Director Interviews
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Wayne Wang, A Thousand Years Of Good Prayers
FAYE YU AND HENRY O IN DIRECTOR WAYNE WANG’S A THOUSAND YEARS OF GOOD PRAYERS. COURTESY MAGNOLIA PICTURES. Wayne Wang’s work has always been about a balance of contrasts, whether it be Chinese and American, classical and experimental, or independent and Hollywood. Wang was born in Hong Kong in 1949 and moved to the U.S. in his late teens to study film and television at the California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland. He made his directorial debut in 1975 with A Man, a Woman, and a Killer (on which he is co-credited alongside Rick Schmidt) but it was […]
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Irena Salina, Flow
There are many paths to cinematic success, some of them direct, some of them not, and it is fair to say that Irena Salina has taken a more meandering route than some to reach her current position. Born in Paris in the wake of May ’68, she grew up in a theatrical family (her uncle was the late, great French actor Philippe Noiret) and initially aspired to becoming an actress. When her adolescence was disrupted by her parents’ divorce, she chose to drop out of school and became a radio reporter at the age of just 15. After a stint […]
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Chris Smith, The Pool
VENKATESH CHAVAN IN DIRECTOR CHRIS SMITH’S THE POOL. COURTESY VITAGRAPH FILMS. Chris Smith is an interesting conundrum, a filmmaker who brings a narrative verve and energy to his documentaries and approaches fiction films with the delicate restraint and remove of a documentarian. A graduate of University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee’s film program, Smith first appeared on the scene in 1996 with American Job, a low-key narrative feature loosely based on the work experiences of the film’s star and co-writer, Randy Russell. During the editing of that film, he met Mark Borchardt, an oddball wannabe horror filmmaker who became the subject of Smith’s […]
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Jiri Menzel, I Served The King Of England
IVAN BARNEV AND ASSORTED FEMALE FRIENDS IN DIRECTOR JIRÍ MENZEL’S I SERVED THE KING OF ENGLAND. COURTESY SONY PICTURES CLASSICS. Ji?í Menzel is rather like a character from literary fiction, the brilliant best friend who is beset by bad luck but accepts his lot in life with a wry, philosophical smile. Menzel, born in the former Czechoslovakia on the cusp of World War II, grew up with a passion for theatre but failed to get into drama school due to a perceived lack of ability. Instead he went to film school, where he was taught by the seminal Czech director […]
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Azazel Jacobs, Momma’s Man
MATT BOREN, FLO JACOBS AND KEN JACOBS IN DIRECTOR AZAZEL JACOBS’ MOMMA’S MAN. COURTESY KINO INTERNATIONAL. Trying to make it as a director is difficult – and particularly so when your father is one of the most respected filmmakers in his field – however in the last few years Azazel Jacobs has made a name for himself in his own right with a string of individual and resonant films. Jacobs, the son of avant garde filmmaker Ken Jacobs and painter Flo Jacobs, grew up in New York City and studied film at Purchase University in upstate New York. His graduation […]
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Jon Knautz, Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer
ROBERT ENGLUND AND TREVOR MATTHEWS IN DIRECTOR JON KNAUTZ’S JACK BROOKS: MONSTER SLAYER. COURTESY ANCHOR BAY ENTERTAINMENT. At a time when horror films are getting ever more brutal, Jon Knautz brings a comfortingly old- fashioned feel to genre filmmaking. The Ottawa-born writer-director, who grew up on a diet of slasher films and 50s creature features, went to Vancouver Film School to pursue his dream of making movies. Knautz’s graduation project, Apt. 310 (2002), a stylish, tightly scripted noir, was the first in a series of shorts that harked back to classic modes of filmmaking. After making the blood-spattered comedy horror […]
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Steven Sebring, Patti Smith: Dream Of Life
PATTI SMITH IN DIRECTOR STEVEN SEBRING’S PATTI SMITH: DREAM OF LIFE. COURTESY PALM PICTURES. Since he first picked up a camera, Steven Sebring has been defying expectations and blurring genre boundaries. A South Dakota native who grew up in Arizona, Sebring taught himself photography during his teens and then honed his style during several years spent in Europe. Following his return to the States, the mix of glamor and grit he brought to his images made him an in-demand fashion photographer, and also distinguished himself as an inventive celebrity portraitist. His background in fashion and an interest in cinema led […]
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Dorothy Fadiman, Stealing America: Vote By Vote
A true independent, documentarian Dorothy Fadiman has resolutely worked outside the system for more than 30 years. Pittsburgh native Fadiman was a Stanford speech pathology graduate with a husband and two kids when, in 1976, an LSD trip inspired her to become a filmmaker. The resulting short, Radiance, took a religious, poetic and academic look at light in the universe, and motivated Fadiman to continue to make films driven by her passions and interests. A grassroots activist since the early 60s, Fadiman has predominantly focused on social and political issues in her documentaries, and she had tremendous success with the […]
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Margaret Brown, The Order Of Myths
MARDI GRAS QUEEN HELEN MEAHER IN DIRECTOR MARGARET BROWN’S THE ORDER OF MYTHS. COURTESY CINEMA GUILD. Though she may appear to casual observers as simply a gifted young chronicler of Southern culture, Margaret Brown’s talents extend beyond that. The daughter of Milton Brown, the songwriter who penned the catchy title song for the Clint Eastwood vehicle Every Which Way But Loose, Brown was raised in Mobile, Alabama, and since graduating from university has been highly active behind the camera. In the past decade, Brown’s filmmaking career has been impressively diverse: she first produced the Student Academy Award-winning short Six Miles […]
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Johnnie To, Mad Detective
LAU CHING WAN IN DIRECTOR JOHNNIE TO’S MAD DETECTIVE. COURTESY IFC FILMS. Somewhere between John Woo and the auteurs of the French New Wave lies Hong Kong native Johnnie To, currently one of the most engaging and vibrant directors in world cinema. The 53-year-old started making action movies in 1980, and over the course of the next decade and a half established himself as a skilled genre director, not only of thrillers but also of light comedies and melodramas. He rose to prominence with a number of highly successful collaborations with star Chow Yun Fat and in 1996, along with […]
