Alliance of Women Film Journalists Award for Best Woman Director
# Alliance of Women Film Journalists Award for Best Woman Director

The Alliance of Women Film Journalists Award for Best Woman Director is an annual award given by the Alliance of Women Film Journalists. The award is often referred to as an EDA as a tribute to AWFJ founder Jennifer Merin's mother, actress Eda Reiss Merin. EDA is also an acronym for Excellent Dynamic Activism.

## Winners

* "†" indicates Academy Award-winning direction.
* "‡" indicates Academy Award-nominated direction.

### 2000s

| Year | Director(s) | Film |
| - | - | - |
| 2007 | Sarah Polley | Away from Her |
| 2007 | Tamara Jenkins | The Savages |
| 2007 | Kasi Lemmons | Talk to Me |
| 2007 | Mira Nair | The Namesake |
| 2008 | Courtney Hunt | Frozen River |
| 2008 | Isabel Coixet | Elegy |
| 2008 | Kimberly Peirce | Stop-Loss |
| 2008 | Kelly Reichardt | Wendy and Lucy |
| 2009 | Kathryn Bigelow † | The Hurt Locker |
| 2009 | Jane Campion | Bright Star |
| 2009 | Lone Scherfig | An Education |

### 2010s

| Year | Director(s) | Film |
| - | - | - |
| 2010 | Debra Granik | Winter's Bone |
| 2010 | Andrea Arnold | Fish Tank |
| 2010 | Lisa Cholodenko | The Kids Are All Right |
| 2010 | Sofia Coppola | Somewhere |
| 2010 | Nicole Holofcener | Please Give |
| 2011 | Lynne Ramsay | We Need to Talk About Kevin |
| 2011 | Dee Rees | Pariah |
| 2011 | Vera Farmiga | Higher Ground |
| 2011 | Kelly Reichardt | Meek’s Cutoff |
| 2011 | Jennifer Yuh | Kung Fu Panda 2 |
| 2012 | Kathryn Bigelow | Zero Dark Thirty |
| 2012 | Andrea Arnold | Wuthering Heights |
| 2012 | Sarah Polley | Take This Waltz |
| 2013 | Nicole Holofcener | Enough Said |
| 2013 | Lake Bell | In a World... |
| 2013 | Gabriele Cowperthwaite | Blackfish |
| 2013 | Jennifer Lee | Frozen |
| 2013 | Sarah Polley | Stories We Tell |
| 2014 | Ava DuVernay | Selma |
| 2014 | Jennifer Kent | The Babadook |
| 2014 | Laura Poitras | Citizenfour |
| 2015 | Marielle Heller | The Diary of a Teenage Girl |
| 2015 | Isabel Coixet | Learning to Drive |
| 2015 | Maya Forbes | Infinitely Polar Bear |
| 2015 | Sarah Gavron | Suffragette |
| 2015 | Céline Sciamma | Girlhood |
| 2016 | Ava DuVernay | 13th |
| 2016 | Andrea Arnold | American Honey |
| 2016 | Rebecca Miller | Maggie's Plan |
| 2016 | Mira Nair | Queen of Katwe |
| 2016 | Kelly Reichardt | Certain Women |
| 2017 | Greta Gerwig † | Lady Bird |
| 2017 | Kathryn Bigelow | Detroit |
| 2017 | Patty Jenkins | Wonder Woman |
| 2017 | Angelina Jolie | First They Killed My Father |
| 2017 | Dee Rees | Mudbound |
| 2017 | Angela Robinson | Professor Marston and the Wonder Women |
| 2017 | Agnès Varda | Faces Places |
| 2018 | Marielle Heller | Can You Ever Forgive Me? |
| 2018 | Elizabeth Chomko | What They Had |
| 2018 | Debra Granik | Leave No Trace |
| 2018 | Tamara Jenkins | Private Life |
| 2018 | Karyn Kusama | Destroyer |
| 2018 | Nadine Labaki | Capernaum |
| 2018 | Rungano Nyoni | I Am Not a Witch |
| 2018 | Sally Potter | The Party |
| 2018 | Lynne Ramsay | You Were Never Really Here |
| 2018 | Chloé Zhao | The Rider |
| 2019 | Céline Sciamma | Portrait of a Lady on Fire |
| 2019 | Greta Gerwig | Little Women |
| 2019 | Marielle Heller | A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood |
| 2019 | Lulu Wang | The Farewell |
| 2019 | Olivia Wilde | Booksmart |

### 2020s

| Year | Director(s) | Film |
| - | - | - |
| 2020 | Emerald Fennell | Promising Young Woman |
| 2020 | Eliza Hittman | Never Rarely Sometimes Always |
| 2020 | Regina King | One Night in Miami... |
| 2020 | Channing Godfrey Peoples | Miss Juneteenth |
| 2020 | Kelly Reichardt | First Cow |
| 2020 | Chloé Zhao | Nomadland |
