John Landis

John Landis is the award-winning director (producer, writer or co-writer) of many acclaimed motion pictures. These include, ANIMAL HOUSE, THE BLUES BROTHERS, AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON, TRADING PLACES, and THREE AMIGOS, INTO THE NIGHT, SPIES LIKE US, COMING TO AMERICA and INNOCENT BLOOD. So impressed was Michael Jackson with AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON, he asked Landis to write and direct the groundbreaking music video Michael Jackson’s THRILLER. Landis and Jackson later collaborated on Michael Jackson’s music video BLACK OR WHITE.

John Landis’ honors include the Peoples’ Choice Award, the W.C. Handy Award, the Cable Ace Award and the NAACP Image Award. John Landis was made a Chevalier dans l’ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French Government in 1985, was awarded the Federico Fellini Prize by Rimini Cinema Festival in Italy, and was named a George Eastman Scholar by The Eastman House. The Edinburgh Film Festival, the Torino Film Festival and the International Film Festival of India have held career retrospectives of his films. In February 2009, a Landis Retrospective will be held at the Cinemathèque Française in Paris. In 2004, Landis received the Time Machine Career Achievement Award at the Sitges Film Festival in Spain. Landis edited Best American Movie Writing 2001 (Thunder’s Mouth Press, 2001). Giulia D’Agnolo Vallan’s book, JOHN LANDIS was published by M Press, a division of Dark Horse in 2008.John Landis’ feature length Emmy winning documentary “Mr. Warmth: The Don Rickles Project” premiered at the New York Film Festival on October 13th, 2007, and on HBO in December 2, 2007. Landis will be directing BURKE AND HARE, a very black romantic comedy for Ealing Films in London spring 2009.