Cirrus@Austlit

Award-winning film director.

Born in Sydney, Weir attended The Scots College and Vaucluse Boys' High School, then undertook an Arts/Law degree at the University of Sydney, where his fellow students included Phillip Noyce and the film-makers who would form the film-making collective Ubu Films.

After leaving university in the mid-1960s, Weir began work with television station ATN-7, where he was a production assistant on The Mavis Bramston Show. Using the facilities available to him in the station, Weir made two short films in 1968: the 16-minute Count Vim's Last Exercise and the thirty-seven-minute The Life and Times of the Reverend Buck Shotte.

After ATN-7, Weir went to work with the Commonwealth Film Unit (now Film Australia), for which he made a number of documentaries, including Whatever Happened to Green Valley? (1973), for which residents of an underprivileged outer Sydney suburb were invited to make their own film segments. He continued to make short films, including the six-minute Stirring the Pool (1969), and began making longer works, including the fifty-minute comedy Man on a Green Bike (1969), which he co-wrote with Grahame Bond, soon to come to prominence with The Aunty Jack Show.

In 1970, he was one of three writer-directors for the three-part film Three to Go: he wrote and directed the segment 'Michael', while other segments were written and directed by Brian Hannant and Bob Ellis ('Judy') and Oliver Howes ('Toula'). The film won producer Gil Brealey the Australian Film Institute Grand Prix in 1970.

Shortly after this, Weir made his first major film: the independent film Homesdale (1971), a black (and black-and-white) comedy starring Kate Fitzpatrick and Grahame Bond. He continued to make documentaries for the Commonwealth Film Unit throughout the early 1970s: titles listed under his name on the Internet Movie Database include Incredible Floridas, Boat Building, The Billiard Room, The Computer Centre, The Field Day, and Three Directions in Pop Music (all 1972).

In 1974, Weir directed his first feature film, The Cars that Ate Paris, a small-town horror film based on a story by Weir, Keith Gow, and Piers Davies. A minor success (and popular in the then thriving drive-in circuit), the film was overshadowed a year later by Weir's first major success: Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975). Adapted by script-writer Cliff Green from Joan Lindsay's novel, the film won or was nominated for a plethora of awards: two Saturn Awards (a win for Best Cinematography and a nomination for Best Writing, 1979), an AWGIE Award (a win for Feature Film, 1976), three BAFTA Awards (a win for Best Cinematography and nominations for Best Costume Design and Best Sound Track, 1977), a British Cinematography Award (nomination, 1976), and the Golden Charybdis at the Taormina International Film Festival (1976).

Weir followed Picnic at Hanging Rock with a return to television, directing two episodes of Luke's Kingdom, an historical series starring British actor Oliver Tobias, as well as directing Judy Morris, Ivar Kants, and Robert Coleby in the telemovie The Plumber (1977). But from the mid-1970s, he was more occupied with films than with television.

In 1977, he directed the supernatural thriller The Last Wave, which attracted awards and nominations across the spectrum of organisations: Saturn Awards (nominations for Best Director and Best Fantasy Film, 1980), AFI Awards (wins for cinematography and sound, and nominations for editing and music, as well as for Best Director and Best Screenplay: Original, 1978), and the Special Jury Award at the Avoriaz Fantastic Film Festival (1978).

Successful as both Picnic at Hanging Rock and The Last Wave were, however, they were overshadowed by 1981's Gallipoli: written by David Williamson from a story by Weir, the film was instrumental in the development of Mel Gibson's film career, and attracted eight AFI Awards (including Best Director, Best Film, and Best Screenplay: Original or Adapted) and an additional four nominations (1981); Cinematographer of the Year for director of photography Russell Boyd (Australian Cinematographers Society, 1982); an AWGIE Award for Feature Film: Original for Williamson (1981); an NBR Award from the National Board of Review, United States (1981); and a Golden Globe nomination for Best Foreign Film (1982).

In 1982, Weir directed Gibson again, in The Year of Living Dangerously. The film's accolades centred on Linda Hunt, who won numerous awards, including an Oscar, for her performance as photographer Billy Kwan. But it was also nominated for twelve AFI Awards (including for Best Director, Best Film, and Best Screenplay: Adapted, 1983), the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival (1983), and a WGA Award (Writers Guild of America) for Best Drama Adapted from Another Medium.

The Year of Living Dangerously was Weir's final film before he began working in the United States. In 1985, he made the first of two back-to-back films with Harrison Ford: Witness, in which a detective goes into hiding in an Amish community to protect his young witness, won two Oscars (including for Best Writing: Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen), and attracted Weir's first Oscar nomination for Best Director (and an additional five Oscar nominations, including for Best Picture). It also won a BAFTA Award and was nominated for six more (including Best Film), was nominated for six Golden Globes (including Best Director and Best Motion Picture: Drama), and attracted a plethora of other awards and nominations. Weir followed this with his second film starring Ford: The Mosquito Coast (1986) attracted fewer awards than Weir's earlier films, but was nominated for two Golden Globes.

Weir's next film, Dead Poet's Society (1989), won an Oscar for the screenplay, and gained Weir his second nomination for Best Director: in addition to other awards and nominations, it won two BAFTAs and was nominated for four more (including Best Direction) and was nominated for four Golden Globe Awards (including Best Director: Motion Picture).

Green Card (1990), the first film in some time that Weir had both written and directed, attracted an Oscar nomination for Best Writing (Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen, 1991), a BAFTA Award nomination (for Best Screenplay: Original, 1992), and a WGA award nomination (for Best Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen), and won Weir a Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture: Comedy/Musical.

Fearless (1993), directed to a screenplay by Rafael Yglesias (and based on Yglesias's novel) was lauded primarily for its acting (including an Oscar nomination), but also attracted a nomination for Weir for the Golden Berlin Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival (1994). The awards continued to increase with Weir's next film, The Truman Show (1998), with twenty-nine wins and thirty-six nominations, including three Oscar nominations (including another for Best Director), two Saturn Awards (Best Fantasy Film and Best Writer) and three more nominations (Weir's first Saturn Awards since The Last Wave), an AFI Award nomination for Best Foreign Film Award, three BAFTAs and four more nominations, and three Golden Globes plus an additional three nominations. Finally, the film won 1999's Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation (presented to Weir and script-writer Andrew Niccol).

In 2003, Weir directed Master And Commander: The Far Side of the World. Based on Patrick O'Brian's novels and written by Weir and John Collee, the film attracted even more awards and nominations than The Truman Show, with an AFI Award, two Oscars and an additional eight nominations (including Best Director and Best Picture), four BAFTAs (including the David Lean Award for Direction) and an additional four nominations, and three Golden Globe nominations (including Best Director and Best Motion Picture: Drama), as well as a slew of other awards and nominations.

Most recently, Weir directed The Way Back, co-written by Weir and Keith Clarke, which attracted an Oscar nomination (for Best Achievement in Makeup) and a number of acting awards.