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I knew the numbers were bad in terms of women getting nominations in certain categories, but yikes, these numbers are pathetic. Looks like women can make documentaries and costumes but not much else. If they didn't give out acting awards to women, we'd probably never see women win anything.

Unacceptable.

BEST DIRECTOR
Nominees - 392 total, 2 women -- .5%; Winners - 80 total, 0 women -- 0%
BEST PICTURE (producers)
Nominees - 431 total, 32 women -- 7%; Winners - 92 total, 5 women -- 5%
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Nominees - 521 total, 0 women -- 0%; Winners - 80 total, 0 women -- 0%
BEST EDITOR
Nominees- 365 total, 53 women -- 15%; Winners- 98 total, 12 women -- 12%
BEST ART DIRECTION
Nominees- 1,324 total, 93 women -- 7%; Winners- 269 total, 17 women -- 6%
BEST WRITER
Nominees- 1,198 total, 96 women -- 8%; Winners- 226 total, 20 women -- 9%
BEST DOCUMENTARY
Nominees - 318 total, 81 women -- 25%; Winners- 88 total, 16 women -- 18%
BEST SCORE
Nominees- 654 total, 12 women -- 2%; Winners- 145 total, 5 women -- 3%
BEST COSTUME DESIGN
Nominees- 448 total, 218 women -- 49%; Winners- 95 total, 49 women -- 52%

Numbers from Variety

Award season is the time of year when occasionally the critics and prognosticators focus on women. Of course, their focus is always on the acting nominees. I have heard not a peep about any potential women directing nominees, but that's not surprising since a woman will probably win a directing Oscar...when we have a female president. I'm not holding my breath.

The Envelope at the LA Times took an early look at the field this year.

Aside from Melissa Leo (Frozen River) and Penelope Cruz (Elegy or Vicky Christina Barcelona)

This year, however, it is already clear that the race, for all intents and purposes, is backloaded with the most imposing and competitive list of genuine best actress possibilities in many years.

There are so many great female performances still to come this year. Here's a watch list:
Meryl Streep- Doubt
Kate Winslet- Revolutionary Road and The Reader
Angelina Jolie- Changeling
Cate Blanchett- The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Anne Hathaway - Rachel Getting Married
Nicole Kidman- Australia
Keira Knightley - The Duchess
Kate Beckinsale- Nothing but the Truth
Sally Hawkins- Happy-Go-Lucky
Emma Thompson- Last Chance Harvey
Kristin Scott Thomas- I've Loved You So Long

I started a list on the left side of the site. My list will be a bit different from the typical Oscar watchers because I will include performances from films that will not get noticed by the awards community because they just didn't get enough buzz or have the right pedigree. Keep in mind, awards are a very political business.
Hottest actress race in years heats up (LA Times)
Could this be Meryl Streep's year? (Variety)

Now that this year's Oscars are over and the critics agree that the ceremony and the awards themselves are out of date (the ratings this year were lower than the first night of American Idol), the Academy will have to struggle to figure out how to make the Oscars, and the movies more relevant.

Here's my answer: Make more movies about women. Not just crappy reductive chick flicks (I'm not saying all chick flicks are crappy), but movies about real women.

In this year's lead up to the Oscars there were several stories written (mostly in the British press) about how the Oscars had gotten so dark, and so male. (Imagine the conversation if Juno hadn't been included as a nominee.)

But is this year any worse than previous years, or did it just actually get some press this time around?

A new study by Stacy L. Smith and her colleagues at the Annenberg School of Communication at USC took a look at all the speaking parts in films nominated for the Best Picture award over the last 30 years (not including this past year) to see what the gender balance looks like. (This research is part of a larger research program on looking at gender roles in the media that is funded by actress/activist Geena Davis.)

The news is not good.

"Of the 6,833 single speaking characters only 27.3% were females." (The data set included anyone who spoke a line onscreen no matter how big or small their part was. The leading character counted just as much as the person who said one line.)

"Very simply, there has been no change in the frequency of roles for females in best picture nominated films in the last 30 years."

Smith spoke with Women & Hollywood about the research.

