Despite equal representation of male and female filmmakers at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, a new study shows there has been little change in the number of women working as directors and producers at the independent-film showcase over the past decade.
But women still fare better behind the camera in independent film than in studio productions.
The Sundance Institute and Women in Film commissioned the study last year and announced the results Monday in Park City, Utah.
Researchers at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism examined gender disparity in American narrative and documentary films shown at Sundance from 2002 to 2012.
Study director Stacy L. Smith and her team assessed the gender of more than 11,000 directors, writers, producers, cinematographers and editors of the 820 narrative and documentary films shown over this period and found that women represent less than one-third of those filmmakers.
“There has been no sustained or meaningful change across the last 11 years in the percentage of directors or producers at the Sundance Film Festival,” Smith said.
There are more women working in documentary films than narrative films, but Smith said the research finds that “as commerce moves in, females move out.”
The study found that female directors comprise a norm of 22.2 percent of narrative competition films and 14.5 percent of premieres and other non-competition films at Sundance over the past 11 years. During the same period, female directors made up only 4.4 percent of the top-grossing Hollywood films, a ratio of more than 15 male directors for every female. Of those women, though, more than 40 percent had come through the filmmaking programs of the Sundance Institute.
Women and men participate in the institute’s programs in almost equal number, Smith said.
Female filmmakers find more equal representation in the documentary sphere, comprising nearly half of those represented at Sundance from 2002 to 2012.
Finally, the study found that films directed by women employ greater numbers of women behind the camera than those made by men.
The Sundance Institute and Women in Film aim to use the results of this study to create mentoring and support programs to increase the number of women working behind the camera in American filmmaking.
Is “Glicked” The New “Barbenheimer”? “Wicked” and “Gladiator II” Hit Theater Screens
"Barbenheimer" was a phenomenon impossible to manufacture. But, more than a year later, that hasn't stopped people from trying to make "Glicked" — or even "Babyratu" — happen.
The counterprogramming of "Barbie" and "Oppenheimer" in July 2023 hit a nerve culturally and had the receipts to back it up. Unlike so many things that begin as memes, it transcended its online beginnings. Instead of an either-or, the two movies ultimately complemented and boosted one another at the box office.
And ever since, moviegoers, marketers and meme makers have been trying to recreate that moment, searching the movie release schedule for odd mashups and sending candidates off into the social media void. Most attempts have fizzled (sorry, "Saw Patrol" ).
This weekend is perhaps the closest approximation yet as the Broadway musical adaptation "Wicked" opens Friday against the chest-thumping sword-and-sandals epic "Gladiator II." Two big studio releases (Universal and Paramount), with one-name titles, opposite tones and aesthetics and big blockbuster energy — it was already halfway there before the name game began: "Wickiator," "Wadiator," "Gladwick" and even the eyebrow raising "Gladicked" have all been suggested.
"'Glicked' rolls off the tongue a little bit more," actor Fred Hechinger said at the New York screening of "Gladiator II" this week. "I think we should all band around 'Glicked.' It gets too confusing if you have four or five different names for it."
As with "Barbenheimer," as reductive as it might seem, "Glicked" also has the male/female divide that make the fan art extra silly. One is pink and bright and awash in sparkles, tulle, Broadway bangers and brand tie-ins; The other is all sweat and sand, blood and bulging... Read More