Gender In Zero Dark Thirty

War films have always been a part of the American culture. From the beginning of film history we have had a number of notable war films ranging from romantic to even horror. The vast majority of them are long, maybe even boring in parts, but they all have some sort of objective and all of them show shootouts and battles. Most of these films were directed by men. It seems right that men would direct films such as these since the nature of them are more "manly". The film Zero Dark Thirty, however, was perhaps just as brutal and "manly" and is directed by a woman, Kathryn Bigelow.

Kathryn Bigelow has been around for a while, but only recently hit the big leagues with her film The Hurt Locker (2008). This is another war film that stunned the world and won her an Oscar for the best film of the year, and for best director, which was the first time a woman had won that award. A few years later Bigelow decided to quickly film a movie on the killing of Osama Bin Laden. She got the film out quickly after the event occurred, leaving people baffled and curious as to where she got the information. It was put together fast and surprisingly accurate, and again Bigelow was up for an oscar for best film but was not chosen for the win this time.

Zero Dark Thirty follows a woman who is put on the case of finding Bin Laden in 2003. She is a rock solid person who only breaks a few times, even after viewing and initiating some of the torturing going on. She soon becomes obsessed with finding and killing Bin Laden and will let nothing get in the way of her mission. This begs the question, is this Bigelow's attempt to have feminism in the film? Even when she is being denied certain things the main character eventually gets what she wants, she doesn't let the men tell her she couldn't do something.

This makes me wonder, would this movie have been the same if it was directed by a man? Would the lead woman have had so much power, so much intensity, so much heart? I think no. I think a man would have focused more on the mission at hand, more on the attack of the home that Bin Laden was hiding in. The lead may have still been the woman, but I don't think the focus would have been on her.