14 DAY TRIAL // Last night at the Academy Awards, the Best Movie category saw two very unlikely productions go neck and neck, with underdog “The Hurt Locker” taking home the much coveted statuette. Not only that, but the comparatively small budget war drama took home another 5 awards, including for Best Director, thus making Kathryn Bigelow the first female director to get this kind of recognition.
Shortly after the nominations were announced, people made a lot of the fact that Bigelow would go up against her ex-husband in both Best Picture and Best Director categories, James Cameron who brought to the table the box-office sensation that is “Avatar.” Cameron himself said at one point that, should he lose, he’d rather he lost to his former wife than to any other director / movie up for an award, which is precisely what happened.
“This really is… There’s no other way to describe it, it’s the moment of a lifetime. First of all, this is so extraordinary to be in the company of such powerful, my fellow nominees, such powerful filmmakers who have inspired me and I have admired for, some of whom, for decades. And thank you to every member of the Academy. This is, again, the moment of a lifetime,” Bigelow said when she took to the stage to accept the Best Picture award.
As also noted above, “Avatar” and “The Hurt Locker” were the two favorites of the night, each garnering an impressive 9 nominations, including in the two big categories. With his usual lack of modesty, Cameron was telling the media that chances were the Academy wouldn’t give him another Oscar after “Titanic” because of his long and boring acceptance speech back then. This probably prepared him for his ex’s grand win of last night, when Academy members voted the underdog “The Hurt Locker” as the best film 2009 had to offer.
“Cameron is adamant Oscar bosses weren’t impressed with his speech when he picked up the Best Director trophy for Titanic in 1998, in which he quoted one of the film’s famous lines, telling the crowd, ‘I’m king of the world!’ [He says] ‘I always believe it’s very unlikely that lightening will strike twice. I believe it’s very unlikely that we will win because I made such a jack[expletive] out of myself last time. Although there might be some curiosity about what I might do.’ But Cameron hopes Bigelow’s movie goes on to rule the ceremony instead,” a Wenn report was saying a while ago, as we also reported.