13. December 2021
by SchspIN
2 Comments

Strong Woman, Punch her in the Face!

Making Women Characters suffer on Television

Warning: this text is about, among other things, violence against women portrayed on television.

Warning: some of the photographs used may cause unpleasant feelings.

I recently read the appeal by Liz Tucker, Chair of Women in Film and Television UK, on the issue of violence against women in fictional programs. It began with the question “Why do so many shows feature violence against women?” – which goes with two older texts of mine, one published, one unpublished, which I will present today.

WFTV UK is asking Why?

Liz Tucker published the following on 1 November (You can find the full text on the WFTV UK website and on Broadcast Now, emphasis in the quote by me):

Every night of the week across a wide range of broadcast platforms, if I so wish, I can watch stories about women being raped, decapitated and murdered in ever more imaginative and gruesome ways. As it happens, I don’t wish, because I think the time has come for all of us working in the broadcast industry to think much more carefully about the message we are sending out when we continually produce TV crime dramas and documentaries that have women as the central victims. Recent years have seen an avalanche in this type of programming and there seems to be a spiralling competition between some writers and directors to escalate the violence and come up with ever more graphic and disturbing ways to portray the murder of women. (…) Would it really be so hard today to come up with imaginative new plots that don’t involve the brutalisation and murder of women?

No. Of course not. It just has to be wanted.

A tick is biting into a human breast. Photo: SchspIN

Part 1 and 2 of the Trilogy

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29. November 2021
by SchspIN
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Old Women. Visibility. Part III

Here is the last episode of my Old Women. Visibility. Trilogy.

Old Women, visible. Made younger.

In Part I from Oct. 29 I mentioned, among other things, that it is not uncommon to rejuvenate characters in film and television through casting, i.e. to have older characters played by younger actors. Since I’ve received several questions about this, I‘d like to talk about this today again, with a bit more detail.

Can they actually do that?

A never-ending discussion revolves around the question whether actors can take on a role that, unlike them, is white / black / brown / Eastern European / Asian / flawless / handicapped / young / old / good-looking / fat / slim / heterosexual / homosexual / transgender / female / male / stable / psychotic / depressed / boring / stubborn / cheerful or has a different nationality and mother tongue. Many deny this, at least in relation to certain characteristics, others say “Yes, because you don’t have to have murdered anyone to....”.

I think it depends.

Regarding age: Is it bad if someone younger is cast for an older role and the older age is simply claimed, or if a role is unceremoniously made younger or older so that the desired casting fits?

I think that also depends.

Dealing with Age/ing

Continue Reading →

Old Women. Visibility. Part II

1. November 2021 by SchspIN

From our Society – Older Visible Women

A few days ago I wrote in the text Old Women. Visibility. Part I that I would compile and publish a gallery of “older and old women from real life. You can now view it here, either as a general overview, or click through the portraits individually and read the German explanations under the pictures: Name, age in the photo, profession and photographer:in / Common Licence. This information should also appear when you move your mouse over the pictures (the photos also function as an occupation game, which is why I have added the occupation to the female politicians).

As I said, there are many female politicians, on the one hand quite banal, because they are so easy to find as a larger group of older women in Wikipedia, with public domain photos. But there are also other women, I have, for example, looked through the lists of the Order of Merit Ribbon Awards – which are mostly made up of men, but a few women have also been awarded. Most of them have an entry in Wikipedia, but many without a picture. And women scientists, writers and a few actresses and a few under 40 are there too.

What I haven’t done is to make a percentage distribution of all possible population groups. But I think the pictures are already much more diverse in terms of older women than those who populate German fictional TV.

As a reminder: “Since they are mostly official photos or photos of professional appearances, the women were of course also made up and the pictures were certainly also edited, which is perfectly okay.” Nevertheless, they look different from PR photos of older actresses.

We Should be seeing Women like These on Fictional TV Programmes

This gallery contains 0 photos

29. October 2021
by SchspIN
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Old Women. Visibility. Part I

Yesterday I was standing at the checkout in an organic supermarket. The cashier asked the customer in front of me if she had a student card – that must have given her a discount. The woman went completely berserk with pleasure for having been mistaken for a student. She was wearing a mask of course and a beanie, but from her eyes, among other things, I would have guessed she was easily in her late 30s or early 40s. Anyway. She was beaming all over, “This is the most beautiful thing I’m going to experience today!” It was 10:45 a.m.. What a prospect.

