Julien Magnat

One of the most visually distinctive filmmakers to emerge from the French National Film school, Julien attracted international attention with his short student film, 'The All-New Adventures of Chastity Blade', which garnered him an Academy Award nomination in 2001 and marked him as one of France's rising talents. Julien's micro-budget debut feature, 'Bloody Mallory' - a subversive take on Buffy with the outrageous aesthetics of Japanese Anime - received worldwide distribution and has gained a cult following for its colorful, gender-bending characters. Julien made his North-American debut as writer-director with 'Faces in the Crowd', an indie thriller starring Milla Jovovich as the sole witness of a murder who suffers from 'face-blindness", the inability to recognize people's faces. Julien captured the palpable strangeness of this rare condition by having each individual character played by a host of different actors. The movie was praised for its novel, inventive premise and for Jovovich's strong performance. As a writer, Julien's versatility has allowed him to delve into live-action, comic books and animation. He has penned over two hundred screenplays on various TV shows ranging from Marvel's' 'Iron Man: Armored Adventures' to Cartoon Network's 'Ben 10' and the Emmy-Award winning series 'The Garfield Show', which airs in 130 different countries. Julien has recently completed the graphic novel adaptation of Capcom's video game franchise 'Dragon Dogma'. Julien Magnat is a graduate of the French National Film School, La Fémis (MA in film & television directing) and the University of Reading, England (BA in Film & Theatre). Julien also studied documentary filmmaking at the Australian Film Television & Radio School as part of his directorial training. Julien is a professional member of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA), the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences and the Writer's Guild of America.