Breaking the Celluloid Ceiling: Women in European Cinema Discussion + Q&A at HOME

Join HOME as they discuss roles, specific works by women, and opportunities for women in the European film industry. Focusing on four countries (UK, Spain, Italy and France), our panel of experts will address what is unique in how women directors, screenwriters and/or producers approach film-making, and highlight the opportunities for and contributions of women in the industry.

Rachel Hayward is the Interim Creative Director: Film at HOME, Manchester. She has led the artistic team for ¡Viva! Spanish and Latin American Film Festival since 2009 and is a co-curator of HOME’s Not Just Bollywood film programme. She co-curated the wide-reaching 2019 programme Celebrating Women in Global Cinema, a year-long programme of films and events highlighting and celebrating women in film from across the world.

Carman Herrero is Principal Lecturer of Hispanic Studies at Manchester Metropolitan University, UK. She leads the research group Film, Languages and Media Education (FLAME) and founded with Isabelle Vanderschelden the Film in Language Teaching Association (FILTA). Her research focuses on film and screen studies, in particular their pedagogical applications for language learning and teaching.

Dr Silvana Serra (PhD) has been teaching Italian language and culture, and curating cinema events for the Societa’ Dante Alighieri in Manchester, for many years. She graduated in Italian Literature and Grammar at Università degli Studi Roma III, and was awarded a PhD in Film Studies at Salford University. The doctoral thesis Emotion and Cognition in the Films of Bernardo Bertolucci was published in 2013. She was one of the curators for Un nuovo cinema politico italiano? Vol.1 (2013) and 2 (2014). In Vol.2 she also contributed to the Section “L’Italia tra Storia e Memoria”, writing the Introduction: Il passato sociopolitico italiano nel cinema del nuovo millennio.

Isabelle Vanderschelden is a former Senior Lecturer in French Studies from Manchester Metropolitan University. Her main areas of research include contemporary French cinema; film production; screenwriting; intercultural competence and film literacy.