Leading up to the 2010 Academy Awards Ceremony, one of the most hotly debated categories was that of Best Director. The incredibly diverse group of directors included Avatar's much celebrated James Cameron who helmed the most financially successful film of all time and Kathryn Bigelow, director of The Hurt Locker, a film that struggled to find initial financing.

Women have been nominated in this category before but never won and with the buzz around Avatar perhaps not winning Best Picture but possibly taking home Best Director as a consolation prize, it looked like it might happen again. But with wins at just about every awards event leading up to the Oscars, including the British Academy of Film and Television Arts and the New York and Los Angeles Film Critics Circle, Kathryn had more than even odds to win. And she did. In the end Kathryn Bigelow became the first female ever to be awarded the Oscar for Best Director.

Bigelow's role as not only director and producer for The Hurt Locker showed her dedication to making this small but incredibly powerful film her way and by awarding her with Best Director Academy Award for 2010 her fellow film makers have acknowledged that her dedication was worth the effort.

From films such as Point Break and Near Dark, Kathryn's films have always danced that fine line between quirky, independent and mainstream success and no matter how simple her films sound on paper they always delve into that which makes us human despite our different circumstances.

The Hurt Locker will be considered her masterpiece. The film follows a United States Army Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) team during the Iraq War and was written and adapted to screen by Mark Boal, a freelance writer who was embedded in Iraq with a bomb squad. Its sweeping panoramas combine with the tension of the subject matter to make a thrilling and profoundly moving personal drama.

The Hurt Locker sets an example to all students of film on how to tell a very real, human story despite all the pyrotechnics and potential for grand action moments. There is a certain level of restraint in the film and this restraint serves the story more than a few extra million dollars worth of visual effects set to a rousing film score would.

By becoming the first woman in history to win Best Director at the Oscars Kathryn Bigelow has become a part of history and her role in supporting this film and bringing her vision to the screen will be inspiring for all future film makers.