Curtis Hanson

Curtis Lee Hanson March 24 1945 September 20 2016 was an American film director screenwriter and producer Born in Reno Nevada Hanson grew up in Los Angeles After dropping out of high school Hanson worked as photographer and editor for Cinema magazine In the 1970s Hanson participated as a writer for the horror film The Dunwich Horror 1970 and made his directorial debut the BMovie Sweet Kill 1973 where he lacked creative control to fulfill his vision While Hanson continued directing he rose to prominence screenwriting critically acclaimed films such as The Silent Partner 1978 White Dog 1982 and Never Cry Wolf 1983 After working on projects that kept him unsatisfied he decided that he should write and direct thriller films based on the success of The Silent Partner Hence he followed up with The Bedroom Window 1987 where his writing and directing finally came to merge By this point his body of work made an impression on screenwriter David Koepp who was convinced that he could handle the directorial duties for his script which led to Bad Influence 1990 Finally he directed The Hand That Rocks the Cradle 1992 which was both a critical and commercial success Moving forward he directed the thriller The River Wild 1994 which grossed 942 million Afterwards he directed the acclaimed neonoir crime film LA Confidential 1997 earning him the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay as well as nominations for Best Picture and Best Director The film was also nominated for the Palme dOr at the 1997 Cannes Film Festival and is preserved by the Library of Congress in the National Film Registry as culturally historically or aesthetically significant His next directorial effort was the critically acclaimed comedydrama Wonder Boys 2000 Then came the hiphop drama 8 Mile 2002 starring rapper Eminem and based on his life experiences The film was a triumph with critics and at the boxoffice grossing 2429 million Finally the romantic comedy In Her Shoes 2005 was also critically acclaimed and a financial success Prior to his 2014 retirement due to poor health Hanson directed Lucky You 2007 and Chasing Mavericks 2012 both had troubled productions and the final results did not come near his previous critical and financial accomplishments Hansons last significant directorial effort was the HBO television film Too Big to Fail 2011 receiving nominations for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Limited Series or Movie and Outstanding Directing for a Limited Series or Movie Hanson died of natural causes in 2016 Description above from the Wikipedia article Curtis Hanson licensed under CCBYSA full list of contributors on Wikipedia