Representation of female directors in movie industry worsened in 2018, study finds

Women made up eight per cent of directors working on the 250 top domestic grossing films of 2018, a new US study has found

The representation of female directors in the movie industry keeps getting worse, a new study has found.

Women made up eight per cent of directors working on the 250 top domestic grossing films of 2018, according to Martha M Lauzen, PhD, and her newly release study The Celluloid Ceiling.

That is three percentage points less than in 2017, when women accounted for 11 per cent of directors working on the top 250 films.

The top grossing domestic films of 2018 include, according to Box Office Mojo (which is cited by the study), Black Panther, Avengers: Infinity War, Incredibles 2, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, Deadpool 2, Dr Seuss's The Grinch, Mission: Impossible – Fallout, Ant-Man and the Wasp, Aquaman, and Solo: A Star Wars Story.

All 10 of those movies were directed by men.

Numbers point to a long-term trend in decreasing representation for female directors: in 1998, they made up nine per cent of directors working on the top 250 films – one percentage point higher than the latest figure.

Women fared slightly better in the industry as a whole, looking at a variety of behind-the-scenes (meaning off-camera) roles.

Over the course of 2018, they made up 20 per cent of all directors, writers, producers, executive producers, editors, and cinematographers who worked on the top 250 domestic grossing films.

That is up two percentage points from 18 per cent in 2017, per Lauzen's study.

Still, overall figures show the movie industry remains overwhelmingly male-dominated. Ninety-two per cent of the top 250 films had no women directors, a staggering 96 per cent had no women cinematographers, and 73 per cent had no female writers.

Seventy-four per cent of those movies didn't employ any women editors and 42 per cent had no female executive producers.

Producing and executive producing roles do appear to be two of the most favourable spots for female representation: they made up 26 per cent and 21 per cent of those categories respectively.

"The study provides no evidence that the mainstream film industry has experienced the profound positive shift predicted by so many industry observers over the last year," Lauzen told Variety.

"This radical underrepresentation is unlikely to be remedied by the voluntary efforts of a few individuals or a single studio."