As reported on the Women and Hollywood blog, Dame Helen Mirren has called out the director of the Karlovy International Film Festival, and indirectly all other film festivals, for not having more films by women in their line-ups.

Note from LB: Having just bore witness to the amazing Viscera Film Festival this past weekend (more on that coming soon), I can tell you there are far more of us directing films than Hollywood would like you to think. Just check out this piece from Viscera board member Heidi Honeycutt who owns Planet Etheria about how Sony neglected to mention in their press release for UNKNOWN that the majority of the episodes of their new horror anthology were directed by Martha Coolidge.

With thanks to Shannon Lark for posting this via the Facebook of the feature film she’s producing, Model Hunger (which will be directed by venerable Scream Queen Debbie Rochon), here’s a brilliant article about how the media’s portrayal of women influences women and young girls as well as how society views them.

I hope y’all have been paying attention to the Viscera Facebook event page or website, but if you haven’t: Tickets are now available for the Viscera Film Festival’s fabulous July 7th 2012 kick-off event and red carpet! 

Admission is $11 and you get to see ALL of the films, food, free drinks (including alcohol), and you get to check out the red carpet and awards ceremonies as well as the after party at the Hotel Roosevelt!

As many of you may be aware, female filmmakers are in an uproar about the lack of films directed by women in the major competition categories at the Cannes Film Festival this year. On the flip side, a post on IndieWire written by Sasha Stone highlights a couple of films made by men that feature good, strong female voices.

(While, in the end, it should be all about the story, you can’t simply ignore half of the world’s population and their viewpoint on the people and events that shape their lives. No film should get into a festival simply to fill a quota or only because of the gender of the filmmaker, but I find it hard to believe that there were no films made by women that were submitted to Cannes that were worthy of being in competition. — LB)

Today’s the day for you Toronto horror fans to catch Karen Lam’s Stained (which got a nice mention in this week’s This Week in Rep Cinema feature on BlogTO) and a Viscera Film Festival screening! It’s $10 just to see Stained at 6pm, but if you pay $5 more you can stay and see the Viscera films (including Karen Lam’s Doll Parts!) And don’t forget about the Q&A with Karen, Jovanka Vuckovic, Dara Jade Moats, and Chris Alexander hosted by Kelly Michael Stewart and Lianne Spiderbaby.

Live in Ireland and not Toronto? Think it’s weird that I’m being so specific? Don’t! Viscera founder Shannon Lark will be at a two-day symposium on Gender, Sexuality, and Horror at the University College of Dublin which starts May 17. That one is a free screening, but you have to contact Emma Hadley to reserve your place!

An interesting paper was posted on Tumblr a few weeks ago dissecting Women in Horror focusing specifically on the slasher subgenre’s Final Girl (and throwing some body horror in there for good measure in the form of the film Teeth.)

What do you think about what was said?

(I’m kinda annoyed by the fact that the author never once mentioned that all of the films she cites were directed and written by men, nor did she mention films like Slumber Party Massacre which was directed by Amy Holden Jones and written by Rita Mae Brown or Friday the 13th which featured a female killer (Mrs. Voorhees, people) and a Final Girl in what could be read as one hell of a feminist showdown. — LB)