HOLLYWOOD — Kathryn Bigelow is only the fourth woman ever to be nominated for the Best Director Academy Award — and only the second American female. The first two nominees were Italian Lina Wertmuller and Australian Jane Campion; the third was Sofia Coppola.
And regardless of gender, Bigelow is the front-runner to nab the directorial Oscar nod, for a film that's not a megahit but which has been universally acclaimed. "The Hurt Locker," set during the Iraq war, is contemporary and also riveting.
The film has been praised, too, for its script and acting, and it may make a star of Jeremy Renner as a highly confident U.S. Army staff sergeant in charge of an elite squad that disarms bombs on the dangerous streets of Baghdad.