Jonathan Glazer | |
|---|---|
_(53255110321)_(cropped)_2.jpg) Glazer in 2023 | |
| Born | (1965-03-26)26 March 1965 (age 60) London, England |
| Education | Nottingham Trent University (BA) |
| Occupations |
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| Years active | 1993–present |
| Notable work |
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| Spouse | Rachael Penfold |
| Children | 3 |
Jonathan Glazer (born 26 March 1965) is an English filmmaker. He began his career in theatre before transitioning into film, directing the featuresSexy Beast (2000),Birth (2004),Under the Skin (2013), andThe Zone of Interest (2023). His accolades include aBAFTA Award, aBritish Independent Film Award, and aCésar Award. He has been nominated for twoAcademy Awards.
Glazer's work is defined by depictions of flawed and desperate characters; themes such as alienation, loneliness and individualism; and a bold visual style uses an omniscient perspective and dramatic music. For the historical dramaThe Zone of Interest, he won theGrand Prix at the2023 Cannes Film Festival and theBAFTA Award for Outstanding British Film and received Academy Award nominations forBest Director andBest Adapted Screenplay. Glazer also accepted theAcademy Award for Best International Feature Film on behalf of theUnited Kingdom.
Glazer has directed music videos for acts includingBlur,Massive Attack,Radiohead,Richard Ashcroft andJamiroquai. He received nominations for theMTV Video Music Award for Best Direction for his videos for Jamiroquai's "Virtual Insanity" (1996) and Radiohead's "Karma Police" (1997). He has also directed commercials for brands includingKodak,Sony,Nike,Barclays,Guinness andAlexander McQueen.
"There were all these fantastic characters, who were in and out of my house when I was a little boy. Many of them were East End Jews who had moved to the suburbs for a better quality of life, not super-intellectual people, but incredible entertainers –vaudeville musicians, writers and the like. As a child, I loved and absorbed the richness of that culture."
Jonathan Glazer was born on 26 March 1965 in London, England,[2] and is ofAshkenazi Jewish descent.[1][3] His ancestors wereUkrainian Jews andBessarabian Jews who fled theKishinev pogrom and arrived in the United Kingdom in the 1900s.[3][4] He said: "My great-grandparents were born inVilnius andOdesa. One was a tailor. His wife, a seamstress."[3] His family lived inHadley Wood, nearBarnet, and wasReform Jewish: "Synagogue three times a year, and Friday-night dinners every week."[4] His father was acinephile, with whom he frequently watchedDavid Lean,Sidney Lumet,Sydney Pollack, andBilly Wilder movies.[4][5]
Glazer attended theJewish Free School, then located in the borough ofCamden.[6] During his childhood, he participated in theGivat Washington programme, spending five months in a religiousboarding school in Israel. After finishing high school, he went to art school, saying drawing was the only thing he was good at.[6] After graduating with an emphasis intheatre design fromNottingham Trent University, Glazer began his career directing theatre and making film and television trailers.[5][7]
In 1993, Glazer wrote and directed three short films ("Mad", "Pool" and "Commission"), and joined Academy Commercials, a production company based in Central London.[citation needed] He directed campaigns forGuinness (Dreamer,Swimblack andSurfer)[8][9] andStella Artois (Devil's Island).[10]
Glazer directed the music videos for "Karmacoma" by Massive Attack and "The Universal" byBlur, both released in 1995.[11] He worked withRadiohead on their videos for "Street Spirit" (1996) and "Karma Police" (1997). He said "Street Spirit" was a turning point in his work: "I knew when I finished that, because [Radiohead] found their own voices as an artist, at that point, I felt like I got close to whatever mine was, and I felt confident that I could do things that emoted, that had some kind of poetic as well as prosaic value."[12]
Glazer won theMTV Video Music Award for Best Direction in 1997 for his work on "Karma Police" andJamiroquai's "Virtual Insanity" (1996).[13] He was unsatisfied with his "Karma Police" video, saying he had "missed emotionally and dramatically".[12] He described his video for the 1998 single "Rabbit in Your Headlights", byUnkle and the Radiohead singerThom Yorke, as a more successful partner to the "Karma Police" video.[12] Glazer's 1999 television advert "Surfer", forGuinness, was voted the best of all time in a poll conducted byChannel 4 andThe Sunday Times the following year.[8]
Glazer was set to direct the filmGangster No. 1, written byLouis Mellis and David Scinto, but was replaced after disagreements with the producers regarding casting. Glazer left the production along with Mellis and Scinto.[14][15] In 2000, Glazer worked with Mellis and Scinto again, directing his first feature, the gangster filmSexy Beast.[16]Ben Kingsley was nominated for theAcademy Award for Best Supporting Actor.[17] In 2004, Glazer directed his second feature film,Birth, starringNicole Kidman.[18]
