Female filmmakers shine bright in Twilight

“I thought it was a girl’s choice,” I said, too startled to be diplomatic. — Bella, in Twilight

If we can pause for a moment and catch our breath from the Oscar vapors, it’s worth noting that Twilight took a $70 mil bite out of the box-office booty this weekend. While not aspiring to any red carpet action (except those ghastly stains), Twilight has achieved something significant all the same. It’s the biggest opening weekend for a film by a female director in, like, forever. The Devil Wears Prada, Sex and the City, Mamma Mia!, and now Twilight have definitively re-asserted female clout at the box-office — and what’s more, two of those titles are directed by girls (three, if you count Michael Patrick King).

“Teen girls rule the earth,” said Paul Dergarabedian, president of Media By Numbers. “If you look back at the ‘Hannah Montana’ movie, how well that did, and now this movie, the teen girl audience will never be ignored again or underestimated. It was always teen boys who were the coveted ones, but someone finally caught on to the idea that girls love movies, too, and if you create something that they’re into, that they’re passionate about, they will come out in big numbers and drive the box office.” (AP)

I’ll justify this post because it relates directly to Sasha’s two recent pieces about the “Sorry State for Women in Hollywood” and the sad “Lack of Females” in contention for awards this year, or any other year. ok, so Sex and the City, Mamma Mia! and Twilight are not going to make many year-end top 10 lists, but they’ll be high on another list that’s equally important for the future of female moviemakers: they’ll be sitting pretty among the top money-makers of the year.

Twilight director Catherine Hardwicke meets in a couple of days to discuss her involvement with the now-instantly-green-lit sequels. Money means power, power means control, control means greater artistic discretion, and with any luck that discretion leads to more important fem-fueled movies like Prada (and fewer like The Women). [I’ll venture that it’s actually a healthy thing that The Women only opened to $10 mil. Because just as we want female directors to exercise discretion, it’s important that female audiences do too. That way we won’t end up with a lot of catfighting Girl Transformers — though now that I see that in print, not an entirely bad idea…]

I know, all anyone wants to hear about today is Benjamin Button and Revolutionary Road, but look! watch me make another connection: Cinematographer Ellen Kuras who shot Todd Hayne’s Swoon, and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, has worked with directors like Scorsese, Schnabel, Spike Lee, Jim Jarmusch, Jonathan Demme. Her most recent project, due out in 2009, is with Sam Mendes on his as-yet-untitled comedy written by David Eggers, starring Maggie Gyllenhaal, John Krasinski, and Allison Janney (…and Jeff Daniels, Cheryl Hines, Catherine O’Hara, Maya Rudolph, Paul Schneider, Chris Messina and a bunch of other cool people). But yeah, Ellen Kuras is that rarest of behind-the-camera birds, the female cinematographer — yet all the hippest directors love the hell out of her work. With her dazzling filmography growing too impressive to ignore, watch for Ellen Kuras to be nominated with the big boys soon.

But back to Twilight, with a few more girlpower quotes to wrap this up:

[Director] Hardwicke, whose previous films include “Thirteen” and “Lords of Dogtown,” also said she was thrilled about the prospect that the success of “Twilight” will inspire other women and young girls to pursue a career in filmmaking.

“I hope not just women but all minorities get enthused and encouraged by it. I look at the (Directors Guild of America) calendar, at the pictures of everyone that had different movies each month, and it’s usually 22-29 different directors, and almost every month there’s one female and maybe one minority,” she said. “We’ve been having a lot of events, talking to a lot of fans, and so many kids of course are madly in love with Robert but tons of kids of every kind (and) girls are coming up to me and saying ‘I want to direct now, I’m writing a screenplay now, you’re my inspiration.’ I think it’s great that people are getting excited.” (AP again)

And all this is excellent news for smaller studios, too, in our Incredible Shrinking Economy:

The big opening for “Twilight” also helps put Summit Entertainment on the map, said Richie Say, the company’s president of domestic distribution. Summit has only been around since April 2007 and “Twilight,” its sixth release, cost just $37 million to make.

“It certainly says what we’ve been saying all along, that we can do more with less,” he said. When Warner Bros. pushed “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” from this weekend to a July 2009 debut, and Summit jumped to move “Twilight” from Dec. 12 into that spot on the schedule, “that decision was made in a day. I don’t know that the major studios have that ability.”

Sweet. Spoken like an expert vein-tapper. Can’t wait to see what these Hollywood girls decide to suck next. In a good way.