James Gray (film director)

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Born in 1969 in Brooklyn, New York, James Gray is a film director and screenwriter.

He grew up in Queens, New York. He has stated that seeing Francis Ford Coppola's film Apocalypse Now at age 10 was a turning point for his future life.^{[citation needed]} Having shown early interest in drawing and pictorial art, his interests subsequently expanded to filmmaking.^{[citation needed]} He attended the University of Southern California, where his student film Cowboys and Angels received favorable reviews.^{[citation needed]}

In 1994, at age 25, he made his first feature film Little Odessa, a dark film about a hit man confronted by his younger brother upon returning to his hometown, "Little Odessa" a section of Brighton Beach, Brooklyn. This tense psychological drama was critically praised. In 2000, Miramax produced his second film, The Yards, written and shot in 1998. This film, in which Gray revisited the film noir genre, received a nomination at the Cannes Film Festival.^{[citation needed]}

In the interim, Gray turned down several scripts, among them The Devil's Own, directed later by Alan J. Pakula, in 1997.^{[citation needed]} He also wrote an adaptation of Philip K. Dick's novel Paycheck, but no studio opted to produce it.^{[citation needed]} He has also worked on several films as cinematographer and appeared in one as an actor.^{[citation needed]}