Cannes Film Festival Denies Women Entry Unless Wearing Heels

By: Laura Meyers

A group from one of the supposedly most socially progressive industries denied women entry into the Cannes Film Festival in France last weekend if they were not wearing heels. Hoorah for equality, eh?

The incident has been dubbed “Shoegate” or “Flatgate” by some reporters, as staff from the festival denied several female actresses entry; including older women, one in particular who had recently had part of her foot amputated.

Film producer, Valeria Richter told reporters that she was stopped four times on her way into the festival. She was wearing flats because she recently had a toe amputated and couldn’t keep her balance in heels. Dammit, woman.

As she tried to enter the festival, red carpet officials shook their fingers at her, pointed at her shoes and said, “No, no, this won’t work, you can’t get in like this.”

The women who were attendance came to see several film previews; one included Todd Haynes‘ ’50s lesbian romance and one had the first female producer in over 20 years of the festival’s showing. Don’t let the context confuse you, though, even though Hollywood wants to redistribute the wealth, openly supports homosexuality and cries sexism, they still require women to wear stilettos, even when an older lady just had her toe cut off.

Attendee, actress Emily Blunt, told reporters, “Everyone should wear flats to be honest. We shouldn’t be wearing high heels anyways. That’s my point of view. I just prefer wearing Converse sneakers. That’s very disappointing.”

This incident shortly follows an interview on Entertainment Weekly with Melissa McCarthy in which she described her battles with sexism within the film industry.

She exclaimed that Hollywood sexism is “an intense sickness” that she’s done putting up with. “For someone who has two daughters, I’m wildly aware of how deep that rabbit hole goes,” she said. “But I just don’t want to start listening to that stuff. I’m trying to take away the double standard of ‘You’re an unattractive bitch because your character was not skipping along in high heels.’”

So maybe Hollywood is screaming so loudly for gender equality because they’re the ones perpetuating it. But, what do I know? I should be getting back to the kitchen now anyway.