The first woman to ever win the Academy Award for Best Director comes back with another knockout film 3 years after “The Hurt Locker”. Kathryn Bigelow, made history during the 2009 ceremony when she took home the award for best director beating some prominent directors like Quentin Tarantino, Jason Reitman, Lee Daniels and her ex-husband, James Cameron (Titanic, Avatar) now that’s something! Anyway gossip aside, Bigelow is making the rounds again with her highly-acclaimed spy thriller film, “Zero Dark Thirty”
Zero Dark Thirty is about the hunt on America’s number one enemy, the terrorist Osama Bin Laden (oftenly referred to as UBL). The film is from the people behind The Hurt Locker with an original screenplay from Mark Boal. The film centers around a woman CIA agent, Maya (Jessica Chastain) who helmed the whole hunt and was described by most of her colleagues as “a killer” for she has been recruited by the agency out of high school and has worked for them since. Jessica Chastain whom you may know from The Tree of Life & The Help among others has been involved in films with high acclaim and this one proved to be the same, so far Chastain’s track record is as good as it gets. Fortunately, Chastain didn’t disappoint in the film and gave a raw performance as the “motherf****r who found that place” – pertaining to UBL’s hideout. She was feisty, determined, convincing and just plain brilliant also thanks to a genius script which didn’t let her down. For the first time in a long time, a film made my heart stop again for its intensity – The Departed (2006) was probably the last one that did that to me. The very scene that made me skip a beat was the time of the attack, the time when the U.S. Navy SEAls are starting to put on their gears and the time when the countdown begins…whew! Just merely describing the scene takes me back in the moviehouse when everyone’s eagerly anticipating, anticipating and anticipating what will happen next and I even forgot about how really bad I want to pee! Seriously, the film is so good you don’t wanna miss a single scene. Anyway! The other strong point of the film is its’ editing, again it is the kind of editing where no one is allowed to blink an eye if you don’t wanna miss a statement or an action or a revelation – the editing was flawless. From the acting, to the editing and the scriptwriting, each of these won’t be done this way without of course the overall brain that is the director, Kathryn Bigelow. Now if you know me, I am someone who advocates for women and feels strongly regarding the discrimination between the two sexes and whatnots. I know I know I’m starting to sound all geeky now but I know I won’t be alone when I say that the film is honestly this good and one of the best films there is. I can’t tell yet who I think will win best picture this year for I have yet to see the 3 other viable films but I’ll get there…
And I’m glad to inform you that Zero Dark Thirty is up for 5 nominations for this year’s Academy Award ceremony
Best Picture
Best Actress: Jessica Chastain
Best Writing – Original Screenplay
Best Film Editing
Best Sound Editing
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the F word 