Mark N. Hopkins is an English-American filmmaker, best known for his award-winning film Living in Emergency . [1]
Hopkins was born in Puerto Rico, growing up in Kenya, the UK, and other places in Europe. He is fluent in Italian having lived in Italy for 10 years as a child. After completing high school at Sevenoaks in the UK, Hopkins attended Georgetown University majoring in philosophy. During this time he spent 8 months in Vietnam studying history and he was the first student from an American university to teach English at the University of Hanoi. [2] [3]
Hopkins' film career began as an assistant to New York-based producer Scott Rudin working on The Truman Show , A Civil Action , Bringing Out The Dead , Angela's Ashes , Sleepy Hollow, Wonder Boys , Shaft, and other films. He left to start an independent production company with the aim of focusing on non-fiction storytelling.[ citation needed ]
In 2001, Hopkins began working with documentary director George Butler helping to develop and produce Butler's films. The first film was the award-winning documentary The Endurance: Shackleton's Legendary Antarctic Expedition , followed by Roving Mars , and included a series of shorts directed by Hopkins for Columbia Tristar Home Entertainment. Later he produced Butler’s critically acclaimed film Going Upriver: the Long War of John Kerry . [4]
In 2009, Hopkins' film Living in Emergency: Stories of Doctors Without Borders premiered at the Venice Film Festival, was released theatrically, and received numerous awards including the Cinequest San Jose Film Festival Special Jury Award and the Official Best of Fest Award whilst being short-listed for an Oscar for Best Documentary. [5] [6]
Martin Charles Scorsese is an American filmmaker. He emerged as one of the major figures of the New Hollywood era. Scorsese has received many accolades, including an Academy Award, four BAFTA Awards, three Emmy Awards, a Grammy Award, three Golden Globe Awards, and two Directors Guild of America Awards. He has been honored with the AFI Life Achievement Award in 1997, the Film Society of Lincoln Center tribute in 1998, the Kennedy Center Honor in 2007, the Cecil B. DeMille Award in 2010, and the BAFTA Fellowship in 2012. Five of his films have been inducted into the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant".
Barry Lee Levinson is an American film director, producer and screenwriter. His best-known works are mid-budget comedy drama and drama films such as Diner (1982), The Natural (1984), Good Morning, Vietnam (1987), Bugsy (1991), and Wag the Dog (1997). Levinson won the Academy Award for Best Director for Rain Man (1988). In 2021, he co-executive produced the Hulu miniseries Dopesick and directed the first two episodes.
James Francis Ivory is an American film director, producer, and screenwriter. For many years, he worked extensively with Indian film producer Ismail Merchant, his domestic as well as professional partner, and with screenwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala. All three were principals in Merchant Ivory Productions, whose films have won seven Academy Awards; Ivory himself has been nominated for four Oscars, winning one.
Paris Is Burning is a 1990 American documentary film directed by Jennie Livingston. Filmed in the mid-to-late 1980s, it chronicles the ball culture of New York City and the African-American, Latino, gay, and transgender communities involved in it.
Anand Patwardhan is an Indian documentary filmmaker known for his socio-political, human rights-oriented films. Some of his films explore the rise of religious fundamentalism, sectarianism and casteism in India, while others investigate nuclear nationalism and unsustainable development. Notable films include Bombay: Our City (1985), In Memory of Friends (1990), In the Name of God (1992), Father, Son, and Holy War (1995), A Narmada Diary (1995), War and Peace (2002) and Jai Bhim Comrade (2011), and Reason (2018) which have won national and international awards.
Peter Tetteroo is a Dutch journalist and filmmaker.
The Margaret Mead Film Festival is an annual film festival held at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. It is the longest-running, premiere showcase for international documentaries in the United States, encompassing a broad spectrum of work, from indigenous community media to experimental nonfiction. The Festival is distinguished by its outstanding selection of titles, which tackle diverse and challenging subjects, representing a range of issues and perspectives, and by the forums for discussion with filmmakers and speakers.
