Female directors have had to fight for a seat at the table for a long time. However, the film landscape has witnessed a change—albeit gradually— and female directors are now treading on the path of recognition and getting access to projects they rightly deserve after years of challenging the status quo. These women have played an important part in telling stories through the female gaze and cementing their influence in the director’s chair.
Jane Campion
Campion has an impressive repertoire to her name, from An Angel at My Table and The Portrait of a Lady to Bright Light. Her nuanced portrayal of female protagonists is not something audiences generally expect to see in a movie—they are complex outsiders who are resilient and quirky. Most of her movies are shot on New Zealand soil and feature several picturesque locations.
She is also the first woman to win the prestigious Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival for the 1993 film The Piano. She is also the visionary behind the Emmy-winning miniseries Top of the Lake. Campion is an exemplary director who has paved the way for other women professionals in the field.
Greta Gerwig
Greta Gerwig, well-known for her acting prowess, has been the talk of the director town in recent years. Her presence is witnessed in movies such as Mistress America and Frances Ha, which she also wrote. Gerwig’s work also includes an adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women and Lady Bird. All the movies she has solo directed have won multiple Oscar nominations.
Greta was the solo director for the movie Barbie, and the project got her the title of the first female director with a billion-dollar movie in their purse. Barbie became a cultural phenomenon replete with feminist themes, fabulous accessories, and a full-blown existential crisis. The movie earned a total of eight nominations for the 2024 Oscars.
Chloé Zhao
Chloé Zhao made history by being the first Asian-born woman to win the Best Director Oscar award. She is primarily known for her work on independent movies. Songs My Brothers Taught Me was one such movie that brought her prominence. After this 2015 movie, 2017’s The Rider put her on the list of powerful and impactful women directors. A few years later, Zhao captivated audiences with the release of Nomadland, a critically acclaimed film that went on to win three Oscars.
Ava DuVernay
Ava DuVernay is the prime example of someone who started a career later in life and turned it into a successful choice. DuVernay set foot in the industry as the founder of a successful PR firm. Fast forward to 2014, and she became known as the director of the widely successful movie Selma. The movie won several nominations and the Best Picture title at the Oscars. The vivid and realistic adaptation of the Selma Marches from Selma to Montgomery is an absolute must-watch. DuVernay also worked on a documentary titled 13th, which touched upon several socio-political topics. Her list of phenomenal works also includes the live-action with Disney’s A Wrinkle in Time.
Sofia Coppola
Coppola has been privy to the film industry since a very young age. She started her journey as an actress but soon found her passion in film direction. Coppola’s unique sense of storytelling gave audiences compelling movies, which also won her numerous awards.
Her distinctive visual style can be witnessed in Marie Antoinette and The Virgin Suicides. She was the third woman nominated in the best director category for Lost in Translation, a rom-com set in Tokyo that tells the story of a once-famous movie star who is enamored of a lonely woman. Her efforts with The Beguiled got her Best Director at Cannes, making her the first woman to bag the award in 56 years.
Kathryn Bigelow
This formidable director is not afraid of addressing or centering her work around hard topics such as politics, violence, and war, as evident from The Hurt Locker. While the movie was far from a hit at the box office, it won the Academy Award for Best Picture and is still considered one of the best war pictures of the 21st century. It was also the reason she was crowned the first female director to earn the best director Oscar. With the Oscar win, she inspired other female directors to make their way onto the stage. It took 11 years after Bigelow’s big win for another female director to take the statuette home.
Patty Jenkins
The director is best known for her work in the superhero genre. People first took notice when she worked her magic on the movie Monster. This film won Charlize Theron an Oscar award for Best Actress in 2004. However, it was her leadership and initiative with Wonder Woman and Wonder Woman 1984 that captivated audiences.
Jenkins knows the ropes, and she knows it well when it comes to directing independent and strong heroines. She is also the first female director to direct a superhero movie with a budget tag of more than $100 million. Patty Jenkins has also portrayed her talent by directing television series episodes of multiple shows, including The Killing and Arrested Development.