Skip to main content

The Academy's failure, yet one again, to nominate a female director.



The Academy's failure, yet again, to nominate a female director.

"There's been a slow death in a way. On the positive side, there are films getting into the Academy Awards that wouldn't have, but on the negative side, financiers are now dominant and making all the decisions. I can't count the ways a director's vision is compromised." Lili Taylor

I opened my computer and settled to continue working on my feature script about a 'disentranced' woman in a world that could be ours, but dare not admit that it is.  'Disentranced' is the title of the film.  I love this word for it basically means: To awaken from a trance or deep sleep; to arouse from a reverie.  Unfortunately I wasn't able to write as I very quickly got diverted by the nominations for the 91st Academy Awards, which have been released today. 


I watch a lot of films, intrigued by the way performances are brought to life through direction, art design and cinematography.  Of course there are a lot more elements in filmmaking , but those three elements peak my interest more than any other.   I wasn't surprised with the nominations, but I was surprised by the lack of women who have been nominated.  Not one nomination for directing, except in the foreign film category, not one nomination for cinematography, not one nomination for editing, not one for music (original score) and then it dawned on me.  I have been watching films that are pushed towards exhibition ultimately created mainly by men.  These are the films that I watch, because these are the films that are screened,  precipitated by an agenda to push these films towards exhibition by the financiers themselves who fund these films.

 There is not a lack of female talent, don't any one dare say that, but there is a lack of sympathy from those funding these films to allocate female talent in the making of these films.  When will this change?  How can this change?  It is not enough to push statistics that women are not given opportunities at directing, it has to change right at the top,  with those making the financial and creative decisions.

Women have to be given opportunities to be involved in all facets of filmmaking, to not have this happen is archaic, one sided and irrelevant in this day and age. I have been given a choice at the cinema and or VOD that I can either watch films by men or films by men.  Doesn't leave much of a choice.  I hear Lili Taylor's sentiment that financiers are making the decisions, so where does this leave the audiences that will tune in on Feb 25th?  What are the Academy Awards telling these people, the audience, you and I? 

 The Academy Awards are telling you and I that women are not good enough.  I will not not stand by and practice my craft as a director with this echoing in the background amidst the glamour, glitz and applause.  We all have to speak up to not tolerate this inequality in film, for it is more than just film. It is a voice; vision even, of the past, present and future that is provided by men, keeping women asleep or at bay. These are both one and the same.  My film disentranced is about a woman that wakes up from the lies and misconceptions that she has been fed.  Isn't it time we all did this?



Stella Dimadis

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Memories are the key not to the past, but to the future.

"Memories are the key not to the past, but to the future. "   Corrie Ten Boom Corrie Ten Boom was a Dutch watchmaker, who had helped many Jews escape during the Holocaust, was a prisoner and then a writer.  She held many memories, no doubt, fears; images that would stay forever and haunt her, but they were able to unlock a future for her that she would never have imagined.  Her writing and her boldness initiated her knighthood by the Queen of the Netherlands, The King's College in New York City named a new women's house in her honour, her book "The Hiding Place", was  made into a feature film, twice. Locked away in our computer hard drives are examples of our work and lives that we lock away when our computer sleeps, forgetting about their importance because we are always told to focus on the now, forgetting about our past.  Well, perhaps it is time that we also learn to love our past, regardless of what it was like, so that we can understand what our...
Post a Comment
Read more
  Apocalyptic Art 'This is the way the world ends, not with a bang, but a whimper." T.S Eliot For centuries, artists and creatives alike have depicted the Apocalypse, which is the fantastical, unimaginable end of the world and all life on it.  At some point it is going to happen, maybe about 5 million years away when the sun burns out, so perhaps it is this truth that has artists thinking of what this end may look like.  Since it will happen, down the track. Recently it has felt like humanity was in the midst of it with the advent of Covid, but also with the devastation that climate change has been and is inflicting on the land and people globally.  It is very easy to start to think of the end, grim as that may sound. When I had created yesterday's art piece, even though I wasn't happy with the art work, I was very much intrigued by the colours in the background which reminded me of an apocalyptic feel, vibe.  So today's challenge I set ...
1 comment
Read more

Silver Linings Playbook-Cinematography

Cinematography "Photography is truth.  The cinema is truth 24 times per second." Jean-Luc Godard. It comes as no surprise that I made a point of watching 'Silver Linings Playbook', directed by David. O Russell for the one and only  reason that Bradley Cooper is the lead.  I admire his ease and fluidity as an actor in front of the camera, coupled with the control that his eyes muster with each line of dialogue that he delivers.  'Silver Linings Playbook' revolves around Bradley Cooper who plays Pat Solitano, a teacher with Bipolar disorder who has been released from the psychiatric hospital, under the care of his mother, Jacki Weaver and his father, played by Robert De Niro.  He is determined to win back his ex wife, but in the interim meets Tiffany Maxwell, played by Jennifer Lawrence, a recently widowed sex addict who tells him that she will help him get his wife back, providing he enters a dance competition with her.  It is a feel good story by ...
Post a Comment
Read more