Haifaa al-Mansour, Female Saudi Arabian Film Director, Trailblazer

March 11, 2020,

Your mission, if you decided to accept it, as a new producer trying to make a name for yourself you have been provided with a budget to write, produce and direct a story based in Saudi Arabia.

What kind of story will you do?

Will there be guns, oil, corruption, gun fights, terrorist acts or similar?

There is a film that recently depicted life in Saudi Arabia.

It was a relief to view a movie emanating from the Middle East that did not focus on terrorism, gun fire, oil and human loss.

It is also refreshing to see a female lead drive the energy in a film providing a lens into Saudi Arabia, a very fascinating country.

Wadjda is a 2012 Saudi Arabian drama film, written and directed by Haifaa al-Mansour.

Please take note.

It was the first feature film shot entirely in Saudi Arabia and the first feature-length film made by a female Saudi director.

Yes, you read that correctly. A woman.

It won numerous awards at film festivals around the world. The film was selected as the Saudi Arabian entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 86th Academy Awards.

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There is another first.

It was the first time Saudi Arabia made a submission for the Oscars.

Unfortunately it was not nominated.

The film however did successfully earn a nomination for Best Foreign Film at the 2014 BAFTA Awards.

Baby steps but definitely steps in the right direction.

Saudi Arabia is a country in Western Asia constituting the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula.

With a land area of approximately 830,000 square miles, Saudi Arabia is the largest sovereign state in the Middle East, geographically the fifth-largest in Asia, second-largest in the Arab world after Algeria and 12th-largest in the world.

Saudi Arabia is bordered by Jordan and Iraq to the north, Kuwait to the northeast, Qatar, Bahrain, and the United Arab Emirates to the east, Oman to the southeast and Yemen to the south.

It is separated from Israel and Egypt by the Gulf of Aqaba.

It is the only nation with both a Red Sea coast and a Persian Gulf coast, and most of its terrain consists of arid desert, lowland and mountains.

Saudi Arabia is the largest economy in the Middle East as of October 2018 and the 18th largest in the world.

The total number of population of Saudi Arabia is 33.4 million. In terms of a view to the future, 50 percent of the youth population are under 25.

The global travelers at Lonely Planet wistfully enlighten, “If there is a final frontier of tourism left, it's Saudi Arabia. The birthplace and spiritual home of Islam, Saudi Arabia is rich in attractions and stirring symbolism

The pristine, azure waters of the Red Sea ache to be explored and in the south, the jewel in the Kingdom's crown, Asir, reveals breathtaking mountain scenery where mysterious and spectacular villages wait to be discovered.

Saudi Arabia is a fascinating place.

So what is the story about? The movie that is.

Based in the 2000s, Wadjda, a 10-year-old unyielding and ardent Saudi girl living in the capital Riyadh, dreams of owning a green bicycle that she passes in a store every day on her way to school.

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She passionately wants to race against her friend Abdullah, a boy from the neighborhood, but riding bikes is frowned upon for girls and Wadjda's mother refuses to buy one for her daughter.

Wadjda begins to earn the money herself by selling mixtapes, hand-braiding bracelets for classmates and acting as a go-between for an older student.

These activities run her into trouble with the strict headmistress.

The plot line thickens.

Is this film for young audiences? Apparently yes.

The team at Common Sense Media shares, “The movie explores the various religious traditions and laws that many Muslim girls and women have to follow, especially when it comes to dress and submitting to men in authority.

There are a few sad moments, references to girls having their period, and one incident in which a male construction worker says something lewd to a young girl, but otherwise there's no violence or strong language (except for one "damn"). An adult smokes cigarettes more and more as the movie progresses. Also, the movie is subtitled rather than dubbed, but older kids and tweens should be able to keep up with the easy-to-follow story.”

Very good to know.

One reviewer expressed, “This was a fantastic movie! It gave me as an American a look into what life is like in Saudi Arabia for girls and women. It was a great teaching took for my family as well. Learning about other cultures as well as evaluating and appreciating what we have here. Great film!”

What shouldn’t be lost is the role that a woman played in bringing the very sweet film to life.

American Actress, Ms. Geena Davis is advocating that women become far more involved not only acting in movies but becoming involved behind the scenes as well.

She shared this with the press.

U.S. Box Office Returns Up 55% For Female-Led Family Films Over 10-Year Period But Parity Still Far Away, Geena Davis Reports

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New study shows family films with female leads out earning male leads, yet male main characters still outnumber female characters two to one.

LOS ANGELES, Feb. 20, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- In the wake of #MeToo, #TimesUp and heightened awareness of the dramatic gender inequity on screen, family films are far from achieving parity. According to The Geena Benchmark Report, the U.S.'s top grossing family films still feature more male leads, despite global box office earnings being higher for female-led films.

For the study, the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media at Mount Saint Mary's University analyzed 1,115 characters from Variety's top 100 grossing animated and live-action family films between 2007 and 2017. Led by Dr. Caroline Heldman, Research Advisor for the Institute, the study examines the family films' leading characters based on gender, race, sexual orientation and disability.

Women are 52% of all moviegoers according to a report by MPAA and 51% of the U.S. population but the Institute's research discovered that within the last ten years, male leading characters still outnumber female main characters 2:1. Previous research from the Institute also revealed that male characters spoke twice as often as female characters in the top grossing family films of 2017.

Family films with female leads increased box office earnings from $44.3 million in 2007 to $80.1 million in 2017 - a 55% gain over the decade. In 2016, female-led family films outperformed men at the box office for the first time by grossing $94.3 million compared to $88 million for male-led films, a 7% increase. This uptick repeats in 2017 and is a sign that female leads are closing the gap between male-led family films both domestically and internationally.

In 2007, male-led family films earned international revenue of $172.5 million compared to $90.1 million for female-led family films. Yet by 2017, family titles with female leads rose to $217 million in international revenue, just $18 million behind the $235.1 million earned by family films with male leads.

Gender is only one portion of this inequity. When examining main characters, the study revealed that a low 16.7% of leads were people of color in the last ten years and of that percentage, only 26% were women of color. With 39% of the U.S. population being of color, this is dramatic under representation.

Yet, the study also found a positive trend in 2017. That year, family films starring leads of color out earned similar films featuring white actors by 14%, generating $11.5 million more in revenue.

The results for LGBTQIA and leads with disabilities are especially shocking and stagnant. Less than 1% of main characters were LGBTQIA or had a disability and there were so few leads with these identities that researchers were unable to draw intersectional conclusions about race or gender. These numbers haven't improved within the ten-year period.

Institute Founder and Chair Academy Award Winning Actor Geena Davis has been championing industry change since 2004. "Movies do more than inspire us; they promote acceptance and awareness of people's identities. When the stories we tell don't reflect the intersectionality in our society, children learn that people of marginalized identities simply matter less in our culture."

"Our report demonstrates to the industry how representation has changed in film, identifies gains and guides them to understand where dramatic progress is needed. Systemic change in order to achieve gender parity onscreen has been our focus since 2004," states Madeline Di Nonno, CEO of The Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media.

The full report can be downloaded here.

SOURCE Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media