The 7th Edition of the Madrid Films by Women Festival closed on November 10th with 7,359 spectators, a 21.3% increase in audience compared to 2023
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The Madrid Films by Women Festival had 18 "Full Capacity achieved", improving its audience by 21.3% compared to 2023, with a total of 60,498 spectators, 7,359 face-to-face attendees and an online audience of 53,139. In this 7th edition, 74 professionals participated, including directors, producers, actresses, screenwriters and industry experts, sharing their work and knowledge with the large audience. The Madrid Films by Women Festival has established itself as an annual event for films directed by women in the film industry. In the 2025 8th edition, the guest country will be France
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The results of the 7th edition demonstrate the interest aroused by this initiative that makes visible the point of view of women in the audiovisual and cinematographic creation. Once again, the public has responded positively by attending our careful national and international programming of fiction and documentary feature films. The 2024 Madrid Films by Women Festival, with 74 screenings, 19 professional and training activities, 19 face-to-face venues, 74 guests and feature films from 28 countries, has become an unmissable event in the Spain's festival calendar. We have managed to fill many theatres, with a total of 7,359 face-to-face attendees: 6,756 spectators at the screenings -18 full capacity achieved- and 467 attendees in person at the professional and training activities, 70 at the press conference and 66 at the networking meetings. To which must be added the 50,000 viewers of 8MadridTV (according to Kantar Media) and the 460 of Filmin. Therefore, in 2024, we brought together 60,498 viewers, including face-to-face attendees, TV, VOD and the online audience, confirming the importance of making cinema directed by women visible. In addition to the screenings and splendid training activities we had the opportunity to talk with some of the 74 professionals who attended the festival: 30 female directors spoke about their films and the topics that have moved their creations; 30 national and international experts on the changes that the industry is experiencing in terms of equity and 6 female producers, 5 actresses and 3 screenwriters about their personal vision of the sector. In total, 38 Spaniards and 36 of other nationalities participated. Some of these interviews and professional and training activities, as well as the video-summaries of the 7th edition, are already available on the festival's official YouTube channel. Don't miss it!
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However, the press impact of this edition has been weighed down by the unfortunate Cold Drop that began, exactly, on the same day as the opening of the festival, October 29th, 2024. Logically, during the 13 days that the activities lasted, all the press has been focused on the tragedy’s havoc and its dramatic consequences. According to the independent press impact measurement company, My News, hired by the festival to measure the audience between September 1st and November 17th, the 2024 7th edition of the Madrid Films by Women Festival has registered 291 impacts in the media; the total number of readers per publication amounts to a total of 459,889,299. Circulation, that is, the copies of the printed press acquired by readers of the media was 167,485 and the cumulative economic value of these impacts this year amounts to €690,451.
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The Award for a Professional Career, granted by the Festival's Programming Committee, went this year to Nuria Vidal, for her invaluable contribution to film criticism for 40 years, becoming an essential reference of film analysis in our country. Nuria Vidal has always been a fervent defender of women filmmakers, highlighting in her criticism of directors, screenwriters and actresses, among other professionals who have made a difference in the industry.
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The winning film of the International Competition for "2024 Best International Film" was Mond (Moon), by Austrian-Iraqi director Kurdwin Ayub. The jury of the International Competition, made up of producer Mariela Besuievski (Spain-Paraguay), Spanish director and actress Marta Nieto and writer and television presenter, Boris Izaguirre (Venezuela-Spain), also decided to issue a Special Ex-Aequo Mention ex to the films L'homme d'argile (Anaïs Tellene, France) and Horia (Ana-Maria Comănescu, Romania). The winning film of the "Best Spanish Film" award in the Spanish Competition was La Infiltrada by Arantxa Echevarría.
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In addition to the 10 feature films in the International Competition and the 10 feature films in the Spanish Competition, the Focus section of the 7TH edition featured Austrian filmography, with a selection of 8 films screened at the Film Academy, Cineteca Madrid, Cine Estudio del Círculo de Bellas Artes and the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza; and three round tables at the Espacio Fundación Telefónica. The programme was supported by the Austrian Cultural Forum and Austrian Films. On the other hand, in the remaining 15 collaborating venues that made up both the rest of the Official Section and the Parallel Sections, a varied vision of cinema directed by women was screened with a total of 54 titles, including fiction and documentaries, by directors from four continents, mostly awarded at festivals around the world. The International Panorama section, screened at Cineteca Madrid, featured eight recent international titles produced in China, Denmark, India, Iran, the Netherlands, Poland and Tunisia.
It is also worth highlighting the 19 training activities on a wide range of topics, from parity policies in European cinematography, the search for funds in the US market, film production and a wide range of issues related to diversity, health and women's issues, inside and outside cinema. During the festival, 8madridTV has programmed six feature films directed by women from its audiovisual heritage, which have had an audience of 50,000 spectators (source: Kantar Media). In 2024, the festival once again went beyond the Spanish capital thanks to the independent film platform FILMIN, with its own online window in which six films belonging to the 7th edition were screened, in addition to 92 other titles from past editions of the Festival, including Les enfants perdus, Michèle Jacob (Belgium), from the International Competition; Nina de Andrea Jaurrieta (Spain) from the Spanish Competition; Rubikon by Magdalena Lauritsch (Austria), from the Focus Austria programme; Flaming Cloud by Siyi Liu (China) in the International Panorama section, among 6 other titles in the parallel sections.
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