Gregor "Gore" Verbinski (born March 16, 1964) is
an American
film director and
writer.
Personal life
Verbinski
was born the third of five children to Vic and Laurette Verbinski
in Oak Ridge,
Tennessee
. His siblings are Janine, Claire, Diane and
Steven.
His father was of Polish descent and worked
as a nuclear physicist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory
. In 1967 the Verbinski family moved to
Southern California, where a
young Gregor grew up in the town of La Jolla
.
Gregor was an active
Boy Scout and
surf regularly.
He went to Torrey
Pines Elementary, Muirlands Junior High, and La Jolla High
School
before attending UCLA
Film School. Verbinski graduated with his BFA in Film from UCLA
in
1987.
He and his wife Clayton have two children, Anton and Ivan.
Career
His first band was
Thelonius Monster, which included
drummer
Danny Heifetz. He also played
in two local bands,
The Drivers and
The Little
Kings – which backed
Stiv Bators on
"
Have Love Will Travel"; the
song was included on Bators' compilation album
L.A. L.A. –
and the all-star band
The Cylon Boys Choir.
His first films were a series of 8 mm films called "The Driver
Files" circa 1979, when he was a young teen. Although most
associate Verbinski with
feature films,
he started his career directing music videos for bands like
Bad Religion,
NOFX,
24-7 Spyz and
Monster Magnet working
at Palomar Pictures. This was not surprising to his friends in Los
Angeles, since he also played music for various punk and rock bands
including The Little Kings, Bulldozer and the
Daredevils, which included then-departed
member of Bad Religion
Brett
Gurewitz.
Verbinski
moved from music videos to commercials, where he worked for many
brand names including Nike
, Coca-Cola, Canon,
Skittles and United Airlines.
One of his most famous commercials was for
Budweiser, featuring frogs who croak the brand
name. For his efforts in commercials, Verbinski won four
Clio Awards and one
Cannes
Advertising Silver Lion.
After completing a short film,
The Ritual (which he both
wrote and directed), Verbinski made his feature film directing
debut with his comedy flick,
Mouse
Hunt. The film was a hit globally and he soon followed up
the success with the action/comedy
The
Mexican, starring
Julia
Roberts and
Brad Pitt. The film
received mixed reviews, and performed modestly at the box-office,
earning $68 million domestically which was quite meager considering
its star power (it was technically successful due to its moderately
low $38 million budget). Verbinski followed it up with the Japanese
horror film remake
The
Ring (2002), which struck gold globally, grossing well
over $200 million worldwide. Verbinski also had a directorial hand
in
The Time
Machine that year, temporarily taking over for an
exhausted
Simon Wells. Verbinski
directed some of the underground Morlock sequences and is given a
Thanks to credit in the film.
He then directed the very successful
Pirates
of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl which
earned over $600 million at the international box office.
His next film was
The Weather
Man which starred
Nicolas
Cage. The film received mixed to positive reviews but was a box
office failure.
In March 2005 he started filming the sequels
Pirates of the
Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest and
Pirates of the
Caribbean: At World's End. The former then became his
biggest success so far, becoming the third film ever to gross over
$1 billion at the international box office.
His future project will be an adaption of
William Monahan's novel
Light House: A Trifle, which is a
story about an artist running away from the Mafia who hides in a
lighthouse, in which kooky characters live. He will also direct
Butterfly, about a man
trying to drive his wife insane.
Verbinksi was also set to direct a
film for Universal based on the video game,
BioShock. However he has since
been replaced by
Juan Carlos
Fresnadillo as director, but he will still produce.
Music videos
Filmography
References
- The Cut Scene - Video Game Blog by Variety: Gore
Verbinski talks about directing the Bioshock movie
-
http://kotaku.com/5343933/bioshock-movie-gets-a-new-director
-
http://kotaku.com/5343933/bioshock-movie-gets-a-new-director
External links
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