In 2002, Glazer directed the "Odyssey" spot forLevi Strauss jeans.[19][20] In 2006, he directed the second Sony BRAVIA TV advertisement, which took ten days and 250 people to film. It was filmed at an estate in Glasgow, and featured paint exploding all over the tower blocks.[21] Later the same year, he was commissioned to make a television advert for the newMotorola Red phone. The advertisement, showing two naked black bodies emerging from a lump of flesh rotating on a potter's wheel, was due to air in September 2006 but was shelved by Motorola. The advertisement was to benefit several charities in Africa.[citation needed]
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In 2013, Glazer directedUnder the Skin, a loose adaptation of the2000 novel byMichel Faber, starringScarlett Johansson. It premiered at the 2013Telluride Film Festival and received a theatrical release in 2014.[22] The film was named the best film of 2014 by numerous critics and publications,[23] was included in many best-of-the-decade lists, and ranked 61st on theBBC's 100 Greatest Films of the 21st Century list, an international poll of 177 top critics.[24]
Glazer's fourth feature film,The Zone of Interest, based loosely on the2014 novel byMartin Amis, premiered at the2023 Cannes Film Festival to acclaim.[25] It competed for thePalme d'Or,[26] and won theGrand Prix andFIPRESCI Prize.[27]The Zone of Interest won theAcademy Award for Best International Feature Film, becoming thefirst British film to do so.[28][29][30] The film also received threeBritish Academy Film Awards, making it the first film to win bothBest Film Not in the English Language andOutstanding British Film.[31]
In his acceptance speech at the96th Academy Awards, Glazer addressed the ongoingGaza war:[30][32][33][34]
All our choices are made to reflect and confront us in the present. Not to say, 'Look what they did then,' rather 'Look what we do now.' Our film shows where dehumanisation leads at its worst. It shaped all of our past and present. Right now, we stand here as men who refute their Jewishness and the Holocaust being hijacked by anoccupation which has led to conflict for so many innocent people. Whether the victims ofOctober 7th in Israel or the ongoingattack on Gaza, all the victims of this dehumanization — how do we resist?
Known to be discreet about his private life,[35] Glazer is married to thevisual effects supervisor Rachael Penfold.[36] They live in Camden, North London with their three children.[1] He is Jewish.[5][37] Glazer namedStanley Kubrick as his favourite director and said he was close toItalian andRussian cinema, citingIngmar Bergman,Rainer Werner Fassbinder,Federico Fellini, andPier Paolo Pasolini as his greatest influences.[1][35]
| Year | Title | Director | Writer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2000 | Sexy Beast | Yes | No |
| 2004 | Birth | Yes | Yes |
| 2013 | Under the Skin | Yes | Yes |
| 2023 | The Zone of Interest | Yes | Yes |
| Year | Title | Director | Writer | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1994 | Mad | Yes | Yes | Also producer and editor |
| 1997 | Commission | Yes | Yes | |
| 2019 | The Fall | Yes | Yes | |
| 2020 | Strasbourg 1518 | Yes | Yes | TV short |
| First Light: Alexander McQueen | Yes | No |
| Year | Title | Artist |
|---|---|---|
| 1995 | "Karmacoma" | Massive Attack |
| "The Universal" | Blur | |
| 1996 | "Street Spirit (Fade Out)" | Radiohead |
| "Virtual Insanity" | Jamiroquai | |
| 1997 | "Into My Arms" | Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds |
| "Karma Police" | Radiohead | |
| 1998 | "Rabbit in Your Headlights" | UNKLE ft.Thom Yorke |
| 2000 | "A Song for the Lovers" | Richard Ashcroft |
| 2006 | "Live with Me" | Massive Attack |
| 2009 | "Treat Me Like Your Mother" | The Dead Weather |
| Year | Title | Company |
|---|---|---|
| "Husband to Be" | Kodak | |
| "Linda 2" | Pretty Polly | |
| "Shock of the New" | Mazda | |
| "Chief Executive's Wife" | AT&T | |
| "City" | Club Med | |
| "Sales Director" | AT&T | |
| 1996 | "Frozen Moment" | Nike |
| "New York" | Caffrey's | |
| 1997 | "Parklife" | Nike |
| 1998 | "Swimblack" | Guinness |
| "Lamppost" | BT Easyreach | |
| 1999 | "Surfer" | Guinness |
| 2000 | "Kung Fu" | Levi Strauss |
| "Last Orders" | Stella Artois | |
| "Devil's Island" | ||
| "Protection" | Volkswagen Polo | |
| "Whatever You Ride" | Wrangler | |
| 2001 | "Dreamer" | Guinness |
| 2002 | "Odyssey" | Levi Strauss |
| 2003 | "Evil" | Barclays |
| "Bull" | ||
| "Chicken" | ||
| 2004 | "Bar"[38] | Band Aid 20 |
| "Double Don" | ||
| "Rant" | ||
| "Razor" | ||
| 2006 | "Ice Skating Priests" | Stella Artois |
| "Paint" | SonyBRAVIA | |
| "Clay"[39] | MotorolaRed | |
| 2010 | "Temptation" | Cadbury's Flake |
| "Kaka"[40] | Sony 3D | |
| "Last Tango in Compton"[41][42] | Volkswagen Polo | |
| 2013 | "The Ring"[43][44] | Audi |
| 2014 | "Risk Everything"[45] | Nike |
| 2019 | "Flight" | Apple |
| 2024 | "The Galleria"[46] | Prada |
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