Lance Acord

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Lance Acord
Acord at Sundance 2015 (first from left to right)
Occupation(s)Cinematographer, Film director

Lance Acord ASC[1] is an American cinematographer and film director. He is best known for his work on the films, Buffalo '66 (1998), Being John Malkovich (1999), Adaptation (2002), and Lost in Translation (2003).

Early life[edit]

Acord studied photography and filmmaking at the San Francisco Art Institute.[2][3]

Career[edit]

Cinematographer[edit]

Acord began his career with photographer/filmmaker Bruce Weber, which whom he made documentaries, commercials and music videos. His breakthrough came after he shot the music video for Björk's "Big Time Sensuality", directed by Stéphane Sednaoui. Acord continued to work extensively in commercials and music videos through the 1990s. He earned the MTV Video Music Award for Best Cinematography for his work on the Fatboy Slim music video for "Weapon of Choice", which featured Christopher Walken and was directed by Spike Jonze. He also worked with R.E.M. on a regular basis.

Acord made his first foray into narrative feature filmmaking as the cinematographer of Vincent Gallo's Buffalo '66 (1998). He shot Spike Jonze's films Being John Malkovich (1999), Adaptation (2002), and Where the Wild Things Are (2009), Sofia Coppola's Lost in Translation (2003), Marie Antoinette (2006), and her short film Lick the Star (1998), as well as Peter Care's The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys (2002).

Commercial director[edit]

In the late 1990s, Acord began to transition to commercial directing and in 1998, together with his business partner Jackie Kelman Bisbee, he founded the commercial production company Park Pictures. He received 35 Cannes Lions for his work with clients such as Nike, Apple, HP, Volkswagen, P&G, Subaru. He was nominated for Best Commercial Director by the DGA in 2003, 2011, 2012, and 2017. In 2011, his Super Bowl spot for Volkswagen, "The Force", was named the best ad of 2011 by AdWeek, Creativity, and YouTube and consistently ranks on lists of the greatest Super Bowl commercials of all time. His Apple film "Misunderstood" won the 2014 Emmy Award for Outstanding Commercial. In 2019, he won his second Emmy award for the Nike commercial "Dream Crazy," starring Colin Kaepernick.

In 2019, directed the short film commercial for Xfinity, A Holiday Reunion, based on the film E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial and starring Henry Thomas, who reprises his role as Elliott.

Filmography[edit]

Director of photography[edit]

Short film

Year Title Director Notes
1992 Billy Nayer Cory McAbee
1995 Gentle Giants Bruce Weber
1997 How They Get There Spike Jonze
1998 Amarillo by Morning Documentary short
Lick the Star Sofia Coppola
2000 Eventual Wife Bryan Bantry
Dave Diamond
2012 Ed Ruscha, Woody and the World's Hottest Pepper Himself
2013 Apple Misunderstood
2019 E.T.: A Holiday Reunion TV special

Feature film

Year Title Director
1998 Buffalo '66 Vincent Gallo
1999 Being John Malkovich Spike Jonze
2001 Southlander Steve Hanft
2002 The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys Peter Care
Adaptation Spike Jonze
2003 Lost in Translation Sofia Coppola
2006 Marie Antoinette
2009 Where the Wild Things Are Spike Jonze
2014 God's Pocket John Slattery

Documentary film

Year Title Director Notes
1998 Free Tibet Sarah Pirozek
2001 Chop Suey Bruce Weber With James D. Cooper and Jim Fealy
2012 Wild in the Streets Peter Baxter With Peter Baxter, Terrence Hayes, Laurent Malaquais and Mark Williams
2018 Nice Girls Don't Stay for Breakfast Bruce Weber

Music videos

Year Artist Title Director Notes
1993 The Smashing Pumpkins "Cherub Rock" Kevin Kerslake
Björk "Big Time Sensuality" Stéphane Sednaoui
1994 Youssou N'Dour and Neneh Cherry "7 Seconds"
MC Solaar "Nouveau Western"
G. Love & Special Sauce "Cold Beverage" Mark Romanek
Sonic Youth "Superstar" Dave Markey
1995 R.E.M. "Crush with Eyeliner" Spike Jonze
Ween "Freedom of '76"
Waterlillies "Never Get Enough" Christina Wayne
Method Man featuring Mary J. Blige "I'll Be There for You/You're All I Need to Get By" Diane Martel
Method Man & Redman "How High"
Björk "It's Oh So Quiet" Spike Jonze
Elastica "Car Song"
1997 Daft Punk "Da Funk"
Pond "Spokes" Mike Mills
The Chemical Brothers "Elektrobank" Spike Jonze
Björk "Bachelorette" Michel Gondry
The Notorious B.I.G. "Sky's the Limit" Spike Jonze
1998 R.E.M. "Lotus" Stéphane Sednaoui
Fatboy Slim "Praise You" Spike Jonze With Lance Bangs
1999 The Chemical Brothers "Let Forever Be" Michel Gondry
Tricky "For Real" Stéphane Sednaoui
2001 Fatboy Slim "Weapon of Choice" Spike Jonze
Dave Matthews Band "Everyday" Chuck McBride
2003 The White Stripes "I Just Don't Know What to Do with Myself" Sofia Coppola
2004 Yeah Yeah Yeahs "Y Control" Spike Jonze
2005 Björk "Triumph of a Heart"

Producer[edit]

Executive producer

References[edit]

  1. ^ American Society of Cinematographers. Archived 2008-07-04 at the Wayback Machine
  2. ^ "Lance Acord". Adforum. Retrieved 1 August 2023.
  3. ^ Diaz, Ann-Christine (November 1, 2002). "The Next Wave: Lance Acord, Park Pictures". AdAge.

External links[edit]