Kathryn Bigelow

Kathryn Bigelow is an American director, producer,writer and artist. Her films include Near Dark (1987), Point Break (1991), Strange Days (1995), The Weight of Water (2000), K-19: The Widowmaker (2002), The Hurt Locker (2008), Zero Dark Thirty (2012), Last Days (2014), and Detroit (2017).

Early life

She enrolled at San Francisco Art Institute and received her Bachelor of Fine Arts. She then accepted into the Whitney Museum of American Art's Independent Study Program in New York City where is was critiqued by people like Richard Serra, Robert Rauschenberg and Susan Sontag. She then entered a film program at Columbia University, where she arnt her master's degree in theory and criticism.

Trademarks

• Frequently casts Tom Sizemore
• Often uses first person perspectives (Wire trip scenes in Strange Days (1995) and the chase scenes in Point Break (1991)).
• Frequently uses slow motion, particularly in action scenes.

Facts

• First woman to win the Director's Guild of America Award for directing a feature film (for The Hurt Locker (2008)).
•  she became the first woman in Oscar history to win the Best Director award in 2010. 
• First woman to win a BAFTA Award for Best Director.

Quotes

'[on The Hurt Locker (2008)] War's dirty little secret is that some men love it. I'm trying to unpack why, to look at what it means to be a hero in the context of 21st-century combat.'

'Once you've opened the window on topical material, its very hard to close it. Holding up a contemporary mirror is more attractive to me now than ever.'

'[why she moved from fine art to feature films] I knew film had the potential to cross all lines of culture and class. That excited me. [2017]'

“	If there's specific resistance to women making movies, I just choose to ignore that as an obstacle for two reasons: I can't change my gender, and I refuse to stop making movies. It's irrelevant who or what directed a movie, the important thing is that you either respond to it or you don't. There should be more women directing; I think there's just not the awareness that it's really possible. It is.	”
— Kathryn Bigelow in 1990