82nd Academy Awards · 2010
The Hurt Locker
Directed by Kathryn Bigelow
“You don't have to be a hero to do this job. But it helps.”
Tap to rate
The story
During the Iraq War, a Sergeant recently assigned to an army bomb squad is put at odds with his squad mates due to his maverick way of handling his work.
What critics & audiences say
Tomatometer96%Fresh#17 of 98 winnersIMDb7.5500K votes#70 of 98 winners
Metacritic95/ 100#9 of 93 winners
TMDB7.2/ 10
Famous lines
There's enough bang in there to blow us all to Jesus. If I'm gonna die, I want to die comfortable.
As you get older, some of the things you love might not seem so special anymore. … And by the time you get to my age, maybe it's only one or two things. With me, I think it's one.
COL Reed: What's the best way to... go about disarming one of these things?
SFC William James: The way you don't die, sir.
This box is full of stuff that almost killed me.
SGT J.T. Sanborn: Are you within 100 meters of the IED?
SFC William James: Hell I don't know Sanborn, I'll tell you when I’m on top of it.
SFC William James: Eight hundred seventy-three, sir.
COL Reed: Eight hundred! And seventy-three. … That's just hot shit.
Pretty much the bottom line is, if you're in Iraq, you're dead.
But you realize every time you suit up, every time we go out, it's life or death. You roll the dice, and you deal with it.
Contractor Team Leader: We have spares, but we've used up our wrench.
SFC William James: How do you use up a wrench?
You know you can shoot people out here... You don't have to throw a wrench.
Quotes via Wikiquote
Fun facts
- The Hurt Locker became the first film directed by a woman to win Best Picture, and Kathryn Bigelow became the first woman ever to win the Oscar for Best Director.Wikipedia · Accolades
- Producer Nicolas Chartier emailed Academy voters urging them to pick The Hurt Locker over "a $500M film," meaning Avatar. The Academy banned him from the ceremony, the first time it had ever banned an individual nominee.Wikipedia · Accolades
- With just $17 million in the U.S. and Canada, The Hurt Locker is the lowest-grossing film domestically ever to win Best Picture, and one of only two winners on record never to enter the weekend box office top 10.Wikipedia · Theatrical run
- The film was shot in Jordan, some locations less than three miles from the Iraqi border. Jeremy Renner recalled locals dropping two-by-fours with nails and throwing rocks, adding, "We got shot at a few times while we were filming."Wikipedia · Filming
- Temperatures averaged 120°F (49°C) over the 44-day shoot, and Jeremy Renner's bomb suit weighed 80 to 100 pounds; he also lost 15 pounds in three days to food poisoning.Wikipedia · Filming
- Because of import restrictions on military props, special effects artist Richard Stutsman used Chinese fireworks for gunpowder. One day the heat and friction made them blow up in his face, and he was back at work two days later.Wikipedia · Filming
- Army bomb disposal expert Jeffrey Sarver sued, claiming he originated the title and inspired the lead character, but the court threw out his suit and ordered him to pay over $180,000 in legal fees. "Hurt locker" is a Vietnam-era slang phrase.Wikipedia · Lawsuits
- The Jordanian government, eager to start a domestic film industry, helped fund the production when its bond was nearly withdrawn, which let Kathryn Bigelow cut the budget to just $15 million; Jordan also used the shoot to found a film school.Wikipedia · Filming
- Kathryn Bigelow deliberately cast relatively unknown actors to add unpredictability, and chose Jeremy Renner for the lead based on his performance as serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer in the film Dahmer.Wikipedia · Casting
- Rather than risk X-rays at airports, undeveloped film was hand-carried from Amman to London and the video dailies flown back to Jordan, a trip of three days to a week that editor Chris Innis called the "modern-day equivalent of shipping via donkey cart."Wikipedia · Editing