Here you'll find films that either have core themes and values that are of distinct interest to women or stories intent on depth of character, films you may have missed, most having opened and closed because they couldn't hold onto the theaters. In the present day atmosphere, the opening weekend gross has become the determinant of whether a film is 'good' or not. Not true and we have to say it. We have to mobilize to compete on behalf of films which are worth our time and valuable and never set out to be 'blockbuster' of this sort. We need to embrace their DVD as our release -- find and rent or buy these films so that they live.
Sometimes Zea deals with the dumb stuff just like everybody else. The progress she has made, she believes, is in how she reacts to those crazy-making moments. “As I’ve gotten older, I recognize that it’s only a movie. Before I would have thought It’s my life. Something is wrong with me if things are not working out. Now I have the confidence to say, Maybe it’s not supposed to work out; maybe it’s the idea and not me. I’ve developed a tough skin and, I hope, not lost my sense of humor.”More >
Does a male idea of what is sexy really rule? Last November, Maxim magazine, a men’s publication known for its artful
covers of buxom women just barely covered, posted their on-line list of
the unsexiest women. The list, which a Maxim representative said was a
tongue cheek response to an Esquire magazine poll, listed “Sex In the
City” star Sarah Jessica Parker as the unsexiest woman alive.
Viral videos fly around the internet at top speed, generally finding a home on YouTube, SuperDeluxe (superdeluxe.com), Viral Video Chart (viralvideochart.com), MySpace the list goes on and on. Brandon Burkhart and his partner Randall Mills are out there sorting through the videos and lending them a dash of dignity, pre-YouTube, and giving an audience a great evening in the process. More >
The very first day of my very first high profile "industry job," I received an email from my boss by accident. It was meant to answer a colleague’s seemingly innocuous query about me, The New Assistant. The subject heading: "I did not hire..." The email : "I did not hire a piece of ass. But she's a Harvard grad, very bright, and laughs a lot. So there you go." The fact that he considered me intelligent and funny was instantly and utterly lost on me. Less than ten minutes at my brand new desk, there I was, signed, sealed, and delivered...More >
What I am talking about is a complete change in professional orientation. Changing careers. Making new goals. Finding out how to achieve them. And I don’t mean going from a buyer to a seller, (although that one was a real eye-opener) or from catching to pitching, or from actively producing to teaching producing, or from making films to assessing films or enabling films. I’m talking out of one entire field into a new one.
VIDEO Q&A with the Filmmakers of FREEHELD By: WIF/LA Panel A video Q&A with Cynthia Wade, director and producer of FREEHELD and Vanessa Roth, producer. FREEHELD became the winner of the 2008 Academy Award for Best Documentary Short Subject and was finished with a grant from the Women In Film Foundation's Film Finishing Fund. The Q&A is moderated by Ilene Chaiken, creator of The L Word. More >
Dr. Martha M. Lauzen, a professor in the School of Communication at UC San Diego conducts annual studies of women working in the film and television industries. This is The Celluloid Ceiling report for 2007. it provides an in-depth look at the number of women not employed in influential positions on the top 250 grossing films each year.
Women comprised 24% of all creators, executive producers, producers, directors, writers, editors, and directors of photography working on situation comedies, dramas, and unscripted programs airing on the broadcast networks during the 2005-06 season. This percentage represents a decrease of one percentage point from last season...More >
Porn films never get compared to “Citizen Kane.” This is because, first of all, “Citizen Kane” has a plot, which porn films don't. Porn plots usually revolve around a cliched male protagonist strutting and thrusting his way through a series of preposterous situations chosen simply because they highlight the actor’s impressive talent for strutting and thrusting...More >
“The Devil Came on Horseback” and took my breath away, and broke my heart, and explained the origins of the genocide in Darfur, clearly. It’s a provocative call to action.More >
These "how-to's" are contributed by experts in their fields. Plumb them, consider them and if you have more questions post your questions on....
...Post them on the "thread" for that article in Letters to the Editor. The expert will answer your questions specifically to help you expand your knowledge on the subject.
Video: some of these 'articles' present experts via panels video-taped by one of our chapters. (You'll need the capacity on your operating system to watch those that have video content...)
As in the mission statements of all the
Chapters of Women in Film/Television, all the contributors herein and in future issues are proud of "giving back" and committed to doing so. Mentoring makes us strong. After all, mentoring is the backbone of the "old boys' network'. Likewise.
Many of the subjects of the articles were suggested to us by grantees (such as the
Latina New Filmmakers Grants or the
Emerging Filmmakers Grants) as being what talented new-comers really don't know and need to know. Many more suggest themselves in conversation with programming committees from all the chapters. We'd like even more ideas for subject matter from you. If there is a subject you'd like parsed, if you want real information, please let us know by writing a
Letter to the Editor. If there's a woman expert that you'd like to hear from on her subject, let us know that person's name and we'll approach her to write an article for The Virtual Mentor..
Created for and recognizing up-and-coming filmmakers from under-represented communities across the country giving deserving female filmmakers access to valuable resources and contacts that otherwise would be a challenge to attain. You can read more about the 2007 grant winners for both filmmaker grants here.
A collection of Sheila Benson's critical best (LA Times critic from 1981 to 1991, msn.com after that, Seattle Weekly now Etc ). There is something subtly uncommon about Sheila's reviews, another way of observing, another way of remarking on the emotional center of a movie, so often observing things not only unobserved in ordinary reviews but missing from the ordinary review. That is of course from our pov. ......it's nice to pay respect and give credence to that here on these pages.