Stanley Earl Nelson Jr. is an American documentary filmmaker and a MacArthur Fellow known as a director, writer and producer of documentaries examining African-American history and experiences. He is a recipient of the 2013 National Humanities Medal from President Obama. He has won three Primetime Emmy Awards.
Benton Jennings is an American film, television, commercial, voice-over, and stage actor, writer and director based in Los Angeles, California.
Peter Raymont is a Canadian filmmaker and producer and the president of White Pine Pictures, an independent film, television and new media production company based in Toronto. Among his films are Shake Hands with the Devil: The Journey of Romeo Dallaire (2005), A Promise to the Dead: The Exile Journey of Ariel Dorfman (2007), The World Stopped Watching (2003) and The World Is Watching (1988). The 2011 feature documentary West Wind: The Vision of Tom Thomson and 2009's Genius Within: The Inner Life of Glenn Gould were co-directed with Michèle Hozer.
Living in Emergency: Stories of Doctors Without Borders is a 2008 American documentary film directed by Mark N. Hopkins. It was among the 15 documentaries shortlisted for the Best Documentary Oscar by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for the 82nd Academy Awards.
Melody Gilbert is an independent documentary filmmaker, and educator from Washington, D.C. now living in Natchitoches, Louisiana. She has directed, filmed, produced, and sometimes edited, seven independent feature-length documentaries since 2002. The Documentary Channel calls her "one of the most fearless filmmakers in contemporary documentary cinema." She is currently an assistant professor of journalism at Northwestern State University.
Cynthia Wade is an American television, commercial and film director, producer and cinematographer based in New York City. She has directed documentaries on social issues including Shelter Dogs in 2003 about animal welfare and Freeheld in 2007 about LGBT rights as well as television commercials and web campaigns. She has won over 40 film festival awards, won an Oscar in 2008, and was nominated for her second Oscar in 2013.
Wanuri Kahiu is a Kenyan film director, producer, and author. She is considered to be “one of Africa's most aspiring directors, being part of a new, vibrant crop of talents representing contemporary African culture”. She has received several awards and nominations for the films which she directed, including the awards for Best Director, Best Screenplay and Best Picture at the Africa Movie Academy Awards in 2009 for her dramatic feature film From a Whisper. She is also the co-founder of AFROBUBBLEGUM, a media collective dedicated to supporting African art for its own sake.
Laura Poitras is an American director and producer of documentary films.
Roger Ross Williams is an American director, producer and writer and the first African American director to win an Academy Award (Oscar), with his short film Music by Prudence; this film won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Short Film in 2009.
Mainak Bhaumik is a Bengali film director, documentary filmmaker and editor. He made his directorial debut with 2006 Bengali film Aamra.In 2012, he made another Bengali film Bedroom, a dark ensemble film about the new generation of young Indians. His critically and commercially successful movies are Maach Mishti & More, Bibaho Diaries, Generation Ami, Cheeni, Ekannoborti.
Gianfranco Rosi is an Italian-American documentary filmmaker. His 2013 film Sacro GRA won the Golden Lion at the 70th Venice Film Festival, while his 2016 film Fire at Sea won the Golden Bear at the 66th Berlin Film Festival. Rosi is the only documentary filmmaker to win two highest awards at the three major European film festivals and is the only director besides Michael Haneke, Ang Lee, Ken Loach, and Jafar Panahi to do so in the 21st century.
Matthew Heineman is an American documentary filmmaker, director, and producer. His inspiration and fascination with American history led him to early success with the documentary film Cartel Land, which was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature Film, a BAFTA Award for Best Documentary, and won three Primetime Emmy Awards.
It Will Be Chaos is an HBO documentary on the European refugee crisis directed by US-based Italian filmmakers Lorena Luciano and Filippo Piscopo. In 2019 It Will Be Chaos won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Current Affairs documentary at the 40th News & Documentary Emmy Awards. It Will Be Chaos also won the Best Directing Award at the 2018 Taormina Film Festival. Translated into over 10 languages, the documentary has been distributed worldwide.