Hardly anyone wants to be old, people are turning 60 years young, old has become a dirty word. Actually, not always, in German. There‘s the phrase „Was geht ab, Alter?“ / “What’s up, dude?” – originally from youth language. Alter (dude) literally translates to old man. I’ve never heard the word “Alte” (old woman) in a similar context. Have you?

Old Women, visible. In Film and Television.

Being thought of as younger is enormously important for many people. Not only for women, by the way, but especially for them, because youth mania with everything that goes with it, partly presented by society, partly by the media, leaves its mark. The Hamburg-based initiative Pink Stinks (“Magazine, campaign office and an educational organisation against sexism.”) has been addressing the connection between a format like GERMANY’S NEXT TOP MODEL and slimness mania up to bulimia among young female viewers for years.

Age and eternal youth are also topics in the film and television industry. If a – famous – actress is over 50 or 60 or 70, it is always emphasised that she looks at least ten, if not twenty years younger. Famous older actresses play much younger roles (e.g. still a pregnant woman at 53), which – if you didn’t know their age – they could often pass as, because they work on their appearance and / or have it worked on and look tremendous. When older actresses like Iris Berben, Senta Berger or Hannelore Elsner once showed a grey hair in a role, it was highlighted as a special achievement. Continue Reading →

15. September 2021
by SchspIN
Comments Off on Not bad if you like Men Productions: German TV Awards 21

Not bad if you like Men Productions: German TV Awards 21

The German Television Awards 21 – Nominations, Fictional Formats

Last week, a colleague from Cologne drew my attention to this year’s nominations for the German Television Prize, which will be awarded tomorrow, September 16, in Cologne. In response, I looked at the nominated fictional productions and television creators through light blue and pink coloured glasses and made an analysis.

There are four categories for films and series in this award: Best Television Film, Best Multi-part Features, Best Drama Series and Best Comedy Series, for each of which three productions were nominated. In addition, there are the individual awards for Directing, Screenplay, Cinematography, Editing and Music, with three productions nominated in each category. For the set design nominations, production design, costume design and, for two of three productions, make-up design were combined. In addition, there are the awards for Best Actress and Best Actor with five nominees each, partly for two productions.

6-Divisions-Check of all Productions with Nomination/s

A total of 22 productions appear in all fictional television awards, 7 television films and 15 serial formats. Once again, many crime dramas, but interestingly no TATORTs (“crime scene“, Germany‘s top cop drama)

The first figure shows the proportion of women and men for the six departments directing, screenwriting, cinematography, sound, editing and music (6-divisions-check). Yes, there is no television award for sound, I wonder why (cue sound and vision), but since the sound engineers are usually in my 6-divisions-checks, I’m also including them here:

Continue Reading →

26. July 2021
by SchspIN
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Filmfest München 21: New German Cinema & TV Movies

From July 1 to 10, 2021, this year’s Munich Film Festival took place, for real, in an open-air edition. Four awards were announced in advance, Senta Berger and Robin Wright received the CineMerit Award, Franka Potente the Margot Hielscher Award and Małgorzata Szumowska was the centre of the Homage, so to speak (The Cineastic Foursome).

An acquaintance suggested that I should take a look at the New German Cinema and New German Television sections, especially with regard to female screenwriters – so here goes!

New German Cinema & New German TV Movies at the FFM

All films in the New German Cinema section were invited by a selection committee, on the other hand, broadcasters can put forward films for the New German TV Movies section. What both groups have in common is that the films must be premieres, at least German premieres, ideally European or world premieres.

This means that the cinema films are predominantly early films, i.e. first, second or third films of the respective directors or producers – because those who are already established would probably prefer to show their film in Berlin, Tokyo, Toronto or Cannes. The situation is different for television films, where the festival merely has to take place before the first broadcast.

The following first figure shows the women and men as script writers or directors for the twelve films in the New German Cinema series – with a majority of women in both departments:

The second figure shows the women and men responsible for scripts and directing for the thirteen films in the New German TV Movies section; here the men are in the majority in both departments..