Women & Hollywood: How did this research come about?

Stacy Smith: We had been doing some other work on films and were curious about how these prestigious films might do in terms of gender balance. They often tackle controversial issues of historical import. We were looking to see where people are doing a good job and where there is room for improvement.

W&H: What did you learn?

SS: The previous 30 years don't look so great. Are things getting better? No, they're not. Now we have hard evidence to show that there is lots of room for improvement. Without the data it's hard to know. Any way you slice it up this representational portrait is out of balance.

W&H: Why did you decide to track the data this way?

SS: This is the whole bandwidth of characters from the most prominent to the least prominent not the amount of words they say. If we think about representation and that females should represent half the characters or half the space we want to make sure that it is across all characters not just the ones that have compelling lead roles.

Of the 150 films nominated for best picture from 1977-2006. Only 5 and a half of the films are directed by women.

These films are:
1986- Children of a Lesser God, directed by Randa Haines
1990- Awakenings, directed by Penny Marshall
1991- The Prince of Tides, directed by Barbra Streisand
1993- The Piano, directed by Jane Campion
2003- Lost in Translation, directed by Sophia Coppola
2006- Little Miss Sunshine, co-directed by Valerie Faris

"An analysis revealed a significant difference in the percentage of females depicted on screen by director sex. The proportion of females on the silver screen is significantly higher when a female is directing a motion picture than when a man is at the helm."

W&H: The data clearly shows that when a woman directs, the number of female speaking parts is higher.

SS: We just know that the numbers make a significant jump when the female is a director and that's a positive. It would suggest that maybe we need more female directors.

W&H: What are your hopes for this research?

SS: I spend a lot of time educating my students and sending them into the film industry informed is really important. It's about empowering them and giving them the courage to tell stories that are rich and multi-dimensional. This data suggests that there is a lot of room for improvement and it's important to educate the next generation of filmmakers about these issues so they remember issues of representation and diversity when they are creating their scripts and pitching their stories. The goal is not to deal with this on the back end in the research, but that the next generation of content creators are thinking about these issues when they tell the stories.

I watched the Oscars as I watch most things nowadays, using my TIVO. I start late, don't need to watch any of the boring stuff (including some of the awards) and don't watch any commercials.

From my perspective, the show was just as it always is, too long and too fawning, but it had some funny moments and I thought Jon Stewart did fine especially since he only had writers working with him for a little over a week.

It figures that a site about women and Hollywood would get both its predictions in the actress category wrong, but that's life. I'm still surprised that both Marion Cottilard and Tilda Swinton won. My rationale for Swinton is that the voters wanted to give something to Michael Clayton which was really the only studio film nominated so they gave it to Swinton. She's spectacular but I gotta say that she was even better in the much smaller Stephanie Daley so if you want to see this woman's range, rent that.

Regarding Marion Cottilard's win, I think that the Academy loves biopics where people transform themselves and this woman really went through the ringer for this role. I'm surprised that Julie Christie didn't win since she was, as has been said before, transcendent in Away from Her. Maybe the folks in the Academy don't like Christie because she won't play by the Hollywood rules. Too bad. Hers was the performance of the year.

Diablo Cody was truly overwhelmed by her win (and uncomfortable in a too high slitted dress that was hard for her to walk in) and dedicated her win to writers. I noticed that she wore flats (did anyone else see that?).

Two women did win best director last night -- Cynthia Wade and Vanessa Roth won for directing the documentary short, Freeheld. Freeheld is the story of a Laurel Hester's dying fight to give her police pension to her partner and the homophobia she encountered during her fight. I really need to see this one.

How cool was it that the song from Once beat out the Disney machine of Enchanted. It was even cooler that Marketa Irglova got to come back onstage after getting cut off and say her thanks. Classy moment.

Some fun lines:
Tilda Swinton to CNN:

That's what the professional actress who lives in the U.K. confessed to CNN reporters on the red carpet earlier today while describing her feelings about being at this event as "mellow," adding "Feels like being at a dog show."

Helen Mirren to Regis Philbin:

Unfortunately the roles are often not good enough for the women. But the roles for the men are always wonderful.

