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New study reveals women filmmakers involved in just 20% of UK films

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A new study released by the University of Southampton has shown that a majority of British qualifying films in 2015 didn’t include women in key production roles.

The controversial study led by Dr Natalie Wreyford analysed 203 films produced in 2015 and discovered that women accounted for just 20% of all roles in British qualifying films. Ethnic minorities accounted for just 1.5% of the total workforce. 25% of those films also included no female roles in the fields of directing, writing, producing, cinematography and editing.

On average, the study concluded that women accounted for just 13% of all screenwriters involved in British films produced in 2015, and fewer than 2% were from ethnic minority groups. Nearly half of all films produced last year had no women producers at all. Across the 203 productions, there were no BAME women cinematographers.

Compared to the recent DCMS study that showed how women held 33.5% jobs across the entertainment industry in 2014, these figures suggest a bleaker picture.

Discover more information about the report here. The University of Southampton will be holding an event today at the BFI Southbank from 7pm onwards.

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