By Gabriela Resto-Montero
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
MORNINGSIDE HEIGHTS — The Academy Awards are just around the corner, but the first-ever Athena Film Festival celebrating films produced by women is just uptown at Barnard College.
The festival, co-sponsored by the Athena Center for Leadership Studies and Women and Hollywood, kicks off Thursday and will run through Feb. 13 at the school at West 116th Street and Broadway.
The festival will feature films like the Academy Award-nominated "Winter's Bone," as well as others produced by women and also featuring strong female characters.
"We hope to illuminate the sometimes passionate, sometimes agonizing stories of women who have made a difference in their countries and communities," said Kathryn Kolberg, a co-founder of the festival, in a statement.
Other films in the festival lineup include the Benazir Bhutto documentary "Bhutto" and the New York premiere of "Miss Representation," a film that looks at the portrayal of women in the media through public figures like Nancy Pelosi and Rosario Dawson.
In 2009, the last year for which numbers were available, women made up 55 percent of moviegoers but directed just 7 percent of the top 250 grossing films, Women and Hollywood reported.
By giving a stage to the work of women filmmakers, organizers hope to show what it takes to make it in Hollywood and inspire women to make their own films, said Melissa Silverstein, a co-founder, in a statement.
