Jane Campion

Jane Campion

Jane Campion (born 30 April 1954) is a filmmaker and screenwriter. She is one of the most internationally successful New Zealand directors, although most of her work has been made in or financed by other countries, principally Australia – where she now lives – and the United States. Campion is the second of four women ever nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director.

Early life

Campion was born in Wellington, New Zealand, the daughter of Edith, an actress, and Richard Campion, a theater and opera director. She graduated with a degree in anthropology from Victoria University of Wellington in 1975. In 1976 she attended Chelsea Art School in London and travelled in Europe. She graduated with a painting major at the Sydney College of the Arts in Australia in 1979. She made her first short film, Tissues in 1981. In 1982 she began studying at the Australian Film and Television School where she made further short films.

Career

Campion started making films in the early 1980s at the Australian Film Television and Radio School.

Her first short film, Peel (1982) won the Short Film Palme d'Or at the 1986 Cannes Film Festival, and other awards followed for the shorts Passionless Moments (1983), Girls Own Story (1984) and After Hours (1984).

Having left the Australian Film and Television School she directed an episode for ABC's light entertainment series Dancing Daze (1986), which led to her first TV film, Two Friends (1986) produced by Jan Chapman.

Sweetie (1989) was her feature debut, and won international awards. Further recognition followed with An Angel at My Table (1990), a biographical and psychological portrayal of the New Zealand poet Janet Frame. International recognition followed with another Palme d'Or at the 1993 Cannes Film Festival for The Piano, which won the best director award from the Australian Film Institute and an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay in 1994. At the 66th Academy Awards, she was the second woman ever to be nominated for Best Director.

Campion's work since that time has tended to polarize opinion. The Portrait of a Lady (1996), based on the Henry James novel, featured Nicole Kidman, John Malkovich, Barbara Hershey and Martin Donovan. Holy Smoke! (1999) teamed Campion again with Harvey Keitel, this time with Kate Winslet as the female lead. In the Cut (2003), an erotic thriller based on Susanna Moore's bestseller, provided Meg Ryan an opportunity to depart from her more familiar onscreen persona. Her 2009 film Bright Star, a biographical drama about poet John Keats (played by Ben Whishaw) and his lover Fanny Brawne (Abbie Cornish), was shown at the Cannes Film Festival.

Campion was an executive producer for the 2006 documentary Abduction: The Megumi Yokota Story.

Personal life

In 1992 she married Colin Englert, second unit director on The Piano and leads group work with dads who suffer postnatal depression (PND) at the Royal Hospital for Women in Sydney. They have a daughter named Alice, born in 1994. They have since divorced. Colin has a son Gabriel born in 2004.

Filmography

Director

• A Girl's Own Story (1984)
• Sweetie (1989)
• An Angel at My Table (1990)
• The Piano (1993)
• Portrait of a Lady (1996) - based on the novel by Henry James
• Holy Smoke! (1999)
• In the Cut (2003) - based on the novel by Susanna Moore
• The Water diary - segment of the feature film 8
• Bright Star (2009)
• Top of the Lake (2013)

Producer

• Soft Fruit (2000)
• Abduction: The Megumi Yokota Story (2006)

See also

• New Zealand film makers

Bibliography

• Ellen Cheshire. Jane Campion. London: Pocket Essentials, 2000
• V. W. Wexman. Jane Campion: Interviews. Roundhouse Publishing. 1999
• Deb Verhoeven. Jane Campion. London: Routledge, 2009

External links

• Jane Campion's Agent
• Jane Campion at the Internet Movie Database
• Jane Campion Myspace Fan Page
• Jane Campion at AllRovi
• Jane Campion Bibliography (via UC Berkeley
• Senses of Cinema: Great Directors Critical Database