Top-Grossing Films Of 2021 Featured Slight Rise In Female Leads & BIPOC Women Representation Than 2020 Titles, Study Finds

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Representation of female protagonists and BIPOC women in 2021’s top-grossing films have ticked up slightly, the latest study from San Diego State University’s Dr.

Martha Lauzen finds.Lauzen, the executive director of SDSU’s Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film, revealed that female The study, titled It’s a Man’s (Celluloid) World, Even in a Pandemic Year: Portrayals of Female Characters in the Top U.S.

Films of 2021, found that female protagonists led 31% of the year’s highest-grossing films, up slightly from 2020‘s 29%. However, even with the incremental shift, 57% of the surveyed films featured male protagonists. “Despite the major disruptions in the film business over the last couple of years, on-screen gender ratios have remained relatively stable,” Lauzen noted. “Last year audiences saw almost 2 male characters for every female character, and although women protagonists led some of the most high-profile films including Spencer, Being the Ricardos, and The Eyes of Tammy Faye, women comprised slightly less than one third of sole protagonists last year.” Lauzen’s latest It’s a Man’s (Celluloid) World report also highlighted increases in representation among BIPOC women:When it comes to increases for Latina and Asian and Asian American women, the report attributes the rise of on-screen representation to titles like Encanto, In The Heights, West Side Story, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, Minari and Mortal Kombat.

Without such culturally-specific titles, both demographics fell slightly below their 2020 levels. “These findings suggest that the increases in Latinas and Asian and Asian American females in major roles are largely due to their presence in a handful of films, rather than their