5 Truly gifted film-makers of our times!
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Denis Villeneuve is a French Canadian film director and writer. He was born in 1967, in Trois-Rivières, Québec, Canada. He started his career as a filmmaker at the National Film Board of Canada. He is best known for his feature films Arrival (2016), Sicario (2015), Prisoners (2013), Enemy (2013), and Incendies (2010). He is married to Tanya Lapointe.The French-Canadian writer/director made Hollywood take notice with his excellent indie-flick ‘Incendies’ back in 2010. His filmography constitutes: the crime-drama ‘Prisoners’ marked by two out-of-this-world performances from Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal; the mystery thriller ‘Enemy’ that intrigued viewers with its quirky narrative, again starring Jake Gyllenhaal; ‘Sicario’, presumably the most well-made crime thriller in recent times (that made great use of the scintillating cinematography work by Roger Deakins); ‘Arrival’, a sci-fi drama that had its feet constantly on terra-firma even with an improbable plot; ‘Blade Runner 2049’, a ground-breaking sequel to Ridley Scott’s ‘Blade Runner’, which was critically acclaimed, but went on to become a dud at the box office.- Director
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Wesley Wales Anderson was born in Houston, Texas. His mother, Texas Ann (Burroughs), is an archaeologist turned real estate agent, and his father, Melver Leonard Anderson, worked in advertising and PR. He has two brothers, Eric and Mel. Anderson's parents divorced when he was a young child, an event that he described as the most crucial event of his brothers and his growing up. During childhood, Anderson also began writing plays and making super-8 movies. He was educated at Westchester High School and then St. John's, a private prep school in Houston, Texas, which was later to prove an inspiration for the film Rushmore (1998).
Anderson attended the University of Texas in Austin, where he majored in philosophy. It was there that he met Owen Wilson. They became friends and began making short films, some of which aired on a local cable-access station. One of their shorts was Bottle Rocket (1993), which starred Owen and his brother Luke Wilson. The short was screened at the Sundance Film Festival, where it was successfully received, so much so that they received funding to make a feature-length version. Bottle Rocket (1996) was not a commercial hit, but it gained a cult audience and high-profile fans, which included Martin Scorsese.
Success followed with films such as Rushmore (1998), The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004), The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) and an animated feature, Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009). The latter two films earned Anderson Oscar nominations.Known for his idiosyncratic style of film-making (characterized by artistic props, rare collectibles and dousing of colours), Wes Anderson films have mostly been offbeat comedies or in-depth character studies. Favorites include: ‘Rushmore’, that launched his career and that of Jason Schwartzman’s, and is one of his sublime works; ‘The Royal Tenenbaums’, that centres around the themes of loss, redemption and familial disorder told in highly sarcastic fashion; ‘The Darjeeling Limited’, a journey of brotherly bonding, set in (a moving train in) India; ‘Moonrise Kingdom’, a coming-of-age drama painted in strokes of eccentricity; ‘The Grand Budapest Hotel’, a comedy with neatly-written characters and a stand-out performance from Ralph Fiennes. His stop-motion animation flick ‘Fantastic Mr. Fox’ was also well-received for its aesthetic appeal. The world looks on for his next stop-motion venture titled ‘Isle of Dogs’ and featuring a massive voice-over ensemble.- Producer
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Self-taught writer-director Richard Stuart Linklater was born in Houston, Texas, to Diane Margaret (Krieger), who taught at a university, and Charles W. Linklater III. Richard was among the first and most successful talents to emerge during the American independent film renaissance of the 1990s. Typically setting each of his movies during one 24-hour period, Linklater's work explored what he dubbed "the youth rebellion continuum," focusing in fine detail on generational rites and mores with rare compassion and understanding while definitively capturing the 20-something culture of his era through a series of nuanced, illuminating ensemble pieces which introduced any number of talented young actors into the Hollywood firmament. Born in Houston, Texas, Linklater suspended his educational career at Sam Houston State University in 1982, to work on an offshore oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico. He subsequently relocated to the state's capital of Austin, where he founded a film society and began work on his debut film, 1987's It's Impossible to Learn to Plow by Reading Books (1988). Three years later he released the sprawling Slacker (1990), an insightful, virtually plotless look at 1990s youth culture that became a favorite on the festival circuit prior to earning vast acclaim at Sundance in 1991. Upon its commercial release, the movie, made for less than $23,000, became the subject of considerable mainstream media attention, with the term "slacker" becoming a much-overused catch-all tag employed to affix a name and identity to America's disaffected youth culture.This is a director that makes films as raw and real as they come, with characters behaving exactly how they would in normal life, given the circumstances. His films are delightfully optimistic and carry broad perspectives on life. He loves hitting the nostalgia bone of viewers and relishes structuring films on indefinite narratives (i.e. the beginning and closure are not clearly defined). Have a look at the ‘Before..’ trilogy or ‘Boyhood’ where he has filmed actors over a span of 10+ years and incorporated changes based on their own life experiences. Linklater’s films are essentially talkathons where we get to understand characters through exchanges sprinkled with wit, honesty and sentiment. ‘Everybody Wants Some’ was a fantastic throwback to the ‘80s and featured a kick-ass soundtrack.- Producer
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Darren Aronofsky was born February 12, 1969, in Brooklyn, New York. Growing up, Darren was always artistic: he loved classic movies and, as a teenager, he even spent time doing graffiti art. After high school, Darren went to Harvard University to study film (both live-action and animation). He won several film awards after completing his senior thesis film, "Supermarket Sweep", starring Sean Gullette, which went on to becoming a National Student Academy Award finalist. Aronofsky didn't make a feature film until five years later, in February 1996, where he began creating the concept for Pi (1998). After Darren's script for Pi (1998) received great reactions from friends, he began production. The film re-teamed Aronofsky with Gullette, who played the lead. This went on to further successes, such as Requiem for a Dream (2000), The Wrestler (2008) and Black Swan (2010). Most recently, he completed the films Noah (2014) and Mother! (2017).The American filmmaker is renowned for his set of films trademarked by deeply disturbing (and graphic) scenes, in a manner similar to Korean cult-films (of Na Hong Jin, Joon-ho Bong and Chan-wook Park). Films such as ‘Requiem for a Dream’, ‘The Wrestler’, ‘Black Swan’ and ‘Mother!’ aren’t exactly the easiest to sit through. He loves teasing the viewers with perturbing scenes of psychological horror while attempting to convey the characters’ inner turmoil. Aronofsky is evidently one of the most controversial directors in Hollywood at the moment, yet he continues to get A-listers to act in all his films. He has however, been on the receiving end of both criticism as well as accolades.- Producer
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Born in Puducherry, India, and raised in the posh suburban Penn Valley area of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, M. Night Shyamalan is a film director, screenwriter, producer, and occasional actor, known for making movies with contemporary supernatural plots.
He is the son of Jayalakshmi, a Tamil obstetrician and gynecologist, and Nelliate C. Shyamalan, a Malayali doctor. His passion for filmmaking began when he was given a Super-8 camera at age eight, and even at that young age began to model his career on that of his idol, Steven Spielberg. His first film, Praying with Anger (1992), was based somewhat on his own trip back to visit the India of his birth. He raised all the funds for this project, in addition to directing, producing and starring in it. Wide Awake (1998), his second film, he wrote and directed, and shot it in the Philadelphia-area Catholic school he once attended--even though his family was of a different religion, they sent him to that school because of its strict discipline.
Shyamalan gained international recognition when he wrote and directed 1999's The Sixth Sense (1999), which was a commercial success and later nominated for six Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Original Screenplay. Shyamalan team up again with Bruce Willis in the film Unbreakable (2000), released in 2000, which he also wrote and directed.
His major films include the science fiction thriller Signs (2002), the psychological thriller The Village (2004), the fantasy thriller Lady in the Water (2006), The Happening (2008), The Last Airbender (2010), After Earth (2013), and the horror films The Visit (2015) and Split (2016).An American screen-writer & film-director with Indian roots, familiar with viewers for films containing supernatural elements and unpredictably twisted finales. He has displayed immense capability in blending drama, horror and science fiction with psychological thrills to conjure up popular films like ‘The Sixth Sense’, ‘Signs’ and ‘Unbreakable’. His career showed a bit of a droop when he made underwhelming films such as ‘The Village’, ‘The Happening’, ‘The Last Airbender’ and ‘After Earth’ but most of them fared decently well at the box office (except for ‘After Earth’). He bounced back in 2015 with the horror-thriller ‘The Visit’ and kept his graph steady in 2016 with the psychological thriller ‘Split’ (both made on budgets less than 10 million) striking gold at the box office and winning the hearts of most critics. He is currently working on a crossover between ‘Split’ and ‘Unbreakable’ titled ‘Glass’ with lead characters from both films returning.