Last weekend, “Pitch Perfect 2” opened to an astonishing $69.2 million. To put this number in context, the original “Pitch Perfect” made $65 million in its entire domestic run. The film’s success does not just highlight a successful advertising campaign by Universal Pictures, but also a growing trend in the film industry: the importance of women.

Let’s talk some numbers here:
• In 2014, the highest grossing film directed solely by a woman was Angelina Jolie’s “Unbroken,” which opened to $30.6 million on Christmas Day leading to a final domestic gross of $115.6 million.
• The next highest grossing female directed film was “Selma,” which made $52 million. Unless “Pitch Perfect 2,” which was directed by Elizabeth Banks, flames out spectacularly, it will surely surpass “Unbroken.”
• Earlier in 2015, “Fifty Shades of Grey,” which was directed by Samantha Taylor-Johnson, grossed $166 million domestic and still counting, which is almost as much as “Unbroken” and “Selma” combined.

So here we are, halfway through 2015, and two movies are guaranteed to gross more than the highest grossing female directed film of 2014, which came out on the last week of the year. Does this mean things are getting better for women in Hollywood? Somewhat. Let’s go over the films in 2015 with female directors:

• September’s romantic comedy “The Intern” was directed by the queen of classy romcoms, Nancy Meyers.
• Angelina Jolie will be back at it again in November with “By the Sea.”
• On the same weekend, “Love The Coopers” will be released, which was directed by Jessie Nelson.

So 2015 will have five major releases directed by woman. An improvement over 2014? Definitely. Proper representation? I would say no. In fact, though there were fewer female-directed films in 2014, I feel those two films are more representative of women as auteurs.

“Unbroken” was a film that received mixed reviews, but still told a powerful story of a war hero. “Selma,” on the other hand, was a universally acclaimed film about one of the most important American historical figures of the last century, Martin Luther King Jr. These films are bold, serious and presented on a grand scale. They have no traces of being “girly.”

Now let’s look at 2015’s line up. We have a movie based on a beloved, but not respected, novel. We have a sequel. We have a romantic comedy. “By the Sea” and “Love the Coopers” certainly have potential, but they just seem to be your average night at the movie theater. We are not seeing films of epic war scale like “Unbroken” directed by women in 2015. We are not seeing films that possess the same grandiose scale and historical significance of “Selma” this year.

Now, I am not claiming that every movie should have the ambition of a “Selma” or “Unbroken,” but there are many 2015 movies that do have that ambition, and all seem to be directed by men.

It seems to me that studios are handing women projects that have middle-of-the road budgets or that are easy “wins,” such as a sequel or hotly anticipated book adaption. Let’s be honest here, does the director of “Fifty Shades of Grey” or “Pitch Perfect 2” make those films any more or less successful? Probably not. There have been some breakthroughs with women directors, such as Kathryn Bigelow who directed “The Hurt Locker” and “Zero Dark Thirty.” We also have Sofia Coppola, who directed “Lost in Translation,” but these women are far more the exception rather than the rule.

Honestly, I am not so sure there really is a reason for this lack of representation behind the camera. This lack of representation though is really a shame because there are tons of people, regardless of gender, who have great talent that should be brought to the screen. More so, in 2015 movies are starting to become more and more similar, so to have some different mindsets in Hollywood would be great.

Times are changing, as the American Civil Liberties Union has taken notice of this lack of representation and is pushing the California government into investigating for full gender discrimination, according to a May 13 Los Angeles Times article.

Say what you will about “Fifty Shades of Grey” or “Pitch Perfect 2,” but they are already hugely successful films by women, mostly about women and mostly for women. Though women should be trusted with films more ambitious than these, their success shows that audiences and studios are ready for more women-centered films. Hopefully they can lead the way to more equality in Hollywood and more diversity in my film collection.

Erik Benjamin is a television radio, and film major. If you want to talk movies he can be reached at ebenjami@syr.edu.

Published on May 26, 2015 at 8:51 am