Underwire Film Festival

The Underwire Film Festival is an annual event observing short films made with a major female contribution. Held in London, this film festival is dedicated to promoting and celebrating female talent across the UK television and film industry.[1] Underwire Awards recognise teamwork, skill, artistry, vision and endeavour of women who have excelled in key production roles, both as actors and from the production team.

History

The Underwire Film Festival began in 2010 founded by Gabriella Apicella and Gemma Mitchell to help tackle the gender imbalance within the film industry,[2] and focusses on short films.[3] 2011 Underwire Festival co-director, Helen Jack, noted that the gap in 2011 between gender of short film directors, was quite possibly as high as one female to nine male directors.[4] In 2018, the number of film entries submitted to the Underwire Film Festival had grown to a purported 1000 submissions.[5]

In its early years, the Underwire Festival awards were held at the Ritzy Cinema in Brixton, London.[3] In recent years it has been held at the Barbican Centre, London.[1] In its third year in 2012, the festival expanded as the number of short film submissions went up three-fold.[3] The 2020 festival was cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic,[6] however, the Underwire Festival was due to make a return on September 5, 2021.[7]

The Underwire Film Festival is a BAFTA recognised film festival since 2015.[8][9]

Aims

The Underwire Awards are given in recognition of the teamwork, skill, artistry, vision or endeavour of women who have excelled in key production roles.[10] The long-term goal to improve equality statistics not just in front of the camera, but behind it too for traditionally male dominated roles like directing, producing, screenwriting, editing, cinematography, sound design, composing, production design and animation [10] The festival covers a broad range of genres including drama, documentary, music video, artist film and animation, with the only stipulations being, that one of the major production roles is led by a woman,[10] and that the film run time is 20 minutes or less.[11] The festival awards training and mentoring opportunities as part of the award prize.[6]

Award categories

Each category receives a number of nominations from which the eventual winner is decided.[6] Categories are:

  • Best Actor
  • Under 25: for outstanding work by a female practitioner aged 15–25
  • XX Award: for the best onscreen female protagonist
  • Best Director
  • Best Producer
  • Best screenwriter
  • Best Editor
  • Best Cinematographer
  • Best Composer
  • Best Sound Designer
  • Best Production Designer
  • Best Animator [7]

Award Winners timeline

Some previous winners include:

References
  1. "ten Years of Underwire". barbican.org.uk. 19 September 2019.
  2. "Underwire Addressing gender". asff.co.uk. 2020.
  3. "Smurfs Up: Women Filmmakers Make a Splash in London". huffingtonpost.co.uk. 20 November 2012.
  4. "Helen Jack Talks UnderWire Festival". thequietus.com. 23 November 2011.
  5. "Underwire Addressing gender". Little White Lies. 28 November 2018.
  6. "Underwire Festival Cancelled due to Covid 19". filmfreeway.com. Archived from the original on 15 June 2020. Retrieved 15 June 2020.
  7. "Underwire Festival Event date: September 5, 2021". filmfreeway.com. Archived from the original on 10 July 2021. Retrieved 10 July 2021.
  8. "Underwire Festival" (PDF). bafta.org. 2019.
  9. "A Visit to the 8th Underwire Film Festival (2017) – Female Filmmaking At Its Finest". circleofcinema.com. 28 November 2017.
  10. "Underwire Festival". Festical.ca. 2020. Archived from the original on 15 June 2020.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
  11. "Underwire Film Festival: celebrating shorts by women. At the Ritzy until Saturday!". thefword.org.uk. 22 November 2012.
  12. "Award Winners". underwirefestival.com. 2020. Archived from the original on 26 February 2021.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
  13. "Underwire Festival 2013: the winners". mydylarama.org.uk. 10 December 2013.
  14. "Award Winners". underwirefestival.com. 2017. Archived from the original on 6 October 2018.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)

Official website Underwire Film Festival

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