Jane Campion is the third woman in history to win the Academy Award for Best Director as the Academy celebrated a female filmmaker two years in a row.
he New Zealand-born director took home the award for her western, The Power of the Dog, starring Benedict Cumberbatch, Kirsten Dunst and Kodi Smit-McPhee.
Campion is the first woman to be nominated twice for the Director’s Award, having also received a nomination for her 1993 film The Piano.
Jane Campion (Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP)
The historical drama starring Holly Hunter, Harvey Keitel, Sam Neill and a young Anna Paquin earned her the prestigious Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, the first filmmaker to receive the gong, and the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay.
Hunter and Paquin also won Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress awards for their roles as a mute Scottish woman who travels to a remote part of New Zealand with her young daughter.
Campion’s triumph follows Chloe Zhao’s success at the 2021 Oscars, where she won for directing Nomadland.
Zhao made history as the first woman of color to win the award and only the second woman ever, after Kathryn Bigelow for The Hurt Locker in 2010.
Since The Piano, Campion has screened The Portrait Of A Lady, starring Nicole Kidman and John Malkovich, among others; Good gracious! who reunited her with Keitel; “In the Cut” with Meg Ryan and the John Keats biopic “Bright Star” with Ben Whishaw.
She took an extended break from cinema to co-create and direct the TV mini-series Top Of The Lake and its sequel China Girl, starring Elisabeth Moss, which were widely acclaimed and nominated for a number of awards.
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Campion with Elisabeth Moss and Alice Englert promote Top Of The Lake (Ian West/PA)
The Power of the Dog is Campion’s first film since 2009’s Bright Star and was an instant winner of the awards.
Campion’s road to Oscar fame included wins at the Baftas and Directors Guild of America, but she faced a speed bump after making a comment about tennis stars Venus and Serana Williams while ringing the gong for best director at the Critics’ Choice Awards (CCA). .
During her acceptance speech for Best Director at the CCA, Campion said she was “honored” to be in the same room as Venus and Serena, but added that they “don’t play against the boys like I have to.”
Following a backlash to her online comments, Campion apologized for her “thoughtless” comment and said she had “no intention of belittling these two legendary black women and world-class athletes.”
https://www.independent.ie/entertainment/movies/jane-campion-becomes-third-woman-in-history-to-win-best-director-oscar-41494019.html Jane Campion becomes the third woman in history to win the Oscar for Best Director