Tony Asimakopoulos

Last updated
Tony Asimakopoulos
Tony Asimakopoulos.jpg
Born
Antonios Asimakopoulos

Nationality Canadian of Greek origin
OccupationFilm director
Years active1991–present

Tony Asimakopoulos is a Canadian film and television director based in Montreal. He often collaborates with the Montreal-based Canadian film production company EyeSteelFilm. He is best known for his autobiographical documentary Fortunate Son .

Contents

Career

Antonios Asimakopoulos was born and raised in Montreal to Greek immigrant parents, Aristomenis and Vassiliki Asimakopoulos. He studied at Montreal's Concordia University, and earned a degree in film production in 1993. His short film Jimmy Fingers was awarded the "Prix de le Rélève", for most promising Quebec filmmaker, at the 1991 Festival de jeune cinema in Montreal. This was followed by his short Mama's Boy, which screened at the Toronto International Film Festival and in Montreal, Locarno, Gothenburg and Melbourne.

He moved to Ottawa in 1995 to enter treatment for drug addiction and alcoholism. [1]

After resuming his own work with Horsie's Retreat, a dramatic feature made at the Canadian Film Centre in 2004. [2]

His work as an editor includes the 2009 EyeSteelFilm documentary feature RiP!: A Remix Manifesto , and the 2011 autobiographical bilingual documentary film Fortunate Son being a candid look at his relations with his own family. [3] [4] [5]

Filmography

Director
Cinematographer
Screenwriter
Editor

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Les Automatistes</span> Canadian art group

Les Automatistes were a group of Québécois artistic dissidents from Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The movement was founded in the early 1940s by painter Paul-Émile Borduas. Les Automatistes were so called because they were influenced by Surrealism and its theory of automatism. Members included Marcel Barbeau, Roger Fauteux, Claude Gauvreau, Jean-Paul Riopelle, Pierre Gauvreau, Fernand Leduc, Jean-Paul Mousseau, Guy Borremans, Marcelle Ferron and Françoise Sullivan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Denys Arcand</span> Canadian film director

Georges-Henri Denys Arcand is a French Canadian film director, screenwriter and producer. His film The Barbarian Invasions won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film in 2004. His films have also been nominated three further times, including two nominations in the same category for The Decline of the American Empire in 1986 and Jesus of Montreal in 1989, becoming the only French-Canadian director in history whose films have received this number of nominations and, subsequently, to have a film win the award. For The Barbarian Invasions, he received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay, losing to Sofia Coppola for Lost in Translation.

"Fortunate Son" is a 1969 song by Creedence Clearwater Revival.

Don Owen was a Canadian film director, writer and producer who spent most of his career with the National Film Board of Canada (NFB). His films Nobody Waved Good-bye and The Ernie Game are regarded as two of the most significant English Canadian films of the 1960s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michel Brault</span> Canadian filmmaker

Michel Brault, OQ was a Canadian cinematographer, cameraman, film director, screenwriter, and film producer. He was a leading figure of Direct Cinema, characteristic of the French branch of the National Film Board of Canada in the 1960s. Brault was a pioneer of the hand-held camera aesthetic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brett Gaylor</span> Canadian documentary filmmaker

Brett Gaylor is a Canadian documentary filmmaker living in Victoria, British Columbia. He grew up on Galiano Island, British Columbia. He was formerly the VP of Mozilla's Webmaker Program. His documentary, Do Not Track, explores privacy and the web economy.

Open Source Cinema was a collaborative website created to produce the documentary film RiP!: A Remix Manifesto, a co-production with Montreal's EyeSteelFilm and the National Film Board of Canada (NFB). It was launched in 2004 as a public beta, and in 2007 launched at the South By Southwest Interactive festival on the Drupal platform.

<i>RiP!: A Remix Manifesto</i> 2008 Canadian film

RiP!: A Remix Manifesto is a 2008 open-source documentary film about "the changing concept of copyright" directed by Brett Gaylor.

Daniel Cross a Canadian documentary filmmaker, producer and activist whose films deal with social justice.

The Street: A Film with the Homeless is a 78-minute 1997 documentary film about the homeless in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The film was directed by Daniel Cross and produced by him and Don Haig. The production houses were the National Film Board of Canada and Necessary Illusions Productions Inc.

