The director of "The Hurt Locker" (read a review here), Kathryn Bigelow, has won the Director's guild of America Award, making her the front-runner for the Best Director Oscar at the 82nd Academy Awards. She made history today as she became the first woman to ever win the DGA award, and is now the front-runner for the gold. Sophia Coppola was the American first woman to ever be nominated for the best director Academy Award for "Lost in Translation" in 2003 when she lost to Peter Jackson. The first woman ever to be nominated for best director was Linda Wertmuller back in 1975 for her film "The Seven Beauties". The other DGA award nominees were James Cameron ("Avatar"), Lee Daniels ("Precious"), Jason Reitman ("Up in the air"), and Quentin Tarantino ("Inglourious Basterds"). Those men will most likely be Bigelow's competitors come Oscar night, and her biggest competition actually comes from her ex-husband James Cameron who won the Best Director and Best motion picture drama Golden Globe.
Bigelow has also won the Critic's choice award for best director and picture and is the favorite among experts worldwide to take Oscar gold come March 7th. Her chances of winning are pretty high now, seven out of the past nine DGA winners have gone on to win the Academy Award (with Ang Lee in 2000, who lost to Steven Soderbergh, and Rob Marshall in 2002 who lost to Roman Polanski). In the 2000s as well, six out of the nine best director winners have also won the Best Motion Picture Oscar at the Academy Awards. In the 90s the correlation was larger, with 9 out of the ten best director winners winning the Best Picture Oscar. "The hurt locker" also won the Producer's Guild of America Award, and five out of the past nine PGA winners have won the Best Picture Oscar.
If numbers are our guide, the film is the front-runner for Best Director and Best Picture, although the Academy might choose to honor "Avatar's" James Cameron as a way of showing support for his hard work and as a way of showing they appreciate what audiences like. "Avatar" as of January 31st is 6 million dollars away from beating Titanic's domestic 600 million record, which placed it in #1 for over a decade, and is the highest grossing film of all time worldwide with more than 2 billion dollars. "The Hurt Locker" in comparison has only won 12 million domestically and 6 million worldwide, although it is clear that most of their profit will probably come from DVD sales and rentals as it is already out for rental.
The other motion picture DGA winner is Louie Psihoyos for his documentary "The Cove" (find a review here). He is the front-runner to win the best documentary Academy Award, as his main competitor is "Food Inc.", a film that already lost its buzz.
The Academy Awards will be aired on Mach 7th, with the nominees announced February 2nd. Here is a full list of the DGA winners.
Comments
Its hard to see how the academy can ignore the utterly smashing Avatar box office. I've seen both films. Hurt Locker was interesting but Avatar in 3-D was a truly inspiring experience. Although Hurt Locker is an OK film, Avatar's box office numbers show that it is 1000% more popular with the public. et's give some credit to the public. Avatar is a film that huge portions of the world wan't to see while the Hurt Locker was DOA at the box office. So which picture deserves more accolades and respect?
Sofia wasn't the first woman ever. She was the first American woman ever.
Also, reality check, I don't think box office grosses necessarily demonstrate who deserves an award. I saw both films, and while Avatar is a fantastic visual experience and a technology gamechanger, it's plot and acting are not very good, and the directing itself isn't smashing. After all, the lead's Australian accent comes back about ten times. It's an easy fix, and was missed. Hurt Locker was one of the most suspenseful films I've ever seen, beautifully shot and attentive to detail even with a shoestring budget. And it never received the extended release it deserved. Does a greater example of craft deserve to be punished because the Iraq war is a tough sell with audiences? I don't think so.
"Avatar" was a great pic, and so was "The hurt locker", and I think that both films deserve recognition. I think that the author was trying to say that because "The hurt locker" has won so many awards then it would be a surprise if it did not win, not that "Avatar" doesn't deserve to win. Aren't articles supposed to be unbiased?
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