Reel Moments (sometimes Glamour Reel Moments or Glamour's Reel Moments) is an annual film series project by the magazine Glamour. The program entails a competition where its readers submit short stories with three being selected to be made into short films. The short stories submitted are all personal non-fiction essays. Actors, directors, and crew all donate their time to the project. Sponsors fund scripting, production, and screening costs. Proceeds benefit a charity chosen by each director, such as FilmAid International. It is hoped that the directing experience will open doors for female directors.
Each film is directed by a woman, often a celebrity. As of 2011, 20 films have been produced through the program, including giving directorial debuts to Jennifer Aniston, Jessica Biel, Courteney Cox, Kirsten Dunst, Bryce Dallas Howard, Kate Hudson, Eva Mendes, Demi Moore, and Rachel Weisz. The films are also matched up with female talent throughout the production process, including actresses. Objectives of the project include empowering women by producing female-friendly short films while creating opportunities for actresses to direct and extending the Glamour brand.
History
2004
In 2004, inspired by BMW’s short film series, Glamour Magazine wanted to attract new advertisers, with Francesca Silvestri as a producer of the film series. Each year, as a part of their general media buy, different advertiser(s) would be the new sponsor(s) of the film series.
2005
The series began in 2005 with Bebe Stores, Elizabeth Arden, and Mercury as sponsors. That year, the winners from among the 4000 750-word essays were selected for production by an advisory board of female executives and actresses that included Katie Holmes, Lucy Liu, and Julianna Margulies. Among the directors that year was Gwyneth Paltrow who made her directorial debut. She co-directed Dealbreaker with Mary Wigmore, and the film was introduced in the previews of Ryan Reynolds' Just Friends. She also, co-wrote the film. One of the shorts was accepted into the 2006 Sundance Film Festival and earned the Grammy Award for Best Arrangement, Instrumental and Vocals at the 48th Annual Grammy Awards on February 8, 2006 for "What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?", which was a soundtrack song performed by Chris Botti and Sting. All of the films that year were selected to the Santa Barbara International Film Festival. A DVD of the winning films was included in the December 2005 edition of Glamour. Talia Lugacy was also a director in 2005, and her short, Little Black Dress, was received so well that she parlayed the experience into a directing role for the 2007 movie Descent. Other directors in the first year were Jenny Bicks, Lisa Leone, and Trudie Styler, while actresses included Rosario Dawson and Debi Mazar.
2006
Cartier SA paid Glamour 1.8 million dollars to be the sponsor in 2006. The 2006 entries had a love theme about moments in the lives of the entrants that made them "victorious, stronger or wiser." The 2006 selections, which were available on Glamours website, debuted at the Directors Guild of America in Los Angeles and were shown in 10 cities. Jennifer Aniston's film, Room 10, starred Kris Kristofferson and Robin Wright. Another film that year was by Bryce Dallas Howard, the daughter of director Ron Howard, who directed Orchids, a love story that she co-wrote starring Alfred Molina and Katherine Waterston. Carol Leifer was the final director of Blinders starring Jamie-Lynn Sigler. The publicity for the 2006 films continued well into 2007. They appeared in the Palm Springs International Festival of Short Films in August 2007. After having been written, directed and acted almost entirely by women, the films were also produced by a woman from Moxie Pictures in Los Angeles. Aniston, who was a first-time director, co-directed with Andrea Buchanan.