Jane Campion Clobbers Sam Elliott Before Adding Another Award to Her Shelf

Jane Campion, the New Zealand-born, Australia-based director of The Power of the Dog, and the closest thing to a sure bet in your Oscars betting pool, attended the Directors Guild of America (DGA) Awards in Beverly Hills Saturday night. On the red carpet, Variety reporter Marc Malkin offered her an awards season layup by asking about Sam Elliott’s recent comments about her film—and she did not hold back.

In case you missed it, Elliott, the mustachioed film and television star who has played Sam Houston, Wild Bill Hickok, Virgil Earp, and a biker in a relationship with Cher, called The Power of the Dog “a piece of shit” when he sat with Marc Maron on his popular podcast, WTF with Marc Maron. Elliott continued to speak ill of “all these allusions to homosexuality throughout the fuckin’ movie.” After saying Campion was “a brilliant director,” he then laced into her, asking: “What the fuck does this woman from down there, New Zealand, know about the American West?” He also asked: “Why in the fuck does she shoot this movie in New Zealand and call it Montana …?” (Remember that last bit.)

Campion, who, it should be noted, ended the night with a DGA win against four formidable opponents in Paul Thomas Anderson, Kenneth Branagh, Steven Spielberg, and Denis Villeneuve, didn’t dodge the question. Indeed, she fired her six-shooter back at Elliott, saying, “he was being a little bit of a B-I-T-C-H.” Then she reminded everyone that “he’s not a cowboy, he’s an actor.” After taking a beat for a wide smile, she added that “the West is a mythic space and there’s a lot of room on the range.”

Cinefiles then shouted “hallelujah!” when she schooled Elliott that many Westerns considered classics (e.g. Sergio Leone’s collaborations with Clint Eastwood) weren’t shot in Montana either; they were shot in Spain. Elliott’s selective memory, Campion suggested, was “a little bit sexist.”

It may not surprise you to learn that there was a significant response to this on Twitter. Here’s the tip of that iceberg.

This will likely put an end to the Sam Elliott line of questioning, as what response could really ever top it? Previously, The Power of the Dog’s Jesse Plemons, Oscar-nominated for best supporting actor, shrugged the comments off, saying they “made me laugh.” Kodi Smit-McPhee, also Oscar-nominated in the same category, was a bit more pointed, saying he had “nothing” to say to Elliott, “’cause I’m a mature being and I’m passionate about what I do. And I don’t really give energy to anything outside of that. Good luck to him.”

The Power of The Dog is nominated in 11 Academy Awards categories, for best picture, best director, best actor, best supporting actor (twice), best supporting actress, best adapted screenplay, best cinematography, best film editing, best original score, best production design, and best sound. It has already won the Silver Lion at the Venice Film Festival, three Golden Globes, and three prizes from both the Los Angeles Film Critics Association and the New York Film Critics Circle. The movie is currently playing in theaters in select cities and streaming on Netflix.

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