The Women’s Voices Now Online Film Festival https://grants.dudleytdoughertyfoundation.org/proposals-2020/the-women2019s-voices-now-online-film-festival https://grants.dudleytdoughertyfoundation.org/@@site-logo/sitelogo-75x75.png

The Women’s Voices Now Online Film Festival

Additional Information
Used for	The Women’s Voices Now online film festival seeks to address the significant lack of representation of women in film, as well as the lack of access to essential funding for women in film. The grant from the Dudley T. Dougherty Foundation will support two aspects of the festival that are key to ensure long-lasting impact for our beneficiaries: professional development events for the filmmakers and communication needs for the festival.
Benefits	Our film festival’s primary beneficiaries are the filmmakers themselves. We provide them with visibility towards audience members around the world, financial support, access to a community of filmmakers, and networking opportunities. Audience members are the secondary beneficiaries of this program: they benefit from watching social-change films that will raise their awareness on specific issues related to women’s and girls’ rights, and are provided with resources and tools to create positive social change.
Proposal Description	THE NEED Our Women’s Voices Now (WVN) online film festival is directly tied to the organization’s overall mission of using social-change films that drive positive social change to advance women’s and girls’ rights globally. We use film across our programs because we believe in its power to bring positive social change. Film has a unique ability to reach wide audiences, raise awareness on specific topics, generate empathy and re-shape representations. As such, it has an incredible potential to challenge gender-based and cultural stereotypes. It is a powerful influencer that can inspire audience members to reflect upon, discuss, and act in favor of women’s and girls’ rights around the world. But currently, women filmmakers still face difficult access to the film industry. Their films remain underfunded and under-distributed, especially if their films focus on women or minorities. This is also known as the Celluloid Ceiling: - In the United States, “women described difficulty in generating financing or interest in films about females, or individuals from underrepresented groups, [... ] or for female-ori­ented films”. (1) (please see sources below) - In Europe, only 16% of the funding goes to films directed by women. (2) - Stereotypes about women's skills and ambition and male-dominated networks remain a powerful barrier to entry. (3)(4) OUR APPROACH The WVN online film festival was designed to address these specific, gender-based obstacles. Our festival promotes women and femme-identifying filmmakers using social-change films to advocate for women’s and girls’ rights around the world, by offering: - Visibility We provide emerging filmmakers with a global platform where they can share essential, authentic stories with global audiences. In reaching these audiences, our filmmakers are able to leverage their social-change films to influence public discourse and, ideally, action on the ground on pressing women’s rights issues. - Support Filmmakers enter to win one of seven awards and a cash prize (totaling 10,000 USD) to invest in their next project, and sometimes to help them cover their living expenses or other urgent needs. -Networking opportunities We create a supportive space and opportunities for filmmakers to connect and increase access to film industry professionals. To date, the festival has taken place 6 times since 2011, received over 740 film submissions from 66 countries, awarded $98,000 in cash prizes to filmmakers and gathered online audience members from 178 countries. Please refer to the one-pager attached with this application to read some testimonials and quotes from filmmakers, speaking to the festival’s long term impact. ABOUT THE FESTIVAL Submissions are open between September and December, in four categories: documentary short; documentary feature; experimental/animation; and youth films. Submitted films must address or shine light upon issues affecting women and/or girls through a social-change lens, but are not limited to a specific theme. The point is to leave it up to the filmmakers to bring our attention to important topics regarding women’s rights around the world. Each year, a theme naturally emerges from the pool of pre-selected films. Filmmakers enter to win seven awards: Leslie J. Sacks Grand Prize Award for Best Film – $3,000 Best Documentary Feature – $2,000 Best Short Social-Change Documentary – $1,500 Best Documentary Short – $1,000 Best Director – $1,000 Best Experimental Film – $1,000 Best Youth Film – $500 The festival then takes place in early March, at the occasion of International Women’s Day, and is centered around a panel of filmmakers, film professionals, and women’s rights experts. Additional events (online screenings and Q&As with audience members, filmmakers