Gyllenhaal Calls Lack of Female Venice Directors 'Systemic' — SkimNews
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- Maggie Gyllenhaal said there is a "systemic problem" explaining why only two female directors are competing for the Golden Lion at this year's Venice film festival, noting it is "harder for women to get films financed."
- Gyllenhaal questioned "who decides what's good" and "who decides what is valuable" in cinema, suggesting women's experiences "are not always deemed high art."
- Venice organizers faced criticism after the original lineup revealed only one of 20 contenders for the top prize was a female filmmaker (May el-Toukhy's Woman Unknown), prompting the festival to add NAZA — co-directed by Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor and produced by the Guardian — to the main competition.
- Gyllenhaal heads a seven-member jury at the 83rd Venice edition that also includes Kaouther Ben Hania, Johnnie To, Shahrbanoo Sadat, Xavier Giannoli, Daniel Blumberg, and Francesco Casetti.
- Gyllenhaal defended cinema's inherent political nature, arguing that films offering "an honest look into other people's experience" are "fundamentally, unavoidably political" — a notable stance given last year's Berlin backlash when jury president Wim Wenders told filmmakers to "stay out of politics."
- Gyllenhaal's short film Flesh Impact, inspired by Marilyn Monroe, will screen out of competition at the festival, where she previously won best screenplay in 2021 for her directing debut The Lost Daughter.
- The 2025 Venice lineup is unusually stacked with politically sensitive works spanning Israel/Palestine, Russia/Ukraine, Rupert Murdoch, and Elon Musk, contributing to reported jury nervousness about facing the press on opening day.
Why it matters: Gyllenhaal's comments turn a jury press conference into a public indictment of the industry's gatekeepers — the question "who decides what is valuable" lands with weight given Venice's role as an Oscar bellwether, and the festival's scramble to add a female-directed film after criticism exposes how thin the original slate really was.
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