SINCE THE TURN of the 2020s, the Academy Award for Best Director has been received by two female directors; Chloé Zhao for Nomadland and Jane Campion for her 2021 feature, The Power of The Dog.
Their respective wins were historical because it marked the first time since the inaugural Oscars ceremony was held in 1929, that the award was won by a female director in consecutive years. Even more remarkable, Campion and Zhao brought the number of female directors who have received this award to three. In 2009, Kathryn Bigalow became the first woman to take the accolade home for her feature, The Hurt Locker.
Throughout the history of filmmaking and cinema, there have been countless women who have written, produced and directed some of the most beloved and celebrated titles in cinema. From Nora Ephron to Agnès Varda and Greta Gerwig to Sofia Coppola, there’s a wealth of accomplished and acclaimed women in filmmaking. However, in a historically male-dominated industry, it can be challenging for emerging female talents to establish their position and vision to take the creative form in a new direction.
Born in Dublin and now residing in New York, Edelle Kenny has already made an impression with her recently released debut short film, Ossobuco. The film, described as “a feminist short which aims to shift entrenched perceptions of ‘overly emotional women’”. Prior to commencing work on the piece, Kenny had amassed invaluable experience working primarily in television projects from docu-series and reality shows such as 90 Day Fiancé.
The shift towards filmmaking was driven by Kenny’s desire to explore challenging themes in her work, as she told The Journal. “Over the pandemic, I really started to reconsider the type of media I was making and if and how that impacted the world. My thesis almost a decade previous had researched the power of representation and dismantling harmful stereotypes through the media, I felt like 2021 was a time that I could combine my array of experience with a need to tell more influential stories.”
Certainly, Ossobuco’s story is thematically bold and makes a strong statement from Kenny for her directorial debut. Adapted from a play written by Renwick McAslan, depicts an interaction between a couple in their New York City apartment. Kenny describes what drew her to McAslan’s work as the foundation for her short film; “I was drawn to this script because I hated the character in the first few pages. I knew her already. I had encountered this woman being described so many times through life and through film and so I had stereotypical preconceived opinions about her. But when I truly listened to her, instead of listening to the way people described her, I felt something more for her.”
Kenny continues, “I was also drawn to this script because conveying the emotions in such a confined space really set out some directing challenges. Since we had just spent the last two years confined to small apartments I really felt it was the right time to channel those memories to make something that required the same energy.”
Despite already having carved out a successful career in New York, where she has lived for the last 8 years, delving into a project with a text that challenged gender constructs, as Ossobuco does, presented moments of creative uncertainty for Kenny; especially for her debut offering, as she describes.
“Throughout the entire process I found myself doubting my decision in choosing this as my debut film; a challenging feminist short film that highlights our internalized misogyny is not something that everyone jumps to watch. For many years I had gotten too comfortable making ‘easy watching’ shows for audiences of millions and I was worried that this film was too controversial, too niché, and the subject matter would hinder me because nobody would want to watch it. However, it was actually the feedback from men that I found the most reassuring.”
She continues, “They disclosed that it brought up strong feelings about how they behaved in past relationships and with women who were upset in their presence. If my work can make just one person think about or feel something more than they did before they watched it, it’s empowering. Doubt, in moderation, can be a great asset to your work. I spend a lot of time working alone and I try my hardest to view doubt as a colleague. It asked questions that I might not have addressed in the initial process.”
The film has received a warm reception and acclaim from several respected institutions and has been included in a number of festivals such as the Amsterdam Lift-Off Film Festival, Boden International Film Festival Sweden, Toronto International Women’s Film Festival, and the Amsterdam Freedom Independent IFF.
This recognition, so early in her filmmaking career, has been encouraging to Kenny. “We all make and watch films to escape, but do we want to watch films about the problematic aspects of the film industry? Festivals can be a hard circuit to navigate and when I got my first rejection I immediately spiralled and thought I shouldn’t have poked this bear! But when I slowly started getting official selections, it really instilled faith that the right festivals will choose this and in turn, the people who are open to change will watch it through those screenings.”
Further instilling faith and the motivation to continue questioning these constructs in cinema, Kenny is hopeful that things are changing – slowly, but surely, in the film industry. “There has been a great effort in highlighting the inequalities of women in crew, but we have a great deal to go in terms of achieving true equality. When I returned home to Ireland this year I was really impressed with the Irish film industry’s efforts to support and build platforms for under-represented groups. If you want to depict accurate stories of women on screen, it’s crucial to have women on your crews. The crew are the first consumers of this story, they have to relate and understand the characters to provide the means that are needed to tell it.”
Better Nature Productions / Vimeo
With Ossobuco, Edelle Kenny has made an assured artistic statement and she intends to maintain the momentum into 2023. “I’m currently writing my next project which is feature length. It’s also a women-driven story that challenges societal expectations, but I can promise it’s not as heavy as Ossobuco! I’m also in post-production with my next short which will be released in 2023.”
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