Sean Fine is an American

cinematographer The cinematographer or director of photography (sometimes shortened to DP or DOP) is the person responsible for the recording of a film, television production, music video or other live-action piece. The cinematographer is the chief of the camera ...

, producer and

film director A film director or filmmaker is a person who controls a film's artistic and dramatic aspects and visualizes the screenplay (or script) while guiding the film crew and actors in the fulfillment of that Goal, vision. The director has a key role ...

whose film ''

Inocente ''Inocente'' is a 2012 short documentary film directed by Sean Fine and Andrea Nix. The film received the 2013 Academy Award for Best Documentary (Short Subject). The film is an inspiring coming-of-age story of a 15-year-old girl in California. ...

'' won the

2013 2013 was the first year since 1987 to contain four unique digits (a span of 26 years). 2013 was designated as: *International Year of Water Cooperation *International Year of Quinoa Events January * January 5 – 2013 Craig, Alask ...

Academy Award for Best Documentary (Short Subject) This is a list of films by year that have received an Academy Award together with the other nominations for best documentary short film. Following the Academy's practice, the year listed for each film is the year of release: the awards are announ ...

. He directs his films with his wife,

Andrea Nix Fine Andrea Nix Fine is an American documentary film director whose film ''Inocente'' won the Academy Award for Best Documentary (Short Subject) in 2013. She directs her films with her husband, Sean Fine. The Fines were also nominated for the Academy ...

. The Fines' first feature-length film ''

War/Dance ''War/Dance'' is a 2007 American documentary film written and directed by Sean Fine and Andrea Nix Fine, and produced by Shine Global's Susan MacLaury, a professor at Kean University, and Albie Hecht. It was nominated for the 2008 Academy ...

'' about

child soldier Children in the military, including state armed forces, non-state armed groups, and other military organizations, may be trained for combat, assigned to support roles, such as cooks, porters/couriers, or messengers, or used for tactical adv ...

s was nominated for an

Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature The Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature Film is an award for documentary films. In 1941, the first awards for feature-length documentaries were bestowed as Academy Honorary Award, Special Awards to ''Kukan'' and ''Target for Tonight''. The ...

in 2007. In 2013 their film, Life According to Sam won both a

Peabody Award The George Foster Peabody Awards (or simply Peabody Awards or the Peabodys) program, named for the American businessman and philanthropist George Foster Peabody, George Peabody, honor what are described as the most powerful, enlightening, and in ...

and an

Emmy Award The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the year, each with their own set of rules and award categor ...

for Exceptional Merit in Documentary filmmaking. The Fines launched a boutique film studio Change Content to develop documentaries that affect way audiences feel about critical issues. Change Content's first film ''

LFG LFG may refer to: * Landfill gas, a waste gas containing methane and other gases emitted by landfills * Lexical functional grammar, a theory of syntax * Lagged Fibonacci generator, an example of a pseudorandom number generator * "Looking for group ...

'' premiered at the

Tribeca Film Festival The Tribeca Festival is an annual film festival organized by Tribeca Enterprises. It takes place each spring in New York City, showcasing a diverse selection of film, episodic, talks, music, games, art, and immersive programming. The festival ...

and was instrumental in the U.S. Women's National Soccer Team achieving equal pay.

Life and career

Fine grew up around filmmaking. His parents co-directed award-winning documentary programs for

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...

and

60 Minutes ''60 Minutes'' is an American television news magazine broadcast on the CBS television network. Debuting in 1968, the program was created by Don Hewitt and Bill Leonard, who distinguished it from other news programs by using a unique style o ...

, with his father also being the

and his mother the

film editor Film editing is both a creative and a technical part of the post-production process of filmmaking. The term is derived from the traditional process of working with film stock, film which increasingly involves the use Digital cinema, of digital ...

.Interview with the Fines
International Documentary Association, official website. Retrieved December 26, 2010 Fine's grandfather was the photographer for the

Washington Redskins The Washington Commanders are a professional American football team based in the Washington metropolitan area. The Commanders compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the National Football Conference (NFC) NFC East, East ...

for over 50 years, making Fine a 3rd generation photographer. He attributes his eye to learning from his father and grandfather, and his editing skills to watching his mother work throughout his childhood. He attended

Georgetown Day School Georgetown Day School (GDS) is an independent coeducational PK-12 school located in Washington, D.C. The school educates 1,075 elementary, middle, and high school students in northwestern Washington, D.C. Russell Shaw is the current Head of Sch ...

Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...

, and is a 1996 graduate of

Connecticut College Connecticut College (Conn) is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in New London, Connecticut. Originally chartered as Thames College, it was founded in 1911 as the state's only women's colle ...

, where he earned a degree in

Zoology Zoology ( , ) is the scientific study of animals. Its studies include the anatomy, structure, embryology, Biological classification, classification, Ethology, habits, and distribution of all animals, both living and extinction, extinct, and ...

. It was not until he took a summer film course at

NYU Tisch School of the Arts The New York University Tisch School of the Arts (commonly referred to as Tisch) is the performing, cinematic, and media arts school of New York University. Founded on August 17, 1965, as the School of the Arts at New York University, Tisch is ...

that he realized he wanted to make films for a living. After graduating from college, he went to work for ''

National Geographic ''National Geographic'' (formerly ''The National Geographic Magazine'', sometimes branded as ''Nat Geo'') is an American monthly magazine published by National Geographic Partners. The magazine was founded in 1888 as a scholarly journal, nine ...

'', where he met his wife, Andrea Nix. Within a year after starting to work for ''National Geographic'', he was directing his first documentary, which won two national

s. During his time at ''National Geographic'', Fine traveled to over 30 countries and gained experience shooting in very difficult and remote locations. In 2004, Fine and his wife left ''National Geographic'' to start their own production company, ''Fine Films''. They decided to make a documentary about the twenty-year-old civil war in northern

Uganda Uganda, officially the Republic of Uganda, is a landlocked country in East Africa. It is bordered to the east by Kenya, to the north by South Sudan, to the west by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, to the south-west by Rwanda, and to the ...

after having been contacted by a non-profit, Shine Global. Their son was a year old at the time of filming, causing them to stay in separate parts of Uganda during filming due to the dangers involved.Benjamin Crossley-Marra
Interview
Ion Cinema, official website. November 8, 2007. Retrieved December 26, 2010 He was nominated for an

Academy Award The Academy Awards, commonly known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit in film. They are presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) in the United States in recognition of excellence ...

for Best Documentary Feature in 2007 for ''War/Dance'', which he produced with his wife, Andrea Nix.The New York Times
/ref> They also collaborated on the 2013 documentary, '' Life According to Sam'', produced by

HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American pay television service, which is the flagship property of namesake parent-subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is based a ...

and the 2021 documentary ''

'' about the U.S. Women's National Soccer Team's fight for

equal pay Equal pay for equal work is the concept of labour rights that individuals in the same workplace be given equal pay. It is most commonly used in the context of sexual discrimination, in relation to the gender pay gap. Equal pay relates to the full ...

Filmography

* ''

'' (2007) * '' Lindsey Vonn: In the Moment'' (2011) * ''

'' (2012) * '' Life According to Sam'' (2013) * ''

'' (2021) * '' The Sixth'' (2024)

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Fine, Sean American documentary film directors Living people Connecticut College alumni Directors of Best Documentary Short Subject Academy Award winners Place of birth missing (living people) Year of birth missing (living people) Georgetown Day School alumni