James Cameron
James Cameron attends SiriusXM’s Entertainment Weekly Radio Channel Broadcasts From Comic-Con 2016 at Hard Rock Hotel San Diego on July 22, 2016, in San Diego, California. Getty Images/Vivien Killilea

James Cameron is not apologizing for his controversial remarks about the “Wonder Woman” film.

While speaking with The Hollywood Reporter, the director admitted that he was surprised with how people reacted to his statement when he called the film a “step backwards.” But this does not mean that he will take it back.

“Yes, I’ll stand by that. I mean, Gal Gadot was Miss Israel, and she was wearing a kind of bustier costume that was very form-fitting. She’s absolutely drop-dead gorgeous. To me, that’s not breaking ground,” he said.

Last month, the filmmaker claimed that he helped turn Sarah Connor into a movie icon in the “Terminator” movies, and it worked because she was not a beauty icon unlike Gadot. “She was strong, she was troubled, she was a terrible mother, and she earned the respect of the audience through pure grit. And to me, the benefit of characters like Sarah is so obvious. I mean, half the audience is female!” he told The Guardian.

Immediately after his interview was published, “Wonder Woman” director Patty Jenkins fired back at Cameron via her Twitter account. She said that Cameron may be a good filmmaker, but he is not a woman so he will not understand what the film meant to women all over the world.

In his recent interview, Cameron explained further what he meant when he said “Wonder Woman” was a “step backwards.” “They had Raquel Welch doing stuff like that in the ‘60s. It was all in the context of talking about why Sarah Connor – what Linda Hamilton created in 1991 – was, if not ahead of its time, at least a breakthrough in its time. I don’t think it was really ahead of its time because we’re still not giving women these types of roles,” he stressed.

The director went on to say that Hamilton’s portrayal of the character “looked great,” but she wasn’t treated as a sex object. “There was nothing sexual about her character. It was about angst, it was about will, it was about determination,” he said.

“Wonder Woman” grossed $800 million worldwide and helped make Jenkins the highest-grossing female director of a live-action film, according to Entertainment Weekly.