Alejandro Amenabar Biography

Alejandro Amenabar, Director

Attr: Pedro J Pacheco, CC BY-SA 4.0

Born as	Alejandro Fernando Amenábar Cantos
Occup.	Director
From	Spain
Born	March 31, 1972 Santiago, Chile
Age	52 years

Early Life as well as Background
Alejandro Amenábar was born on March 31, 1972, in Santiago, Chile, as Alejandro Fernando Amenábar Cantos. His mother, Josefina Cantos, is a Spanish national, while his papa, Hugo Ricardo Amenábar, comes from Chile. To escape the political turmoil in Chile under the tyranny of Augusto Pinochet, the family moved to Spain when Alejandro was just a year old. They cleared up in Madrid, where Alejandro would certainly invest a lot of his childhood and also adolescence.

Growing up in Spain, Alejandro Amenábar established a deep fondness for both songs as well as movie theater. As a child, he was drawn to the works of epic filmmakers like Steven Spielberg and Stanley Kubrick. Alejandro educated himself to play the key-board and also made up music for his movies, nurturing his interest for the arts.

Education and Early Career
In 1990, Alejandro Amenábar registered in the Complutense University of Madrid to research Information Sciences. While in college, he began making short movies, the most noteworthy of which was the 1992 movie La cabeza. It was throughout this time around that Alejandro met Mateo Gil; their collaboration would certainly take place to create lots of effective movies. In 1993, he teamed up with Mateo to produce the brief movie Himenóptero, a forerunner to their thriller movie Tesis (1996). Due to Alejandro's active profession, he dropped out of university without completing his researches.

Increase to Fame
In 1996, Alejandro Amenábar made his feature movie debut with Tesis, a thriller about an university student uncovering a snuff film ring. Tesis, which he co-wrote with Mateo Gil, became a significant success in Spain, winning seven Goya Awards, consisting of Best Picture, Best Director, as well as Best Screenplay. It created a great deal of buzz and also raised Alejandro Amenábar to international acknowledgment.

His following film was the 1997 science-fiction dramatization Abre los ojos (Open Your Eyes), which starred Eduardo Noriega and also Penélope Cruz. It was another massive success, both seriously and also readily, becoming reprise into an American film, Vanilla Sky (2001), starring Tom Cruise.

International Success
In 2001, Alejandro Amenábar made his English-language film launching with The Others, a mythological horror-thriller starring Nicole Kidman. The film was a significant hit worldwide, gathering numerous awards and strengthening Alejandro Amenábar's credibility as one of the most knowledgeable and cutting-edge filmmakers in modern cinema.

In 2004, he composed and directed Mar adentro (The Sea Inside), a biographical dramatization based on the life of Ramón Sampedro, a quadriplegic who fought for the right to end his very own life. The movie starred Javier Bardem as well as Belén Rueda, and also it ended up being the highest-grossing Spanish movie of that year. Mar adentro won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film and also made Alejandro Amenábar a Goya Award for Best Director.

Recent Works as well as Legacy
After the enormous success of Mar adentro, Alejandro Amenábar took a quick hiatus from filmmaking. In 2009, he returned with Agora, a historical dramatization set in Roman Egypt, which starred Rachel Weisz. Despite getting mixed reviews, the movie was shown in numerous film festivals and was nominated for many honors.

In 2015, he routed the mental thriller Regression, which starred Ethan Hawke as well as Emma Watson. Extra just recently, in 2019, he guided Mientras dure la guerra (While at War), based on Spanish novelist Miguel de Unamuno's life throughout the Spanish Civil War.

Alejandro Amenábar has proven himself as one of the most innovative and also creative filmmakers in international cinema. Known for his capacity to tell compelling stories and also generate solid performances from his actors, Amenábar has established himself as a major influence on the planet of movie theater. As a writer, director, and also composer, he remains to make groundbreaking as well as impactful movies, leaving an indelible mark on generations of cinephiles and also striving filmmakers alike.

Our collection contains 7 quotes who is written / told by Alejandro.

Related authors: Augusto Pinochet (Soldier), Emma Watson (Actress), Javier Bardem (Actor), Tom Cruise (Actor), Stanley Kubrick (Director), Miguel de Unamuno (Educator), Rachel Weisz (Actress), Nicole Kidman (Actress), Ethan Hawke (Actor), Steven Spielberg (Director)

Source / external links:

7 Famous quotes by Alejandro Amenabar

"What's really exciting for me is communicating to other people and not just going somewhere to make a movie. That's Hollywood to me and it would mean nothing"

"I think the concept of the sea is very important"

"An Oscar means a lot of things because it's like the ultimate award for a filmmaker so it feels great. But I think you have to consider awards with some distance and not get obsessed with it. When you're creating you shouldn't think about it"

"Sometimes a piece of music in the score isn't effective. When a score is too well finished with too many elements, sometimes it's too much"

"I wouldn't say I'm a very controlling person. For instance, when I talk to the actors, I don't tell them exactly what I want because I want them to surprise me. I even encourage them to change some of the verses of the script if they need to"

"My mother used to take my brother and me to get any books we wanted, but they were second hand books published in the '30s and '40s. I liked scary books"

"In horror movies today it's lots of fast cut shot and lots of loud noises on the soundtrack. I tried to do the opposite. Playing with silence for instance"