The Venice Film Festival's main competition line-up for this year includes only one female director, marking the sharpest drop in gender representation in five years. May El-Toukhy, the Danish-Egyptian director behind "Woman Unknown", is the sole woman among the 20 filmmakers competing for the Golden Lion, in a selection curated by festival chief Alberto Barbera. The fall is notable given that women had accounted for a relatively steady share of competition slots in recent editions, and several past female nominees have gone on to win top prizes.

Last year's competition featured six women out of 21 directors, around 29% of the line-up, including Kaouther Ben Hania, who won the grand jury prize, and Valérie Donzelli, who took best screenplay. This year's picture is more mixed elsewhere in the festival: the Horizons sidebar, also curated by Barbera, will see a record eight of 19 films directed by women (about 42%), while the independently run Venice Days sidebar will have a female majority, with 14 of 25 titles directed by women, including its opener, Lili Horváth's English-language debut "My Notes on Mars". Historically, female directors in competition have performed strongly, with wins in recent years for Audrey Diwan, Laura Poitras, Agnieszka Holland and others.