statistics have actually decreased two
percent from 2012 (18%) making it worse for women trying to find a work environment
right now than it was before. Ben Affleck, co-star of Rosamund Pike in Gone Girl, said,
Its inexcusable how few women directors there are. I dont understand it and if you had
that percentage, that inequity in another profession people would be shocked and
appalled. For Affleck to say that, being one of the most successful and coveted
filmmakers right now, means a lot to the film industry because this means they notice the
lack of women working right now and that only can be a good thing.
BAFTA organized a panel in 2013 to answer some questions about the industry,
one of them being why there arent more women in the industry? First answer was that
the people who decide what movies get made are usually men, so youll usually going to
get films targeted to men. Another response was that the workforce inside the industry
doesnt really represent society right now. According to Kate OConnor More women
enter the industry than men, but they drop off between the ages of 30 and 40, which isnt
comparable in other industries. This means that the demand is there, but the job
opportunities are just not.
Question #2: Why does Hollywood need more women-driven films?

There isnt a better time to start making more women-driven films than today.
The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) released on March 27, 2014 its
annual report on the movie audiences demographic. On the report it was stated 52% of
the movie going audience is actually female. This means that more women are actually
attending screenings, and the percentage could increase exponentially if Hollywood starts
releasing more female-driven movies because it would show that they are actually paying

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attention to the audience, but in the majority of the cases they just dont. It really makes
you wonder why are there only 15% of released movies being led by females, when its
really clear that the audience represents a larger number. It seems representing more than
50% of the audience doesnt necessarily mean that Hollywood will change things. This is
because mainly they keep buying tickets to the movies despite dont having an equal
share inside the film industry, and this could make the producers think that women are
okay with the situation, when it clearly isnt.

Figure
2. The gender composition of moviegoers (people who went to a movie at the cinema at least once in the
year) in 2013 skewed slightly more towards women than the overall population. Source: Theatrical Market
Statistics.

(2014,

March

27).

Retrieved

October

30,

2014,

from

http://www.mpaa.org/wp-

content/uploads/2014/03/MPAA-Theatrical-Market-Statistics-2013_032514-v2.pdf

Catching Fire, Frozen, and Gravity are great examples of how a female led movie
can perform on the box office, as long as its good. Catching Fire went all the way and
actually obtained the #1 at the box office, beating movies like Iron Man 3, Man of Steel,
and The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. So clearly the audience is there, and the most
important thing, money, as well, so this doesnt represent as big of a risk as it once
appeared. Lets hope that the recently announced Wonder Woman, and Captain Marvel
will crush it at the box office and finally convince Hollywood of making more female-led
films. I mean look at Lucy, it won #1 at the box office over Hercules, led by Dwayne

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Johnson, so the potential is there, its just a matter of grabbing the opportunity.

Question #3: Which female Hollywood producers have had the highest grossing
films to date?

People tend to think that mainly men produce a lot of the big blockbusters, but
they are wrong. I actually found that out of the top 5 grossing films of all time (Avatar,
Titanic, Marvels The Avengers, The Dark Knight, and Star Wars Ep. I: The Phantom
Menace) only Star Wars Ep. I doesnt have a female producer on their ranks.
Their names are Brooke Breton, Laeta Kalogridis, and Janace Tashjian for Avatar.
Sharon Mann, and Pamela Easley for Titanic. Victoria Alonso, and Patricia Whitcher for
Marvels The Avengers. Emma Thomas for The Dark Knight. All together theyve made
the staggering amount of $2,577,396,281 dollars, and also won a total of 16 academy
awards and received another 16 nominations. So as you can see there are big successful
female producers out there in Hollywood, but not as many as we would want inside the
industry. For example in The Dark Knight there are a total of ten producers and only one
is a woman. In Avatar on the other hand there are a total of eight producers and only
three are women. Meanwhile in Titanic there is a total of seven producers and only two
are women. Marvels The Avengers has eight producers, and again only two women are
on the list. The numbers are still uneven, but its good seeing that there is a female
counterpart inside the big blockbusters, even if sometimes its only one. Emma Thomas
is a special case because she has become a big name inside Warner Bros. after producing
great hits such as The Dark Knight Trilogy, Inception, and Man Of Steel. She currently is
producing two big projects, which consist of Interstellar, and the much anticipated
Batman v. Superman: Dawn Of Justice. So far this year weve had several important

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films produced by women. Gone Girl being the best example of the bunch. Next year will
be big for a certain female producer named Kathleen Kennedy, after producing films such
as Raiders of the Lost Ark, Jurassic Park, and Lincoln she will produce Star Wars Ep.
VII. So its great to see that women are acquiring jobs inside bigger movies, which shows
that Hollywood is starting to open up a little bit more, and hopefully in the next 10 years
everything will be more even.
Question #4: Do you care if a female is leading the movie youre watching?

The following question was answered via a survey made on surveymonkey.com

and we can clearly see that the audience doesnt really care if the lead is male or female.
In the end all they want is just a good movie, regardless of who the lead is. This is great
news in my opinion because it reinforces the idea of releasing more female-driven films,
this tells me that if the movie is good, then regardless of the lead, people will go out and
see it. Gravity is a great example; is basically Sandra Bullocks character on her own for
the whole movie, and people went out and saw it even several times. So I think
Hollywood will get to that place where theyll finally see that there can only be winners
out of this, and they will start releasing more amazing female driven films.

Do you care if a female is

leading the movie youre
watching?
6%
Yes
No

94%

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Figure 3. Pie Chart regarding the survey taken on surveymonkey.com

Conclusion

In conclusion, this literature review has gathered several types of data, and has
answered some very important questions regarding the situation with women on film
right now. The current situation seems to be changing on a slow pace inside the film
industry. Women are slowly getting important and really significant roles inside the
industry. Rosamund Pike, and Emily Blunt are the most recent examples. Women
represent more than 50% of the movie going audience, even though they are only
represented by 15% inside the film industry. We also learned that there are really
successful women producers out there, and its just about picking the right project to
work on. Finally we learned that people dont really care if the movie they are watching
is being led by a man or a woman, they just want good storytelling, and this can only be
good for the industry. In the end the film industry can prove to be a really hard time and
difficult place for any women that is looking for a job inside Hollywood, but as many
things, it isnt impossible to succeed in it. Everything really depends on how future
female-driven films perform on the box office, if they have a successful run we maybe
seeing the start of something new and exciting inside Hollywood.

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References

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Brook, T. (2014, October 7). Where are the women in Hollywood? Retrieved
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Film Question Time: Women in the Film Industry. (2013, April 22). Retrieved
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Hess, A. (2014, March 27). Women Buy Half of All Movie Tickets. That Won't
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Lauzen, M. (2014, January 1). The Celluloid Ceiling: Behind-the-Scenes

Employment of Women on the Top 250 Films of 2013. Retrieved October 20,
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http://womenintvfilm.sdsu.edu/files/2013_Celluloid_Ceiling_Report.pdf

from

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