Nicole Garcia and the director Maïwenn at the anniversary of the Cannes Film Festival in May 2017. - JEAN MARC HAEDRICH / SIPA

The Cannes Film Festival unveiled its "official selection" on Wednesday, a list of 56 films benefiting from a label specially created after the cancellation of its 73rd edition. Among these films, there are slightly more female directors than usual: they are 16 to present a film, against 14 in 2019, or 28.5% against 23.7% last year, according to a press release from festival.

A figure to compare with the number of female directors who submitted their film to the selection which is also low, lower in proportion than the number of female directors chosen by the festival: they were only 532 female directors, or 25.7% of the total. There were 11 female directors in 2018, 12 in 2017, 9 in 2016 and 6 in 2015, the same press release also specifies.

Many French women

"We pride ourselves on the fact that France is the country most favorable to the presence of women in cinema, but it is only 23% of the cinema films produced in the year that are produced by women while in schools, there are 50% of girls. The girls disappear, because their budgets are smaller, and they take longer to reap trust, "explains 20 Minutes Sandrine Brauer, producer of cinema and co-founder of the group 50/50, which promotes equal women and men and diversity in cinema and audiovisual.

Among the directors selected in the competition at Cannes, there are many French women (they make up 38% of the French selection): Maïwenn, Charlène Favier, Suzanne Lindon, Marie Castille Mention-Schaar, Fanny Liatard and Caroline Vignal. To note among foreigners the Japanese Naomi Kawase and the Egyptian Ayten Amin, a country where it is even less easy to be a woman director.

And Sandrine Brauer concludes: “This is proof that when you work on it, your gaze evolves. It is never satisfactory until you are 50-50 but you have to know how to welcome the good news. It's a time when things are moving. We will have to have the same dynamic on diversity. "

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