John Irvin

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John Irvin (born May 7, 1940 in Newcastle upon Tyne) is an English film director. He began his career by directing a number of television episodes, including the BBC adaptation of John le Carré's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, In the 1980s, Irvin made several action films with violent, gritty scenes of gunfire. In the 1990s and 2000s, Irvin directed films such as Robin Hood, City of Industry (1997), and The Moon and the Stars (2007).

[edit] Career

Irvin directed his first films in the 1960s, such as Gala Day (1963), the made-for-TV movie East of Howerd (1966), Bedtime (1967), and Mafia No! (1967). In the 1970s, Irvin directed exclusively for television, including drama episodes and made-for-TV movies. In the mid-1970s, he made Possessions (1974) and Haunted: The Ferryman (1974), and the pilot for The Nearly Man (1974) and seven episodes over 1975. In 1977, he directed an episode for ITV Playhouse and did an episode for the Hard Times series. In 1979, Irvin made episodes for the BBC adaptation of John le Carré's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy,

In the 1980s, Irvin made several action films with violent, gritty scenes of gunfire, such as the The Dogs of War (1981), a film about a mercenary team that attacks an African country; Raw Deal (1986), an action film, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger about an FBI agent who extracts a bloody revenge against a Mafia organization; the Vietnam War story Hamburger Hill (1987), about a violent, close-quarters battle in which US soldiers attacked a well-fortified North Vietnamese Army position; and Next of Kin (1989), an action film starring Patrick Swayze, about a police officer who starts a clan feud against a Mafia family to exact revenge for his brother's death.

Irvin's other films from the 1980s include the horror film Ghost Story (1981); Champions (1984), starring John Hurt; Turtle Diary (1985) a romantic-drama film based on the novel of the same name, which tells the story of a lonely man and woman from London who help a turtle escape from a zoo.

In 1991, Irvin directed the made-for-TV movie Robin Hood, which starred Patrick Bergin and Uma Thurman. Irvin also directed a number of dramatic films, such as Eminent Domain (1991), Freefall (1994), Widows' Peak (1994), A Month by the Lake (1995), the crime film City of Industry (1997), and When Trumpets Fade (1998). In the 2000s, Irvin directed Shiner (2000), The Fourth Angel (2001), The Boys from County Clare (2003), Dot.Kill (2005), The Fine Art of Love: Mine Ha-Ha (2005), and The Moon and the Stars (2007).