Female hit hard by awful film swindle (8)
I believe the answer is:
flimflam
'swindle' is the definition.
(flimflam is a kind of swindle)
'female hit hard by awful film' is the wordplay.
'female' becomes 'f' (abbreviation).
'hit hard' becomes 'lam' (to 'lam' means to hit hard).
'by' says to put letters next to each other.
'awful' is an anagram indicator.
'film' anagrammed gives 'limf'.
'lam' put after 'limf' is 'limflam'.
'f'+'limflam'='FLIMFLAM'
(Other definitions for flimflam that I've seen before include "rot" , "Deception - nonsense" , "swindle" .)