EyeSteelFilm is a Montreal-based Canadian cinema production company co-founded by Daniel Cross and Mila Aung-Thwin, dedicated to socially engaged cinema, bringing social and political change through cinematic expression. Today the studio is run by co-presidents Mila Aung-Thwin and Bob Moore.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mila Aung-Thwin</span> Canadian documentary filmmaker, producer and activist

Mila Aung-Thwin is a Canadian documentary filmmaker, producer and activist whose films deal with social justice.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eric Denis</span> Canadian documentary film maker and activist

Eric Denis better known as Eric "Roach" Denis is a Canadian documentary film maker and activist whose films deal with social justice, and particularly homelessness.

<i>Punk the Vote!</i> 2006 Canadian film

Punk the Vote! is a 73-minute 2006 Canadian documentary about the Canadian elections, and a hilarious and at the same time a critical take on Canadian politics punk-rock style, when two punks decide to run as independent candidates for the Canadian elections. The film is directed by Eric "Roach" Denis of EyeSteelFilm, a Montreal-based documentary production company. It was produced by EyeSteelFilm in association with Canal D Canadian specialty channel specializing in documentaries.

RoachTrip is a 2003 Canadian documentary about two punks, Roach and his friend Smash down the invisible punk highway across Canada. It captures their goal to escape the streets of Montreal as they cross 5,000 km (3,107 mi) to reach the "promised land" of British Columbia's Okanagan Valley.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Omar Majeed</span> Pakistani-Canadian film director and film editor

Omar Majeed is a Pakistani Canadian film director and producer who studied cinema at York University Film School and later on studied editing at the International Academy of Design in Toronto. He is the son of Pakistani actress and singer Musarrat Nazir. He went on to work as producer Toronto's Citytv and won a Gemini Award for his television work. He also worked with Canada's National Film Board through the Reel Diversity program in Montreal and with EyeSteelFilm.

<i>Inside Lara Roxx</i> 2011 Canadian film

Inside Lara Roxx is a 2011 EyeSteelFilm Canadian documentary film by Canadian film director Mia Donovan. It covers the circumstances of a 21-year-old Canadian woman Lara Roxx who in the Spring of 2004, left her hometown Montreal heading to Los Angeles to work in pornography. Within two months she contracted HIV after shooting an unprotected sex scene with two men. It was revealed that one of the two men, porn actor Darren James, was HIV positive. The film did well critically. In 2012, it was nominated for a Claude Jutra Award for Best Documentary.

Mia Donovan is a Canadian photographer and filmmaker. She is best known for her documentary Inside Lara Roxx released through EyeSteelFilm about 21-year-old Canadian Lara Roxx who in the spring of 2004, left her hometown Montreal heading to Los Angeles for working in pornography and within two months contracted HIV after shooting an unprotected sex scene with two males. Donovan followed Lara Roxx through 5 years of Roxx's attempt to build a new identity and find hope in the wake of her past. Her film won "Best Documentary on Society and Humanity" at the 2011 Guangzhou International Documentary Film Festival and it was runner-up for "Best Feature at 2012 Boston Underground Film Festival.

<i>Fortunate Son</i> (film) 2011 Canadian film

Fortunate Son is an autobiographical feature documentary film by Tony Asimakopoulos, a Canadian film director of Greek origin. The film was released in 2011 and produced by Mila Aung-Thwin, Daniel Cross and Bob Moore of the Montreal-based film production company, EyeSteelFilm. The film is in English and Greek, with subtitles in English and French. As Asimakopoulos' first documentary, the film has been called "A searing documentary about family" by Liz Braun of the Toronto Sun, as well as "[...] a story of what binds families together, and what it means to be loved" by Daniel Pratt of Exclaim!.

Julian Biggs (1920–1972) was a director and producer with the National Film Board of Canada and its first Director of English Production. Over the course of his 20-year career, he created 146 films, two of which were nominated for Academy Awards. His film 23 Skidoo (1964) received two BAFTA nominations, including the BAFTA United Nations award.

References

  1. Hays, Matthew (August 16, 2012). "Addiction and anxiety but no catharsis". The Globe and Mail via www.theglobeandmail.com.
  2. Harvey, Dennis (April 13, 2005). "Horsie's Retreat".
  3. Montreal Gazette: Montreal success story Fortunate Son moves to bigger digs at Cinema du Parc
  4. Cinéflic.com: Review of Fortunate Son {Le fils béni (in French)
  5. KlimkiwFilmCorner - Review of Fortunate Son