Backstage:

"Juno's" Diablo Cody corrected descriptions of her former job as "exotic dancer."

"I was not a dancer. I can't dance," she said, which leaves "stripper" as the correct job description. "If I had the money, I would pay off people in the journalism world to not mention it again."

OK Diablo, Women & Hollywood will never refer to you as a former stripper anymore. You are now officially and Oscar winning writer. How does that sound?

Gotta say that this has been a petty lackluster Oscar season (some blame goes to the writers strike) but some of the blame has got to go to the types of films that are nominated. Violent, boy-centric and self-indulgent.

Here's to a better slate of films next year.

Some quotes from around the web on the Oscars:
from Kim Masters at Slate:

I'm amazed that Sarah Polley isn't the human-interest story of these Oscars: She's a 29-year-old knockout who just made an astonishingly mature, critically lauded debut as a writer/director. Is it because Away From Her's subject matter is so depressing (as opposed to the nonstop merriment of, say, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly)? Is it a woman thing? A Canadian thing? Or is Polley just less savvy at self-packaging than, say, Diablo Cody?

I really think that it's interesting to talk about Sarah Polley and Diablo Cody. Both to me are strong female role models in very different ways. Sarah Polley is an artist who let's her work speak for herself. She comes off as shy and not interested in the publicity machine. Cody is just the opposite, very interested in milking the system (saying some great feminist bits) and riding her wave as far as it goes. She seems to have very few inhibitions (kind of makes sense since she worked the pole for a while).

But really, it just seems that Hollywood can't tell more than one "women's" story at a time. God forbid we should have read anything about Nancy Oliver nominated for Lars and the Real Girl. Come on, we must have read 400 stories about No Country for Old Men and There Will be Blood.

The Oscars this year reflect an ongoing trend in the business -- women just don't matter.

from the Guardian:

Intelligent contemporary Hollywood has become very macho: a quality that I think is under-reported and under-analysed by the media, which arguably has just as much of a male bias as cinema. The Coens' No Country for Old Men and Anderson's There Will Be Blood are, I believe, superb: benchmarks for American movie-making. But, goodness, how that testosterone positively drips off the screen. These are movies about the sweat, the thrust, the growl, the facial hair - and the guns and the violence. No Country for Old Men might as well be called No Country for Women of Any Age, although it does have two excellent contributions from Kelly Macdonald and Tess Harper. As for There Will Be Blood, there are hardly any women at all.

That is why I think the remarkable young Canadian director Sarah Polley should have been given a director's nomination for her film Away from Her, starring Julie Christie. Hollywood has only just finished congratulating itself on finally giving acting awards to African-Americans. But it has an inbuilt assumption that the director's role is a man's job - and this assumption goes unchallenged with incredible regularity.

from David Carr aka the Carpetbagger at the NY Times:

Three women are in this category, which should tell Hollywood a story it needs to hear. The conventional wisdom wants Diablo Cody. Juno what? (Yes, the Bagger is a bit punchy by now, but bear with him.) Sometimes the conventional wisdom is right. She nailed something fresh, which even Hollywood can’t resist.

from Gold Derby at the LA Times:

When Oscar is not comforting the long-suffering wife, he can often be found in the arms of a young beauty.

Last year's best actress winner, Helen Mirren ("The Queen") was the first leading woman older than 40 to take home an Oscar in a decade. Up until then, the list of recent winners looked like the lineup at a beauty pageant: Reese Witherspoon, Hilary Swank, Charlize Theron, Nicole Kidman, Halle Berry, Julia Roberts, Gwyneth Paltrow. Personally, I think Mirren was able to overcome that trend by embracing it. At age 62, she's still quite sexy (remember her nude scene in "Calendar Girls"?) and she was brazenly frisky while out on the Oscar campaign trail last year, even appearing on the cover of Los Angeles magazine tugging at her bra.

Granted, the younger screen lovelies would often win acclaim and awards by deglamourizing themselves to show Hollywood that they were more than just pretty faces. But during Oscar campaign season, off came the false noses, boxing gloves and trailer-trash outfits, to be replaced by designer gowns and comely coifs.

