In his speech at the Venice, Audiard stressed that he was not trying to attack the festival’s organisers but noted that the argument of not taking a filmmaker’s gender into account during the selection process is doing everyone a disservice. “The right question is, ‘Do festivals have a gender?’ And the answer is yes,” Audiard said. “I’ve been attending festivals for 25 years with my films and don’t see women. I often see the same men, though. And that’s not okay.”