David Ansen was the Artistic Director of the Los Angeles Film Festival from 2010 until 2014. He was a reviewer and senior editor for Newsweek, where he served as the movie critic from 1977 through 2008, and has continued to contribute to the magazine in a freelance capacity. He came to Newsweek after several years as the chief film critic at Boston's The Real Paper. Ansen appeared in This Film Is Not Yet Rated.
Ansen has also written several documentaries for television, on Greta Garbo (for TNT), Groucho Marx (HBO), Elizabeth Taylor (PBS) and the Ace Award-winning All About Bette (Bette Davis) for TNT. He was on the selection committee of the New York Film Festival from 1990 to 1998.
He is a member of the New York Film Critics Circle, the National Society of Film Critics and the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, and is a three-time winner of the Page One Award from the Newspaper Guild of New York.