François Ozon
François Ozon (born 15 November 1967) is a French film director and screenwriter and whose films are usually characterized by sharp satirical wit and a freewheeling view on human sexuality. He has achieved international acclaim for his films 8 femmes (2002) and Swimming Pool (2003). Ozon is considered to be one of the most important young French film directors in the new “New Wave” in French cinema such as Jean-Paul Civeyrac, Philippe Ramos, and Yves Caumon, as well as a group of French filmmak
Defining films
In their own words
It was a way for me to pay tribute to melodrama, a genre I love. The Red Shoes (1948) by Powell and Pressburger, and the films of Douglas Sirk and Vincente Minnelli were very much in my mind.
Ozon cites directors as diverse as Alfred Hitchcock (Rear Window [1954]), Claude Chabrol (La Cérémonie [1995]) and Michael Haneke (Caché [2005]) as important cinematic touchstones.
I wanted to stay in this genre and keep this suspense that you find in Hitchcock or Buñuel, and in French cinema in Chabrol. It's really psychological horror, a thriller where you don't know if the character is mad or not.
Ozon cites directors as diverse as Alfred Hitchcock (Rear Window), Claude Chabrol (La Cérémonie) and Michael Haneke (Caché) as important cinematic touchstones.
Critical context
b. November 15, 1967, Paris, France
Films by decade
