About us

Fortin Films Inc is a female own film production company that focuses on providing opportunities for women in film and creating compelling stories that highlight dynamic and complex female characters in a raw and authentic way. As a young women who grew up loving science fiction, I idealized Princess Leia from Star Wars. I saw her as a fighter and a leader, similar to Signourney Weaver’s character Ellen Ripley in Ridley Scott’s Alien. However, as I am now a mother of two young girls I look back at my former idols through a new critical lens. Princess Leia had to have the title of “princess” to be a woman with any real voice, and was often portrayed as over-sexualized in many scenes, as well as falling into the damsel in distress archetype (1). On the other hand, Ellen Ripley was emotionless, cold and introverted while also portraying many qualities often stereotyped as
male (1). In order for her to be taken seriously in a position of power she had to embody a more masculine persona. Both of these characters were written by men and show a narrow view point of what it means to be a woman (1). This is often the case for many women characters in this male dominated cinema. Today, science fiction still has only 27% of writers being women. This is the lowest percentage of all genres except for that of horror, which has a devastating
17% of horror writers being women. Thus, the importance and relevancy of women's stores told by women in modern society.