When the film industry was in its infancy – in the late 1890s, 1910s – it was one of the few industries where women could hold leadership positions.Having come to the cinema, they not only received the right to the main place in the production of a motion picture - the title of the author, but also the opportunity to speak in their own name about what excites them.However, since the 1920s, the situation has changed dramatically and the so-called "film ceiling" has appeared.Today, “feminine” is a broad concept that includes various techniques, themes, critical distance, and so on.Nevertheless, the statistics show the underrepresentation of female directors.In the first 90 years of the Oscars, only five women were nominated for Best Director.The situation slowly began to change.In 2020, for the first time, two applicants competed for the category at once.Jane Campion will compete for the statuette in 2021.Lina Vermuller came to the cinema from the theater, where she worked as an assistant director.In 1951 she founded the Harlequin Troupe, wrote her first plays and toured Europe.Wermuller then returned to Rome, where she worked as an actress, journalist, writer and set designer.In the cinema, her path began with a collaboration with Federico Fellini - she became an assistant director in his films La Dolce Vita and Eight and a Half.In the 1970s, Wertmüller made films on acute social topics, in which her unique authorial style crystallizes: a combination of classic Italian comedy and a sharp, largely ironic-satirical view of society and politics.Her painting "Seven Beauties" comes out in 1975 among these works and becomes the most recognized.The tape was nominated for four Oscars in 1977, including Best Director.Wertmüller was the first woman to be nominated for this award.The first Bulgarian female feature film director, Binka Zhelyazkova worked between 1950 and 1990.The film "How young we were" Zhelyazkova filmed according to the script of her husband Hristo Ganev.Both of them participated in the resistance movement during World War II, and Zhelyazkova dedicated the painting "How Young We Were" to this very topic.