Matthew Lessner is an independent award-winning filmmaker who lives and works between New York City and Los Angeles.[1]
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Born in Walnut Creek, California,[2] Lessner was raised in Roseburg, Oregon, where he attended Roseburg High School.[1][3] He graduated in 2005 from Chapman University, where he studied film.[4]
Lessner's directorial debut was the 2005 short film Darling Darling starring Michael Cera, which screened at the Festival du Court Metrage de Clermont-Ferrand, Comedia, and the Ann Arbor Film Festival where Lessner won the Tom Berman Most Promising Filmmaker Award.[5] The film is included on the sixth issue of Wholphin DVD magazine with alternate audio versions by John Cleese and Daniel Handler.[6]
Lessner's second short film, By Modern Measure, premiered at South by Southwest[7] and also screened at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival.[8]
In August 2008, Lessner began work on his first feature film The Woods, which was filmed in the woods around Lookingglass, Oregon.[1][3] The Woods was invited to world premiere at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival. [9] The film made history as the first film to premiere at the Sundance Film Festival that used Kickstarter for production financing.[10] The Woods premiered in New York at the BAMcinemaFest held at the Brooklyn Academy of Music .[11] The Woods premiered internationally at the Cologne Conference in Cologne, Germany.[12]
In August 2011, Lessner was awarded a San Francisco Film Society and Kenneth Rainin Foundation Filmmaking Grant for screenwriting in support of feature film tentatively titled ROSS. [13]
Lessner directed the music video for the Dirty Projectors' single "Stillness is the Move".[14] He also directed the videos for the The Raveonettes' song "Last Dance"[15] and Fool's Gold's "Surprise Hotel".[16]
In the spring of 2008 Lessner worked as an intern for syndicated news program Democracy Now! [17]
| Year | Title | Format |
|---|---|---|
| 2005 | Darling Darling | Short Film |
| 2007 | By Modern Measure | Short Film |
| 2011 | The Woods | Feature Film |
| (unknown) | ROSS | Feature Film |
| Year | Song Title | Band | Label |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2009 | "Set in Stone" | Fires of Rome | The Hours Records |
| 2009 | "Set in Stone" M83 Remix | Fires of Rome | The Hours Records |
| 2009 | "Stillness is the Move" | Dirty Projectors | Domino Records |
| 2009 | "Surprise Hotel" | Fool's Gold | IAMSOUND Records |
| 2009 | "Last Dance" | The Raveonettes | Vice Records |
| 2009 | "Early Warnings" | Foreign Born | Secretly Canadian |
| 2010 | "Forgive Me" | Le Loup | Hardly Art |
| 2010 | "World News" | Local Natives | Frenchkiss Records |
| 2010 | "Neverest" | Hey Champ | Townie Records |
| Year | Subject | Title | Format |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | Dirty Projectors + Björk | Mount Wittenberg Orca I, II, III, V VI | Album Trailers |
| 2011 | Explosions in the Sky | "Last Known Surroundings" | Video Installation |