Joanna Hogg (born 20 March 1960) is a British

film director A film director controls a film's artistic and dramatic aspects and visualizes the screenplay (or script) while guiding the film crew and actors in the fulfilment of that vision. The director has a key role in choosing the cast members, pr ...

and screenwriter. She made her directorial and screenwriting feature film debut in 2007 with '' Unrelated'' followed by ''

Archipelago An archipelago ( ), sometimes called an island group or island chain, is a chain, cluster, or collection of islands, or sometimes a sea containing a small number of scattered islands. Examples of archipelagos include: the Indonesian Arch ...

'' (2010) and ''

Exhibition An exhibition, in the most general sense, is an organized presentation and display of a selection of items. In practice, exhibitions usually occur within a cultural or educational setting such as a museum, art gallery, park, library, exhibitio ...

'' (2013). Two of her films, '' The Souvenir'' (2019) and '' The Souvenir Part II'' (2021), topped the '' Sight & Sound'' annual poll for best film in their respective years, receiving nominations at the British Independent Film Awards, the

Independent Spirit Awards The Independent Spirit Awards (abbreviated Spirit Awards and originally known as the FINDIE or Friends of Independents Awards), founded in 1984, are awards dedicated to independent filmmakers. Winners were typically presented with acrylic gla ...

and at the Berlin International Film Festival.

Career

Early TV work

After leaving school in the late 1970s, Hogg worked as a photographer and began to make experimental super-8 films after borrowing a camera from Derek Jarman, who became an early mentor after a chance meeting in Patisserie Valerie in Soho. One of these, a film about a kinetic sculpture by artist Ron Haselden, won her a place to study direction at the

National Film and Television School The National Film and Television School (NFTS) is a film, television and games school established in 1971 and based at Beaconsfield Studios in Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire, England. It is featured in the 2021 ranking by ''The Hollywood Rep ...

. In 1986, her graduation piece called ''Caprice'' starred

Tilda Swinton Katherine Matilda Swinton (born 5 November 1960) is a British actress. Known for her roles in independent films and blockbusters, she has received various accolades, including an Academy Award and a British Academy Film Award, in addition t ...

.Roger Clark
"Talent issue - the film director: Joanna Hogg"
''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publish ...

'', 29 December 2007. Retrieved 18 August 2010 On graduation, Hogg directed several music videos for artists such as

Alison Moyet Geneviève Alison Jane Ballard ( ; born 18 June 1961) is an English singer noted for her powerful bluesy contralto voice. She came to prominence as half of the duo Yazoo (also known as Yaz), but has since mainly worked as a solo artist. He ...

, and won her first television commission writing and directing a programme segment for

Janet Street Porter Janet Vera Street-Porter (''née'' Bull; born 27 December 1946) is an English broadcaster, journalist, writer, and media personality. She began her career as a fashion writer and columnist at the ''Daily Mail'' and was later appointed fashion e ...

Channel Four Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a fourth television service in ...

series ''

Network 7 ''Network 7'' was a short-lived but influential youth music and current affairs programme screened on Channel 4 over two series in 1987 and 1988. The series was created by Jane Hewland and Janet Street-Porter, who was also editor of the first se ...

'', ''Flesh + Blood''. In the 1990s, Hogg directed episodes of ''

London Bridge Several bridges named London Bridge have spanned the River Thames between the City of London and Southwark, in central London. The current crossing, which opened to traffic in 1973, is a box girder bridge built from concrete and steel. It re ...

'', '' Casualty'' and '' London's Burning''. She also directed the ''

EastEnders ''EastEnders'' is a Television in the United Kingdom, British soap opera created by Julia Smith (producer), Julia Smith and Tony Holland which has been broadcast on BBC One since February 1985. Set in the fictional borough of Walford in the Ea ...

'' special ''EastEnders: Dot's Story'' (2003).

Film

Hogg has said, "I wanted to make a film doing everything I was told not to do in television". She shot her first feature, '' Unrelated'' (2007), in

Tuscany it, Toscano (man) it, Toscana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Citizenship , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = Italian , demogra ...