This year, classic Gallic beauty Marion Cotillard turns from ugly duckling to swan and back playing tragic chanteuse Edith Piaf. With her head shaved and her eyebrows plucked, the French actress, 32, is transformed into the "little sparrow" at the end of her troubled life.

While 1960s siren Julie Christie, star of "Away From Her," still sizzles in real-life, like Mirren, for this 66-year-old to win would be to buck the trend. Though this age bias is less blatant in the category for supporting actresses, older gals still triumph there only now and then: Judi Dench once, Dianne Wiest twice in recent years, for example.

Pace University proved the obvious a few years ago when it conducted an Oscar study spanning the 25 years before 2000 and discovered that best actor winners were, on average, five years older than their female equivalents. And seven years separated male and female nominees.

In the last 15 years only two actresses older than 50 have won an Oscar in the lead or supporting races: Dames Mirren and Dench. Meantime, consider all of these chaps north of the half-century mark who've triumphed during the same years: lead actors Jack Nicholson, Al Pacino, and Anthony Hopkins as well as supporting Alan Arkin , Morgan Freeman, Chris Cooper, Jim Broadbent, Michael Caine, James Coburn, Martin Landau, Gene Hackman, Jack Palance.

Here are all the nominees and Women & Hollywood's predictions (in the categories I have a clue about):

Best motion picture of the year
"Atonement"
"Juno"
"Michael Clayton"
"No Country for Old Men"
"There Will Be Blood"

Winner: No Country for Old Men

Performance by an actor in a leading role
George Clooney in "Michael Clayton" (Warner Bros.)
Daniel Day-Lewis in "There Will Be Blood" (Paramount Vantage and Miramax)
Johnny Depp in "Sweeney Todd The Demon Barber of Fleet Street" (DreamWorks and Warner Bros., Distributed by DreamWorks/Paramount)
Tommy Lee Jones in "In the Valley of Elah" (Warner Independent)
Viggo Mortensen in "Eastern Promises" (Focus Features)

Winner: Daniel Day-Lewis- no one else has gotten any traction in this category. Hollywood is in awe of Day-Lewis.

Performance by an actor in a supporting role
Casey Affleck in "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" (Warner Bros.)
Javier Bardem in "No Country for Old Men" (Miramax and Paramount Vantage)
Philip Seymour Hoffman in "Charlie Wilson's War" (Universal)
Hal Holbrook in "Into the Wild" (Paramount Vantage and River Road Entertainment)
Tom Wilkinson in "Michael Clayton" (Warner Bros.)

Winner: Javier Bardem

Performance by an actress in a leading role
Cate Blanchett in "Elizabeth: The Golden Age" (Universal)
Julie Christie in "Away from Her" (Lionsgate)
Marion Cotillard in "La Vie en Rose" (Picturehouse)
Laura Linney in "The Savages" (Fox Searchlight)
Ellen Page in "Juno" (A Mandate Pictures/Mr. Mudd Production)

Winner: Julie Christie- I think that while Ellen Page is getting lots of traction lately, she is going to have a career and will see her time come later. I'm betting that not enough people have seem La Vie en Rose so that hurt Cotillard's chances. Christie is a mythical character, she transcends film and has become an icon. She doesn't give a shit about the pomp and circumstance and her performance in Away from Her was transcendent.

Performance by an actress in a supporting role
Cate Blanchett in "I'm Not There" (The Weinstein Company)
Ruby Dee in "American Gangster" (Universal)
Saoirse Ronan in "Atonement" (Focus Features)
Amy Ryan in "Gone Baby Gone" (Miramax)
Tilda Swinton in "Michael Clayton" (Warner Bros.)

Winner- Ruby Dee. I'm not sure about this one. Amy Ryan had the early momentum as did Cate Blanchett, but Blanchett recently won and Ryan has faded as Swinton and Dee have gained. I just don't think that this will be the role Swinton will win for and Oscar always likes to honor a body of work and Dee has been around and is deserving.