The third figure gives a more detailed breakdown of authorship for the cinema and television sections. Were the scripts written individually or in teams, and if the latter, who was in them? The majority of the scripts were written by individuals – which is not really a surprise:

Differences or Coincidences

So we were able to establish that there are very different conditions in the two sections. In the case of the New German Cinema, the proportion of women is higher, well over 50%, both in scriptwriting and in directing, and in the case of the New German TV Movies, the proportion of men is well over 50% in both departments. I already mentioned that the selected cinema films are ‘early films’ of the directors in their respective careers. However, this does not apply to the television films, where there are a number of older and more established film people both as authors and directors. It is also interesting to note that of all the cinema films, there was only one director who was not involved in writing the script, writing it alone or in a team (LIEBER THOMAS). Among the television productions, there is only one film (GELIEFERT) which was written and directed by the same person.

Let‘s not forget, there are only 25 films in all, which is not good representativeness (should this term exists, – if not: Tadaa! I have just invented it).

And in front of the camera

In my last text – or the last two? – I only looked at team positions offscreen and not at the distribution of roles, which has been requested by various readers. Therefore, here‘s an analysis of the first roles and the main casts (as they are given on the FFM website entries for the films).

Interesting: in the cinema films, there are more men at the centre of the story (= male first roles), in television more women. I know too little about the television films and also about the other television films that may have been submitted to be able to interpret this meaningfully.

For the main casts, the most important roles, it is the other way round for the two sections; in the cinema films the proportion of women’s roles is over 50 %, in television it is under 50 %. The former could be related to the high proportion of women among the authors, and the latter to the phenomenon of “now we have a female lead, that’s enough” – and could possibly change through the use of NEROPA. But that is a topic for another day.

The last figure shows the age ranges for the female and male first roles, or rather the actors and actresses cast, for both film series.

In New German Cinema, there were no first-role actors over 60, though there were two actresses: Corinna Harfouch (62) and Ulrike Willenbacher (65), the oldest actor was Christoph Kaiser (56). In television there was one actress over 70 (Maren Kroymann), the oldest actor is Joachim Król (63).

Roles in cinema being younger overall than on television is something I had already established many years ago, at least for the first roles (Age: A Picture is worth a Thousand Words). But again: there really aren’t many films in these FFM series, so we should be careful about drawing any authoritative conclusions.

What might be interesting, though, is a comparison of the New German Cinema and New German TV Movies at the Munich Film Festival over the last 20 years. But that’s a task for another day.

18. July 2021
by SchspIN
1 Comment

Babylon Testosterone, Generously Funded

I’m getting so tired of it.

Why are feature films and television drama still so often produced without women, why does a menmenmen series get several million €€€ from public film funding, in addition to the million €€€ of a public broadcaster? Why don’t those in charge at the participating broadcasters make more women behind the camera and gender-dramaturgical counselling mandatory?

The TV series BABYLON BERLIN is hailed as “the most exciting and most innovative series from Germany ever” (Christine Strobl 2018) and as “an important part of the series offensive in the ARD media library” (Florian Hager 2020), by decision-makers in the industry who should be aware of Germany’s constitution. Shouldn’t equality also entitle everyone to equal access to film and television work?

BABYLON BERLIN, quite an expensive male gaze

On 15.11.18 I published a text about the German crime series BABYLON BERLIN, in which I pointed out the impressive production CLASH OF FUTURES as a much better alternative (Two German Series: BABYLON BERLIN and CLASH OF THE FUTURES). At that time I also wrote that I didn‘t really care for BABYLON BERLIN, a sentiment I had right from the start: the original novel‘s Charlotte, a law student and stenotopist for the police, became the series‘ Charlotte, part-time prostitute and police employee. And this feeling, this dislike stuck with me throughout all the episodes – an inglorious low point was the (approx. ten-minute?) sequence in which Charlotte Ritter and DC Rath ended up in the water with their car and sank, and she wanted to sacrifice herself and drown so that he could go on living. Continue Reading →

22. June 2021
by SchspIN
Comments Off on Rosy times for Men in NDR Prime-Time Cop Dramas

Rosy times for Men in NDR Prime-Time Cop Dramas

NDR prime-time Cop Dramas

I was invited to do a study of NDR crime films for the current newsletter of the Film & Medienbüro Niedersachsen. With kind permission, here is a translation of the article (pp. 25-27).