. It tells the story of a childless woman, Anna (Kathryn Worth), of around forty who goes on holiday to Italy with her friend Verena (Mary Roscoe) and her teenage family. Over the course of the holiday, tensions emerge as Anna spends less time with the 'grown-ups' and is drawn towards the teenage crowd and the attractions of Verena's teenage nephew ( Tom Hiddleston). The film received critical acclaim, premiering at the

London Film Festival The BFI London Film Festival is an annual film festival founded in 1957 and held in the United Kingdom, running for two weeks in October with co-operation from the British Film Institute. It screens more than 300 films, documentaries and shor ...

in 2007 and winning the

FIPRESCI The International Federation of Film Critics (FIPRESCI, short for Fédération Internationale de la PRESse CInématographique) is an association of national organizations of professional film critics and film journalists from around the world fo ...

International Critics Award. It also won the Guardian First Film Award in 2008 and the Evening Standard British Film Awards 'Most Promising Newcomer' Award in 2009, as well as being nominated for their Best Film Award and earning Hogg a nomination for the London Film Critics' Circle 'Breakthrough Filmmaker' Award in 2009. Her second film, ''

'', shot on the island of Tresco had its UK premiere at the 2010

, where it was nominated in the Best Film category. It was released in the UK on 4 March 2011 by

Artificial Eye Curzon Film (), formerly known as Artificial Eye or Curzon Artificial Eye, is a British film distributor, specialising in independent, foreign-language and art house films for cinema and home entertainment. History Artificial Eye was founded i ...

. Her third film ''

'' starred musician

Viv Albertine Viviane Katrina Louise Albertine (born 1 December 1954) is an Australian-born British musician, singer, songwriter and writer. She is best known as the guitarist for the punk band the Slits from 1977 until 1982, with whom she recorded two studio ...

and artist Liam Gillick and also featured Hogg's long-time collaborator Tom Hiddleston. The film premiered at the Locarno Film Festival in 2013. Peter Bradshaw writing in ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers '' The Observer'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the ...

'' hailed it as 'a masterful cinematic enigma' awarding it the full five stars. In the A24 podcast episode "A Bigger Canvas",

Martin Scorsese Martin Charles Scorsese ( , ; born November 17, 1942) is an American film director, producer, screenwriter and actor. Scorsese emerged as one of the major figures of the New Hollywood era. He is the recipient of many major accolades, incl ...

has a conversation with Hogg where it is revealed that he saw her film ''Archipelago'' and reached out to her wanting to collaborate with her. He served as an executive producer for her next film, '' The Souvenir'' (2019). The film premiered in the

Sundance Film Festival The Sundance Film Festival (formerly Utah/US Film Festival, then US Film and Video Festival) is an annual film festival organized by the Sundance Institute. It is the largest independent film festival in the United States, with more than 46,6 ...

. It was released in the United States on 17 May 2019 by A24 and in the United Kingdom on 30 August 2019 by Curzon Artificial Eye. The title refers to the painting of the same name by

Jean-Honoré Fragonard Jean-Honoré Fragonard (; 5 April 1732 (birth/baptism certificate) – 22 August 1806) was a French painter and printmaker whose late Rococo manner was distinguished by remarkable facility, exuberance, and hedonism. One of the most prolific ...

and Hogg's personal life, with the performance of Honor Swinton Byrne, Tom Burke and

. The film was nominated in several film awards cerimony and festivals, including the Berlin International Film Festival, the British Independent Film Awards and the

. The sequel, '' The Souvenir Part II,'' had its premier at

Cannes Film Festival The Cannes Festival (; french: link=no, Festival de Cannes), until 2003 called the International Film Festival (') and known in English as the Cannes Film Festival, is an annual film festival held in Cannes, France, which previews new films ...

in July 2021, receiving critical acclaim, with nominations at the British Independent Film Awards, the

Gotham Awards The Gotham Awards () are American film awards, presented annually to the makers of independent films at a ceremony in New York City, the city first nicknamed "Gotham" by native son Washington Irving, in an issue of ''Salmagundi'', published o ...

and at the London Film Critics' Circle. Hogg's newest film, '' The Eternal Daughter'', is a mystery-drama film starring

. The film is set to premier at the 2022 Venice Film Festival.

