With Captain Marvel, Anna Boden has become the first woman to direct a live-action movie that grossed over $1 billion.

Marvel Studios' Captain Marvel has soared to blockbuster success, becoming the first female-led superhero film to pass $1 billion at the box office! It has also made history as the first Marvel Cinematic Universe movie to feature a female solo lead. While the film's themes of perseverance and discovering your own power have spoken to a wide audience, this lead character is particularly meaningful for girls and women, who rarely see themselves as the heroic lead of a superhero film. Continue reading → Continue reading

"This weird idea that women maybe can’t open movies or are not important to storytelling or the female story is not high art, it’s bogus."

Captain Marvel soared past $1 billion global box office sales this month! As of April 12 — a little over one month after its release — the film had earned $380 million domestically and $664 million internationally. Only 37 other films in history have earned at least $1 billion and Captain Marvel marks the first time that a female superhero has driven this level of ticket sales. The movie's success is one more reminder that, contrary to commonly-held attitudes, female-led films do draw in viewers. "A lot of times in our business there is a lot of bias disguising itself as knowledge," observes Christy Haubegger, an agent with the Creative Artists Agency and part of a research team that conducted a recent study that found female-led films have higher box office returns at every production budget level. "The perception that it’s not good business to have female leads is not true.... They’re a marketing asset." Continue reading → Continue reading