The share of women in crews and casts is well below 50%

In early May, NDR (Norddeutscher Rundfunk North German Public Broadcaster) surprised us with the news that the cop drama TATORT: SCHATTENLEBEN, currently being filmed in northern Germany, is particularly diverse, both in front of and behind the camera. For example, 17 percent of those involved are BIPoC (Black, Indigenous and People of Color), and 65 percent of the head positions are held by women. NDR and the production company Wüste Medien GmbH are using the so-called Inclusion Rider for the first time. The initiative came from director Mia Spengler. The goal of the concept, which originated in Hollywood, is to have as diverse a staff and cast as possible.

“NDR has been focusing on diversity in front of the camera for many years. We believe in diversity as a whole,” says head of television film Christian Granderath in the aforementioned press release mentioned. Unfortunately, that doesn’t apply to NDR’s prime-time cop dramas and thrillers of recent years, at least not when it comes to gender equality. Neither in front of nor behind the camera.

I analyzed the share of women for the six departments directing, screenwriting, camera, sound, editing and music of four television series with 90-minute films from the prime-time program: NORD BEI NORDWEST, the USEDOM CRIME STORIES, the NDR TATORTE and the NDR POLIZEIRUF 110.The period under investigation is 2017 to 2020.Two major studies by the FFA German Federal Film Board and public Broadcasters ARD and ZDF (“Gender und Film” and “Gender und Fernsehfilm”) were published at the beginning of 2017. By then, it should have become clear to the industry that there is a considerable gender imbalance in front of and behind the camera and that there is an urgent need for action.
The series NORD BEI NORDWEST has been on air since 2014.There were nine films from 2017 to 2020. The following figure shows the percentage of men in pink and the percentage of women in light blue:

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16. April 2021
by SchspIN
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Fair Participation: Yes, it is possible.

No April Fool’s joke: half of the TATORT screenplays by female authors – #jaesgeht

On 1 April, I posted the ARD news on Instagram that half the top cop drama TATORT’s scripts will be by female authors, i.e. written by one or more women in 2022. Not by mixed teams, but without any men at all:

This post was liked umpteen times and also shared in various Instastories. The only criticism of the post, which was voiced several times, related to the half-sentence “and we are looking forward to this challenge“. Because really, what is supposed to be a challenge about finding female writers or teams of female writers for 18 scripts?

The question of an April Fool’s joke was raised twice, by crew united and by composer Verena Marisa, who had even looked for a press release from ARD and found none.

The ARD or the Tatort-Instagram account, which were tagged, did not react. Neither with a “Good idea, we’ll do that“, nor with a denial, nor with a “Haha, funny“.

Because in fact, it was an April Fool’s joke. And such a joke works best when the message is outrageous but not improbable. Continue Reading →

21. March 2021
by SchspIN
2 Comments

Is Germany’s Top Cop Drama Getting into Trouble about Quotas?

TATORTs. TV Ratings. Quota for Women Off-Screen.

Today I am looking at the 36 new episodes of German Top Cop Drama TATORT in 2020, comparing the shares of men and women in the 6-departments-check (direction, screenplay, camera, sound, editing and music), and analyzing the development from 2011 to 20. In addition, I will check how these films fare under the “2 from 6” departments rule. Finally, I will discuss the TATORTs in respect to the TV ratings and a female quota, with a short detour to the demands set up by Pro Quote Bühne (Pro Quota Stage).

The 6-Departments-Check 2020

It was already apparent during the summer break that 2020 was going to be a very good year for female TATORT directors, with a total of 16 of the 36 TATORTs coming in at 44.4 %. At the other end are the female sound recordists, or not, they were not engaged for TATORTs for the third year in a row. Whereby this is not quite true, the highest proportion of women is once again achieved in the average, this time with 77.3 % female editors. For comparison: Alumni 51:49, Crew United database 35.5 : 64.5.

What about the problem child scriptwriting? Continue Reading →