Radio

In 2015 Hogg directed

Harold Pinter Harold Pinter (; 10 October 1930 – 24 December 2008) was a British playwright, screenwriter, director and actor. A Nobel Prize winner, Pinter was one of the most influential modern British dramatists with a writing career that span ...

's unproduced film screenplay adaptation of the short story by

Karen Blixen Baroness Karen Christenze von Blixen-Finecke (born Dinesen; 17 April 1885 – 7 September 1962) was a Danish author who wrote works in Danish and English. She is also known under her pen names Isak Dinesen, used in English-speaking countrie ...

"The Dreaming Child" for Radio 4, adapting the screenplay with producer Laurence Bowen. It starred Lydia Leonard, who worked with Hogg on ''

'' and

Bertie Carvel Robert Hugh Carvel (born 6 September 1977) is a British actor. He has twice won a Laurence Olivier Award: for Best Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical for his role as Miss Trunchbull in '' Matilda the Musical'', and for Best Actor in a Suppor ...

Gallery curation

In October 2015 Hogg co-curated the retrospective exhibition of film maker

Chantal Akerman Chantal Anne Akerman (; 6 June 19505 October 2015) was a Belgian film director, screenwriter, artist, and film professor at the City College of New York. She is best known for films such as ''Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles' ...

's installation work, "Chantal Akerman NOW", at the Ambika P3 Gallery. This was the culmination of a two-year-long retrospective of Akerman's work she had programmed with Adam Roberts, with whom she founded the cinema collective A Nos Amours in 2011. The collective is "dedicated to programming over-looked, under-exposed or especially potent cinema". In an interview, Hogg said that 'A new generation is growing up who actually don't know the work of directors like Tarkovsky', as a major motivation behind establishing the collective.

Influences and style

Hogg's style is influenced by European and Asian directors such as Eric Rohmer and Yasujirō Ozu, using extended takes and minimal camera movement. She takes the unusual approach of casting a mixture of actors and non-professional actors in her films, such as the landscape painter Christopher Baker in ''

''. Her depiction of unarguably middle-class characters has prompted some commentators to see her work as spearheading a new type of social realism in British film. In an interview with

Vogue Vogue may refer to: Business * ''Vogue'' (magazine), a US fashion magazine ** British ''Vogue'', a British fashion magazine ** ''Vogue Arabia'', an Arab fashion magazine ** ''Vogue Australia'', an Australian fashion magazine ** ''Vogue China'', ...

in 2021, Hogg mentioned women directors

Chloe Zhao Chloe (; ), also spelled Chloë, Chlöe, or Chloé, is a feminine name meaning "blooming" or "fertility" in Greek. The name ultimately derives, through Greek, from the Proto-Indo-European root ', which relates to the colors yellow and green. ...

and

Mia Hansen-Løve Mia Hansen-Løve (born 5 February 1981) is a French film director, screenwriter, and former actress. She has won several accolades for her work. Her first feature film, '' All Is Forgiven'', won the Louis Delluc Prize for Best First Film in 2007 ...

as two friends and inspirations for her productions.

Filmography

Film

Television

* ''Flesh + Blood'' (miniseries for

)

(1988) * ''Kersplat'' (six episodes) Channel Four (1991) * ''Dance Eight'' BBC (1992) * ''Going Underground''

Carlton Television Carlton Television (now part of the non-franchised ITV London region) was the ITV franchise holder for London and the surrounding counties from 9.25am every Monday to 5.15pm every Friday. The company is now managed with London Weekend Tele ...

(1992) * ''Oasis'' (10-part drama) Carlton Television (1992) * ''London Bridge'' Carlton Television (16 episodes 1995–1996) * ''Staying Alive'' (two episodes) LWT (1997) * ''Casualty'' (TV series) BBC (1997–1998) * '' London's Burning'' LWT (1999) * ''Reach for the Moon'' (three episodes) LWT (2000) * ''

: Dot's Story'' BBC (2003)

Awards and nominations

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Hogg, Joanna 1960 births English film directors English screenwriters English women film directors Living people Writers from London WFTV Award winners Alumni of the National Film and Television School Sundance Film Festival award winners