Best animated feature film of the year
"Persepolis" (Sony Pictures Classics): Marjane Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud
"Ratatouille" (Walt Disney): Brad Bird
"Surf's Up" (Sony Pictures Releasing): Ash Brannon and Chris Buck

Winner: It pains me to say that Ratatouille will be about the magnificent Persepolis.

Achievement in directing
"The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" (Miramax/Pathé Renn), Julian Schnabel
"Juno" (A Mandate Pictures/Mr. Mudd Production), Jason Reitman
"Michael Clayton" (Warner Bros.), Tony Gilroy
"No Country for Old Men" (Miramax and Paramount Vantage), Joel Coen and Ethan Coen
"There Will Be Blood" (Paramount Vantage and Miramax), Paul Thomas Anderson

Winner: Joel and Ethan Coen- whatever

Best documentary feature
"No End in Sight" (Magnolia Pictures) A Representational Pictures Production: Charles Ferguson and Audrey Marrs
"Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience" (The Documentary Group) A Documentary Group Production: Richard E. Robbins
"Sicko" (Lionsgate and The Weinstein Company) A Dog Eat Dog Films Production: Michael Moore and Meghan O'Hara
"Taxi to the Dark Side" (THINKFilm) An X-Ray Production: Alex Gibney and Eva Orner
"War/Dance" (THINKFilm) A Shine Global and Fine Films Production: Andrea Nix Fine and Sean Fine

Winner: No End in Sight- great doc

Best documentary short subject
"Freeheld" A Lieutenant Films Production: Cynthia Wade and Vanessa Roth
"La Corona (The Crown)" A Runaway Films and Vega Films Production: Amanda Micheli and Isabel Vega
"Salim Baba" A Ropa Vieja Films and Paradox Smoke Production: Tim Sternberg and Francisco Bello
"Sari's Mother" (Cinema Guild) A Daylight Factory Production: James Longley

Winner: Haven't seen any but I'm pulling for Freeheld

Achievement in film editing
"The Bourne Ultimatum" (Universal): Christopher Rouse
"The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" (Miramax/Pathé Renn): Juliette Welfling
"Into the Wild" (Paramount Vantage and River Road Entertainment): Jay Cassidy
"No Country for Old Men" (Miramax and Paramount Vantage) Roderick Jaynes
"There Will Be Blood" (Paramount Vantage and Miramax): Dylan Tichenor

Winner: Roderick Jaynes (he'll ride of the No Country like sweep)

Best foreign language film of the year
"Beaufort" Israel
"The Counterfeiters" Austria
"Katyn" Poland
"Mongol" Kazakhstan
"12" Russia

Winner: Since they didn't nominate 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days or Perspepolis, I could care less about this category.

Adapted screenplay
"Atonement" (Focus Features), Screenplay by Christopher Hampton
"Away from Her" (Lionsgate), Written by Sarah Polley
"The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" (Miramax/Pathé Renn), Screenplay by Ronald Harwood
"No Country for Old Men" (Miramax and Paramount Vantage), Written for the screen by Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
"There Will Be Blood" (Paramount Vantage and Miramax), Written for the screen by Paul Thomas Anderson

Winner: Joel & Ethan Coen, but wouldn't it be great if Sarah Polley won?

Original screenplay
"Juno" (A Mandate Pictures/Mr. Mudd Production), Written by Diablo Cody
"Lars and the Real Girl" (MGM), Written by Nancy Oliver
"Michael Clayton" (Warner Bros.), Written by Tony Gilroy
"Ratatouille" (Walt Disney), Screenplay by Brad Bird; Story by Jan Pinkava, Jim Capobianco, Brad Bird
"The Savages" (Fox Searchlight), Written by Tamara Jenkins

Winner- Diablo Cody. This will be Juno's award.

Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original score)
"Atonement" (Focus Features) Dario Marianelli
"The Kite Runner" (DreamWorks, Sidney Kimmel Entertainment and Participant Productions, Distributed by Paramount Classics): Alberto Iglesias
"Michael Clayton" (Warner Bros.) James Newton Howard
"Ratatouille" (Walt Disney) Michael Giacchino
"3:10 to Yuma" (Lionsgate) Marco Beltrami

Winner: Dario Marianelli

Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original song)
"Falling Slowly" from "Once" (Fox Searchlight) Music and Lyric by Glen Hansard and: Marketa Irglova
"Happy Working Song" from "Enchanted" (Walt Disney): Music by Alan Menken; Lyric by Stephen Schwartz
"Raise It Up" from "August Rush" (Warner Bros.): Music and Lyric by Jamal Joseph, Charles Mack and Tevin Thomas
"So Close" from "Enchanted" (Walt Disney): Music by Alan Menken; Lyric by Stephen Schwartz
"That's How You Know" from "Enchanted" (Walt Disney): Music by Alan Menken; Lyric by Stephen Schwartz

Winner: Since hardly anyone in the Academy will have seen August Rush or Once (both those songs are great), I'll give it to Enchanted- don't know which one, don't really care.

Achievement in makeup
"La Vie en Rose" (Picturehouse) Didier Lavergne and Jan Archibald
"Norbit" (DreamWorks, Distributed by Paramount): Rick Baker and Kazuhiro Tsuji
"Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End" (Walt Disney): Ve Neill and Martin Samuel

Winner: La Vie en Rose

Achievement in visual effects
"The Golden Compass" (New Line in association with Ingenious Film Partners): Michael Fink, Bill Westenhofer, Ben Morris and Trevor Wood
"Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End" (Walt Disney): John Knoll, Hal Hickel, Charles Gibson and John Frazier
"Transformers" (DreamWorks and Paramount in association with Hasbro): Scott Farrar, Scott Benza, Russell Earl and John Frazier

Winner: The Golden Compass

Achievement in cinematography
"The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" (Warner Bros.): Roger Deakins
"Atonement" (Focus Features): Seamus McGarvey
"The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" (Miramax/Pathé Renn): Janusz Kaminski
"No Country for Old Men" (Miramax and Paramount Vantage): Roger Deakins
"There Will Be Blood" (Paramount Vantage and Miramax): Robert Elswit

Winner: The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

Achievement in costume design
"Across the Universe" (Sony Pictures Releasing) Albert Wolsky
"Atonement" (Focus Features) Jacqueline Durran
"Elizabeth: The Golden Age" (Universal) Alexandra Byrne
"La Vie en Rose" (Picturehouse) Marit Allen
"Sweeney Todd The Demon Barber of Fleet Street" (DreamWorks and Warner Bros., Distributed by DreamWorks/Paramount) Colleen Atwood

Winner: Elizabeth: The Golden Age- bad movie, great costumes

It's Oscar week and I'm going to try and highlight the women nominees as much as possible on the road to Sunday's telecast. Here is an interview from Filmmaker Magazine with writer/director Tamara Jenkins. It's a very interesting pieces about the writing (Jenkins was nominated for best screenplay)

Quotes of note:

Filmmaker: Why did it take so long to make The Savages?

Jenkins: I feel like I know so many people who have made movies and then struggle so hard to get their next movie happening. This almost didn’t happen like 100 times. Just getting the financing…. [First] it was at Focus Features, and they really liked it, they financed the writing of the script, but then they were dissatisfied with the casting, which was crazy. And then we were out. They gave it [back] to us so we could shop it around, which took forever. We couldn’t get anyone to finance it, even with Laura and Phil.

I am floored that with Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman committed that this film almost didn't get made.

A great quote on writing

Writing is weird and lonely and makes you grumpy and strange, and it’s nice when somebody understands that. I also have a dog. That helps. Makes you go out into the world. Then your dog’s like, “Okay, I have to walk you.” There’s something about moving and thinking. A treadmill, working out, and your brain just kind of makes connections. Moving — being in cars, trains, being on treadmills, they’re all really good for the writing brain. But I haven’t written in a long time; I have to start writing. To write you really should be writing every single day to keep the muscle going. But then if you write and make a movie, the year of working on the movie goes by and then you’re supposed to start writing again and you have kind of forgotten how. So I have to start writing. I have to buy a new journal; I have to get some nice pens.

Read full story: Senior Moments