Screening of The look of silence by Joshua Oppenheimer (Denmark, Norway, Great Britain, Indonesia, Finland, 2014, 98’). Through Joshua Oppenheimer’s work filming perpetrators of the Indonesian...
Joshua Oppenheimer
Joshua Oppenheimer is an American film director based in Copenhagen, Denmark.
His first film, The Entire History of the Louisiana Purchase (1997), won a Gold Hugo from the Chicago International Film Festival (1998). From 2004 to 2012, he produced a series of films in Indonesia. His debut feature film, The Act of Killing (2012), premiered at the 2012 Telluride Film Festival. Since then it has won many prizes worldwide, including the European Film Award for Best Documentary, a Panorama Audience Award, and a Prize of the Ecumenical Jury from the 63rd Berlin International Film Festival. The film also received the Robert Award by the Film Academy of Denmark, a Bodil Award by Denmark's National Association of Film Critics, and the Aung San Suu Kyi Award at Human Rights Human Dignity International Film Festival 2013. The Act of Killing won the BAFTA for Best Documentary, European Film Award for Best Documentary, Asia Pacific Screen Award for Best Documentary, and was nominated for an Oscar, the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature at the 86th Academy Awards.
Oppenheimer's latest film, The Look of Silence (2014), is a companion piece to The Act of Killing. It screened in competition at the 71st Venice International Film Festival and won the Grand Jury Prize, the International Film Critics Award (FIPRESCI), the Italian online critics award (Mouse d'Oro) and the European Film Critics Award (FEDEORA) for the Best Film of Venezia 71.
Oppenheimer holds a Bachelor of Arts in filmmaking from Harvard University and a Ph.D. from Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, London. He is currently a Reader in documentary film at the University of Westminster.