Joshua Oppenheimer

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Joshua Oppenheimer

Joshua Lincoln Oppenheimer (born September 23, 1974) is an American film director based in

Marshall Scholar[3] and a 2014 recipient of the MacArthur fellowship.[4]

Life and career

Oppenheimer was born to a

.

His first film The Entire History of the Louisiana Purchase (1997) won a Gold Hugo from the Chicago International Film Festival (1998).[7]

From 2004 to 2012, he produced a series of films in

Robert Award by the Film Academy of Denmark, a Bodil Award by Denmark's National Association of Film Critics,[9] and the Aung San Suu Kyi Award at the Human Rights Human Dignity International Film Festival 2013[10]

Oppenheimer appeared on The Daily Show on August 13, 2013, to talk about The Act of Killing.[11]

The Act of Killing won the BAFTA for Best Documentary, European Film Award for Best Documentary, the Asia Pacific Screen Award for Best Documentary, and was nominated for

Best Documentary Feature at the 86th Academy Awards.[12]

Oppenheimer's next film,

Gotham Award for Best Documentary, and three Cinema Eye Honors
, including Best Film and Best Director. Cinema Eye Honors named him a decade-defining filmmaker in 2016, and both his films as decade-defining films.

In a 2015, interview with

its role in the killings.[17] In October 2017, the U.S. government declassified thousands of files related to the killings, with officials citing the impact of Oppenheimer's films.[18]

In July 2016, he was named as a member of the main competition jury for the 73rd Venice International Film Festival.[19] In September 2017 he was the guest director for the Telluride Film Festival.[20]

In 2021, film production company Neon announced Oppenheimer will direct a feature-film musical starring Tilda Swinton, Stephen Graham and George MacKay.[21]

Personal life

Oppenheimer is openly gay and lives with his partner Shu in Copenhagen, Denmark.[22]

Filmography

Year Title Notes
1995 Hugh Short film
1996 These Places We've Learned to Call Home Short
1997 The Challenge of Manufacturing Short
1997 The Entire History of the Louisiana Purchase Short
2003 The Globalisation Tapes A collaboration between the Independent Plantation Workers' Union of Sumatra, the International Union of Food and Agricultural Workers (IUF), and Vision Machine (Christine Cynn, Joshua Oppenheimer, Michael Uwemedimo, Andrea Luka Zimmerman). He was the producer.
2003 A Brief History of Paradise as Told by the Cockroaches Short
2003 Market Update Short
2004 Postcard from Sun City, Arizona Short
2004 Muzak: a tool of management Short
2007 Show of Force Installation
2012 The Act of Killing documentary film
2014 The Look of Silence
TBD
The End
Musical

Books

  • Acting on AIDS: Sex, Drugs & Politics (Acting on AIDS). London & New York: Serpent's Tail, 1997, . (With Helena Reckitt, co-editor.)
  • Going through the motions and becoming other. (With Michael Uwemedimo, co-author). In: Chanan, Michael, (ed.) Visible evidence. Wallflower Press, 2007. London, UK. (In Press)
  • History and Histrionics: Vision Machine's Digital Poetics. (With Michael Uwemedimo, co-author). In: .
  • Show of force: a cinema-séance of power and violence in Sumatra's plantation belt. (With Michael Uwemedimo, co-author). In Critical Quarterly, Volume 51, No 1, April 2009, pp. 84–110. Edited by: Colin MacCabe. Blackwell Publishing, 2009. ISSN 0011-1562.
  • Killer Images: Documentary Film, Memory and the Performance of Violence. (With Joram Ten Brink, co-author). Columbia University Press (Feb 28, 2013),

References

  1. ^ "Joshua Oppenheimer: 'You celebrate mass killing so you don't have to look yourself in the mirror' | Film". The Guardian. February 22, 2015. Retrieved July 17, 2016.
  2. ^ Cohn, Pamela (December 18, 2012). "BOMB Magazine — Joshua Oppenheimer by Pamela Cohn". Bombsite.com. Archived from the original on January 6, 2014. Retrieved July 17, 2016.
  3. ^ "Centric Core". Marshallscholarship.org. September 23, 2014. Retrieved July 17, 2016.
  4. ^ Lee, Felicia R. (September 17, 2014). "MacArthur Awards Go to 21 Diverse Fellows : Alison Bechdel, Terrance Hayes Among 'Genius Grant' Winners". The New York Times. Retrieved July 17, 2016.
  5. Times of Israel
    .
  6. ^ Fraley, Jason (February 20, 2014). "Oscar nominated doc 'Act of Killing' has local roots". WTOP.
  7. Internet Movie Database
    . Retrieved July 17, 2016.
  8. Internet Movie Database
    . Retrieved July 17, 2016.
  9. Internet Movie Database
    . Retrieved July 17, 2016.
  10. ^ "The Act of Killing modtager Aung San Suu Kyi Pris". Dfi.dk. Retrieved July 17, 2016.
  11. ^ Stewart, Jon (August 13, 2013). "Joshua Oppenheimer". Comedy Central. Retrieved March 1, 2023.
  12. ^ "Oscars: Main nominations 2014". BBC News. January 16, 2014. Retrieved January 16, 2014.
  13. ^ "International competition of feature films". Venice. Archived from the original on October 6, 2014. Retrieved July 24, 2014.
  14. ^ "Venice Film Festival Lineup Announced". Deadline. July 24, 2014. Retrieved July 24, 2014.
  15. ^ "Roy Andersson film scoops Venice Golden Lion award". BBC News. September 7, 2014. Retrieved September 7, 2014.
  16. ^ "Joshua Oppenheimer Won't Go Back to Indonesia". The New York Times. July 9, 2015. Retrieved July 17, 2016.
  17. ^ Sabarini, Prodita (16 February 2014). Director calls for US to acknowledge its role in 1965 killings. The Jakarta Post. Retrieved 3 August 2014.
  18. ^ Krithika Varagur (October 18, 2017). "How The US Came to Declassify 30,000 Pages of American Embassy in Indonesia Files". Voice of America.
  19. ^ Vivarelli, Nick (July 24, 2016). "Laurie Anderson, Joshua Oppenheimer, Zhao Wei Set For Venice Jury". Variety. Retrieved July 24, 2016.
  20. ^ Josh Rottenberg (August 31, 2017). "Oscar buzz to run high as the proudly low-key Telluride Film Festival gets underway". Los Angeles Times.
  21. ^ Katz, David (May 10, 2021). "Documentary auteur Joshua Oppenheimer returns with the mysterious musical project The End, starring Tilda Swinton". Cineuropa - the best of european cinema. Archived from the original on October 5, 2021. Retrieved December 30, 2021.
  22. ^ O'Hagan, Sean (June 7, 2015). "Joshua Oppenheimer: why I returned to Indonesia's killing fields". The Guardian.

External links

External videos
video icon Joshua Oppenheimer on "The Act of Killing": The VICE Podcast 034 on
YouTube