Another year, another complete and total omission of women in the Best Director category. This year’s nominees are Martin McDonagh (The Banshees of Inishiren), Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (Everything Everywhere All At Once), Steven Spielberg (The Fabelmans), Todd Field (TÁR), and Ruben Östlund (Triangle of Sadness). To quote Issa Rae as she announced the infamously problematic category’s nominees in 2020: “Congratulations to those men.”
However, women were, expectedly, at the helm of some of the year’s most talked about—not to mention, critically acclaimed—films. Sarah Polley’s Women Talking, Charlotte Wells’ Aftersun, and Gina Prince-Bythewood’s The Woman King were all shut out to the surprise of, well, everyone, despite the Motion Picture Academy’s storied history of shunning the women behind the camera. Perhaps they thought because women have won the category for the last two years they could just sneak these egregious snubs right past us. But baby, when just seven women have been nominated, and the category has produced but three women winners in the award ceremony’s 95-year history... Women? We ought to do a lot more than talking. (Read: Boycott.) —Audra Heinrichs
