Sundance: Full transcript of Women Directors' Roundtable

Foner: I think there are guys who have the—you know, I'd say Richard LaGravenese is an honorary woman.

Dabis: Rodrigo Garcia writes amazing women.

Foner: Yeah, exactly. And I think there are—

Michael Bay, I'd put in there.

Foner: You know, I think these things are—to make them black and white is really—they're human beings who have the ability to do... But I understand what you're saying. Because I think a white director who's done a movie about black culture and has not really—is gonna be raked over the coals in a different way...

Fidell: Well, but we experience life differently. So I think that at the end of the day—at least this is my understanding—a male director doesn't come to situations the same way that a female director would.

Foner: See, unfortunately, that justifies their telling me I can't write "Blade Runner." Because it's saying, "You know, you don't know what it's like to be inside. You couldn't possibly pick that macho stuff up and be able to—"

Fidell: Well, okay. We can agree to disagree.

Dabis: Well, it just to me feels so much more nuanced and specific. Because it's like, we all come to experiences with something different. It's not gender-based. It's based on so many other things. And I tend to look at other things—rather than see gender as just sort of this black and white, there's so many shades of who we are in between in there. And I'd like to think of us all as having feminine and masculine traits that we hopefully have in some sort of balance. Unfortunately a lot of people don't. They're either super masculine or super feminine. But a lot of people do kind of nurture the other side and find that really interesting. And I actually find that in the filmmaking world, I do see that maybe more than in other places.

Fidell: I mean, at the same time, what my film is dealing with is obsession. And I think I just read in The New York Times a study where women keep overthinking. And that leads to depression.

Foner: Written by a man or a woman?

The study or the news story?

Foner: The study.

Fidell: But it's that overthinking that is so typically… Something that I know I experience, for sure. I'm sure men experience that as well. But I honestly believe that we are able to tell a different story. And why not use that to tell that kind of story?

Garcia:It's so complicated. Because we want to say our point of view is specific and it's valid, and we also want to say, "We don't have one point of view."

It's also universal. It's non-exclusionary.

Garcia: Yeah. It's universal. You know, and a lot of the discussions I've been having about this, and it's coming up here, which I think is so interesting, this idea that, you know, we're talking about sort of masculine traits or sort of being, like, powerful and owning the kind of masculine part of yourself. 'Cause I think an aspect of working in this business and living in this world as a woman is that you are at war with what is feminine about you. And the highest compliment that I got from someone watching me direct was like, "You're so feminine, and that helps everyone. Because you don't get sort of angry or territorial easily." My guys would sort of go at each other and have problems. And it would sort of come down to a lot of territory bs.

Dabis: Did you find yourself moderating or trying to make them feel better?

Garcia:I wouldn't moderate. I would just let them sort of exhaust themselves and then I would be like, "Here's the thing."