networking events) are scheduled throughout March. OUR PARTNERSHIP WITH THE DUDLEY T. DOUGHERTY FOUNDATION The WVN online film festival goals align perfectly with the Dudley T. Dougherty Foundation’s mission to “give a clear voice for those who wish to be a part of the many, worthy, forces for change in our world”. The grant from the Dudley T. Dougherty Foundation will allow us to further the festival’s impact for filmmakers and audience members. Specifically, the grant will support: 1/ Expanding the Women’s Voices Now Program’s Director hours For our next festival cycle, we are planning to develop more opportunities for filmmakers to: (i) connect and stay in touch with one another (and possibly collaborate on future projects) through an online platform facilitated by Women’s Voices Now; (ii) interact with other festival staff, in particular with jury members who will be able to share collective and one-on-one feedback with filmmakers (this platform will also be open to the filmmakers of pre-selected films; (iii) take part in a couple of events featuring guest speakers and film industry professionals to support their professional development and increase their access to the industry; (iv) reach more audience members and interact with them directly through live online Q&As sessions, during which they will be able to talk about their films, the specific topics they chose to focus on, and why it matters. Ultimately, the goal is to create a community for filmmakers, mentors, film industry professionals and audience members. This community will significantly contribute to advancing their careers and ability to get their social-change films shared. 2/ Implementing our communication strategy In addition to creating concrete opportunities for filmmakers’s professional development, our strategy to maximize the festival’s impact for them and audience members is to roll out a comprehensive communications and public relations strategy. This will raise the festival visibility for: (i) filmmakers, first and foremost, and ensure that we receive high quality film submissions from women and femme-identifying filmmakers all around the world; (ii) film industry professionals and corporations, with whom we can partner to support the filmmakers and promote their work; (iii) audience members globally, who will be able to join our festival, watch the winning films, and take part in the conversations they will open. Films selected to the festival will feature calls to action and/or resources supportive of women’s rights and positive social change. Please refer to the budget submitted with this application to see the details of how the grant funds will be allocated. The direct beneficiaries of the festival are the winning filmmakers, as well as the pre-selected filmmakers to a lesser extent. They will benefit from professional and personal support in all the shapes and forms our festival and staff can offer. Most of the filmmakers participating in our film festival are between 26 and 35 years old, and they are in the early stages of their careers. In addition, audience members will benefit indirectly from the program by watching films that will raise their awareness on specific topics pertaining to women’s and girls’ rights, and having the ability to take part in conversations on these topics, designed to move them from empathy to action. WHY THE FESTIVAL’S MISSION IS TIMELY A few years ago, a global movement emerged to support the liberation of women’s voices and stories all over the world. Women have been speaking up for a long time, but they were still not being heard. This movement was perceived as a strong signal that gender equality was progressing. Unfortunately, this movement faced strong backlash, and was marginalized due to the current health, political, economic and environmental crises happening in many parts of the world. It would be tragic for that movement to stop now. It is also precisely now, when women’s and girls rights are threatened and rolled back, that it is the most important time for everyone to hear and see women’s experiences, stories, points of view, and solutions. As the world is in the midst of creating the world of tomorrow, we cannot afford to exclude women’s voices. ------ Sources: (1) “Gender & Short Films: Emerging Female Filmmakers and the Barriers Surrounding their Careers” – Stacy Smith, Ph.D., Media, Diversity & Social Change Initiative at USC’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism (2) UNESCO Mind the Gap: Gender Equality in the Film Industry, 2019 (3) “The Celluloid Ceiling: Behind-the-Scenes Employment of Women on the Top 100, 250, and 500 Films of 2019” – Martha M. Lauzen, Ph.D., Professor and Executive Director of the Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film at San Diego State University (4) “Exploring the Barriers and Opportunities for Independent Women Filmmakers” – Stacy Smith, Ph.D., Katherine Pieper, Ph.D. & Marc Choueiti, Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism University of Southern California