‘Twilight’ Director Says Studio Gave Her a ‘Mini Cupcake’ to Celebrate Film’s Success: Male Directors Get a ‘Car or a Three-Picture Deal or Whatever You Want’

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1. > “Twilight” director Catherine Hardwicke said in an interview with The Guardian that the studio gifted her a “mini cupcake” as a congratulations when the vampire romance opened to an unexpectedly huge $69 million in November 2008. It was a blunt realization that no matter how successful her directing career could be, she would not be valued in the same way as a male director.

   > Whereas a successful male director with a franchise-launching huge opening weekend might be gifted “a car, or a three-picture deal, or [the chance] to do basically whatever you want,” Hardwicke continued, she was given more or less a pat on the back.

   > “I walked into a room with all these gifts, and everybody was congratulating the studio, and they gave me a box,” she remembered. “I opened it up, and it was a mini cupcake.”

2. Ngl Catherine is hard to work with. I won’t get into details but she’s more suited to single steady cam shoot things like a doc directing.

3. She has a point, but male directors hardly get to do whatever they want after their first hit movie.

   James Cameron often mentioned how hard he had to fight for Avatar even though he had nothing but hits for over a decade.

4. Her most recent movie is Mafia Mamma (2023), currently sitting at 21 percent from critics on RT.

   I watched the trailer, and it might have been the longest two and a half minutes of my life. Somehow it stars Toni Collette.

5. Waiting all this time when your power has died off is not the way to change things. She should have spoken out back then. She instead used the power she had to get other jobs which is fine. I just do not think a decade later she can change things. The studio was shitty to the fans stealing URLs and other IP moves and that movie needed those fans to be what it became.

6. Why is it the talentless ladies that harp on about the sexism so much.

   Of course it exists and its rampant, but me thinks some people are using it as a scapegoat

7. They also give up their wives, daughters, sisters, etc. Hollywood’s a sick place.

8. To be fair, she directed Twilight not Titanic. I think a minimuffin is more than adequate for that stinker of a movie.

9. Lol I watched Twight a few years ago just for the shits and giggles…and it’s gotta be up there for the worst cinematography and writing ever produced

10. Maybe because she’s a fucking awful director. The movie was successful despite her involvement, not because of.

11. That’s all that movie deserves

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