Female audiences are under-served and underestimated, and WestEnd Films, an international film sales and finance house, is doing something to address these problems. Variety reports that WestEnd has “launched a brand aimed at female audiences called WeLove, with new projects from Agnieszka Holland and Alexis Zegerman forming part of its launch slate.”
As MPAA research shows, women account for 52 percent of moviegoers. WestEnd aims to offer this often-ignored segment of the population “high-quality commercial projects in a variety of formats, including feature films, TV and web series, and documentaries.”
“It’s an endeavor that answers a real need. The ‘Bridesmaids’ and ‘Trainwrecks’ of this world are too few and far between,” said WestEnd managing director Eve Schoukroun.
“Bridesmaids” grossed nearly $290 million on a budget of $32.5 million, and “Trainwreck” took home over $140 million after being made for $35 million.
WeLove will develop and produce content targeting women. The brand also plans to promote female talent, which we interpret to mean putting actresses front and center in movies, and also ensuring women play prominent roles behind-the-scenes.
WestEnd drew attention to a popular myth in the movie industry — that movies about women don’t make money. In fact, women-centric films make more money than ones centered around male characters: “[S]ince 2006 in the U.S., movies about men have made an average of $80.6 million, while movies about women have made an average of $121.6 million. Female-led movies have made more on average than male-led ones for nearly every year in the past decade.” (For a more in-depth examination about the power of female audiences and the success of female-fronted films, check out “The Ms. Factor,” a toolkit prepared by Women and Hollywood and the PGA’s Women’s Impact Network. )
“WestEnd has been seen as a female company doing female audience movies since it started. We’ve long defended ourselves from being only that. Now, we’ve decided to embrace our specificity and own taste,” commented WestEnd’s Maya Amsellem, the company’s other managing director.
While the plan is for WestEnd to “continue to represent and/or finance elevated genre and male-skewed pictures,” WeLove will set its sights on developing and producing what WestEnd describes as “female auteurs-led projects, distinctive voices, [and] director-driven features offering a clear brand aiming at women of all ages.”
“There is a content frenzy right now: everybody is so afraid of not coming up with the right content at the right time and place,” observed Schoukroun. “When the offer for content is so scattered on so many media platforms, it seemed important to become a distinctive name that can build and keep a loyal and identifiable audience. While WestEnd is known for cross-over arthouse pics and Oscar contenders, WeLove will be known for its female-skewed content and ultimately, we hope, audiences will watch, just because it’s WeLove.” She emphasized, “What WestEnd and WeLove have in common is quality.”
WeLove has already gotten started with their first two productions, Agnieszka Holland’s “Sylvia,” based on the true story of Mossad agent Sylvia Raphael, and actress Alexis Zegerman’s directorial debut “All Inclusive,” an English adaptation of a 2014 Danish hit comedy of the same name.
Holland’s previous credits include the Oscar-nominated films “Europa Europa” and “In Darkness,” and episodes of “The Wire,” “The Killing,” and “House of Cards.” Sharon Harel, WestEnd’s chairperson, promised a “compelling story” and “fascinating lead character” in “Sylvia,” and hinted that the project has “already attracted such creative and inspired talents.”
Of “All Inclusive,” Harel said, “Nearly 10% of the population of Denmark went to the cinema to see the original. We believe that if you give women what they want, they’ll come out in numbers.” Amen. She promised that the characters from “All inclusive” are “far from stereotypical and clichéd female roles behaving as expected. Here, the girls have relationships and family issues one can identify with. The jokes are irreverent but also full-hearted.” “All Inclusive” will land on the marketplace later this year.
