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Power Grid

15 Women Who Could Direct Catching Fire Instead of the Actual Candidates

by Aja Romano | 12:30 pm, April 18th, 2012


Agnieszka Holland

Agnieszka Holland

You’d be hard-pressed to find a director with a longer list of accomplishments than Polish director Agnieszka Holland. As a screenwriter, she collaborated on Kieslowski’s monumental Trois Coleurs trilogy, and directed/wrote two films which nabbed Oscar noms in quick succession: Angry Harvest for Best Foreign Film, and Europa Europa for Best Screenplay.

During World War Two, Holland’s grandparents were killed in the Warsaw Ghetto, and her mother was a member of the Polish Underground. Holland, who has directed in Poland, Germany, France, Britain, and the U.S., has something to bring to the pool of potential Hunger Games directors that many others don’t: real-life experience of totalitarianism and extreme social dysfunction. With her track record of markedly political films, Holland would bring the same unflinching directorial eye to her view of the Capitol as she has brought to Nazi-occupied Europe in Europa and In Darkness, Communist Poland in Ekipa, and post-Katrina New Orleans in the TV series Treme.

In the era of the high-tensity cable drama series, Holland has directed pivotal episodes of The Killing and The Wire, including the famous season three fight between Avon Barksdale and Stringer Bell. In January of this year she received her third Oscar nod when In Darkness was nominated for Best Foreign Film. In addition to her proven ability to direct compelling realist dramas tinged with violence and political strife, she also directed the acclaimed 1993 adaptation of The Secret Garden, featuring wonderful performances from a young cast and cinematography by the legendary Roger Deakins.

Clearly Holland is more than capable of creating a faithful adaptation that remains true to the source material while being brutally honest, and her track record of internationally acclaimed films speaks for itself. All of which leads us to wonder: why the heck wasn’t Lionsgate begging Agnieszka Holland to direct The Hunger Games in the first place?


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  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Amanda-LaPergola/81300432 Amanda LaPergola

    These kind of lists make me happy.  And now I don’t feel bad for liking Jennifer’s Body.  I don’t.  Really, I don’t.

  • Anonymous

    Catherine Breillat!  I don’t think she’s quite right for “Catching Fire,” but that woman is AMAZING.  I saw her speak at TIFF for the release of “The Last Mistress” in 2007, which was the first film she directed after her stroke.  The moderator asked her if it was difficult working with Asia Argento, because Argento is also a director, and Breillat just dismissed the question out of hand.  She said something like, “Are you kidding?  This is my movie, and no one, even Asia Argento can tell me how to execute my vision.”  Bad.  Ass.

  • Jamie Frevele

    Amanda: I love “Jennifer’s Body.” Unironically. I thought it was a fun, fun movie.

  • Life Lessons

    Amanda: I LOVE Jennifer’s Body! It is a fabulous movie – funny, sad,  biting. I tell my friends it is a bit of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” for those who are missing the show. LOVE this movie. Do not be ashamed. You are NOT alone. :)

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=526798549 Christian Ruzich

    Two that I think should definitely be in the conversation: Kimberly Peirce and Catherine Hardwicke

  • http://twitter.com/JSPartisan JS Partisan

    KATHRYN BIGELOW!  You literally made a list for what will ostensibly be an ACTION MOVIE and didn’t put down on the list one of the greatest action directors ever, who is also the only FEMALE TO EVER WIN BEST DIRECTOR?  Seriously Mary Sue, that’s ponderous. 

  • John Wao

    Sarah Polley?

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_GKRXK26OS2FPSNBK2IVNSW32EY Blake

    Why no Kathryn Bigelow? I mean I get if some people didn’t like Hurt Locker, but she’s made other great pics too like Near Dark and Strange Days. I think she deserves to be on the list even if she did win an Oscar.

  • Frodo Baggins

    “Granik’s ability to sustain the intensity and suspense ofWinter’s Bone despite the deceptively simple plot bodes well for her ability to handle fast-moving action sequences like those in the Arena.”

    Now that is lazy logic. Suspense = fast-moving action?

    Aeon Flux and Jennifer’s Body were terrible, just terrible.

    Punisher: War Zone was terrible, just terrible.

    Julie Taymor KEEP HER AWAY FROM IT. Let her guest-direct the scene of the Mockingjay dress if you want. Did you see The Tempest? I saw The Tempest. Terrible, just terrible.

    Of the rest you mentioned, Susanna White is the only one with a proven hand at action (the selling point of a big-budget blockbuster, after all), so she’s my presumptive choice of the pack. I’d also consider Kelly Reichardt, but Meek’s Cutoff still a stretch. Now, obviously, Gary Ross wouldn’t have been my first choice to direct a Hunger Games film either, and he did well with the first one (except for the excess shakycam), so far be it from me to say that any of the filmmakers you suggest wouldn’t thrive working in a new genre. But if we’re talking ideal candidates? You gotta go with someone who has directed good action films. Bigelow is the name that comes to mind. 

  • Adam R. Charpentier

    So tempting to start an “Avatar deserved it” argument…

  • http://profile.yahoo.com/MP55RXXUCRC2NK5L7WA3QN3HGQ Joseph

    Kathryn Bigelow would own this. I would also submit Mary Harron. I don’t know much about her upcoming Moth Diaries movie, but I Shot Andy Warhol, Notorious Bettie Page and American Psycho are pretty diverse. Also maybe Jamie Babbit i dunno?

  • http://krelllabs.blogspot.com christianne

    Lucrecia Martel might be a good choice. She’s even expressed a desire to make an American genre film (she wants to make an Alien film, actually). Also possibilities: Andrea Arnold (who just made a literary adaptation in Wuthering Heights), Brit Marling (who is already making dystopian science fiction movies), Caroline Link, and maybe even Sofia Coppola.

  • http://makecash25.com/ http://MakeCash25.com

    HOw to monetize your searching skills… More on this s.ite

  • Anonymous

    She doesn’t do movies like this, and would be out of her element.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_GHZHAN24RNBC6LUQP6OJSDB6JM Darren M

    … Catherine Hardwicke? Really?

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