K Bigs A+

One female director that is definitely worth taking note of is Kathryn Bigelow. What so interesting about her is that she exclusively directs action films, something that most people wouldn’t expect because most people think of female directors focusing all their attention on the emotional aspects of storytelling. But what makes Ms Bigelow so unique is that she is both a master of suspense and creating fullness in her characters. Take for example her movie Point Break. In terms of suspense, she literally has a seen where Keanu Reeves’ character jumps out of a plane without a parachute in order to chase down Patrick Swayze’s character. And in terms of create incredibly full characters; we can take Reeves’ character development as an example. I feel like in most movies, when the cop gets their man, there is a celebration. Not so in Point Break. By throwing his badge into the Pacific after he finally tracks down Swayze and walking away, we really see the turmoil faced when you have to take down someone you’ve developed a relationship with.
Another one of the themes she is really good at exploring is masculinity. Take for instance her latest movie The Hurt Locker. The whole movie is an exploration of bravery and what it mean to “be a man”, to risk your life everyday in extremely volatile situations in order to save lives. And its funny, according to Roger Ebert, Kathryn Bigelow knows a lot more about what it means to be a man than say someone like Michael Bay.
As far as how well she is received, I personally feel mixed about it. While critics love her, I feel like audiences kind of over look her not because she makes poor movies, but just for the weird fact that mainstream movies lately have just been garbage. Take again the Hurt Locker, basically only played in smaller Indie theaters and had only a limited release, and again according to Roget Ebert, if this movie was made ten years ago, it would have been a blockbuster hit. I guess people just want the promise of transforming robots hanging out with crappy actors from the Disney channel. Anyway, Kathryn Bigelow, A+.