24 HOUR PARTY PEOPLE

A talented and intelligent British filmmaker of intense and often introspective relationship dramas, Michael Winterbottom has displayed a wide array of diverse film projects that ranged from neo-noir thrillers and political docudramas to gritty family melodramas and satirical comedies. After getting his start with Thames Television, Winterbottom made his feature debut with the lesbian-centric noir Butterfly Kiss (1995) before his ambitious take on Thomas Hardy’s novel, Jude (1996). He earned considerable international acclaim for his searing war drama, Welcome to Sarajevo (1997), which unflinchingly depicted the horror of the brutal war in Yugoslavia. After the interesting, but little-seen revisionist Western, The Claim (2000), Winterbottom offered a restless kaleidoscope of images accompanied by a stellar soundtrack for 24 Hour Party People (2002), which once again helped boost his international acclaim. By the time he directed Casey Affleck in The Killer Inside Me (2010), Winterbottom was considered to be one of the more artistically daring directors working in contemporary cinema.