Plenty of ink has been spilled on the fact that, with her Oscar nomination for “Lady Bird,” Greta Gerwig has joined an all-too-exclusive group: the sorority of just five women who have been deemed worthy of a directing nod from the Academy.
Few people recall, though, that the barrier was first broken in 1977, and that for nearly two decades, the club of female nominees boasted a single member: Lina Wertmüller.The Italian director burst onto the international scene in the ’70s with such films as “The Seduction of Mimi,” “Swept Away” and “Seven Beauties,” the Holocaust drama that earned her the groundbreaking Oscar nomination.
Her cinematic creations were flamboyant, erotic, comic, tragic, provocative.
Movie lovers lined up around the block to see the latest offering from an auteur who had worked with Fellini on “8½” and who was immediately recognizable in photos in her trademark white-framed glasses.Wertmüller’s works tackled issues that resonate today: immigration, racism, materialism
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