Denis Villeneuve

Denis Villeneuve
Villeneuve at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival
Born	(1967-10-03) October 3, 1967 (age 49) Trois-Rivières, Quebec, Canada
Occupation	Film director, screenwriter
Years active	1994–present
Spouse(s)	Tanya Lapointe

Denis Villeneuve (French: [dəni vilnœv]; born October 3, 1967) is a French Canadian film director and writer. He is an Academy Award nominee for best direction for Arrival and a three-time winner of the Genie Award for Best Direction, for Maelström in 2001, Polytechnique in 2010 and Incendies in 2011. All three films also won the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television Award for Best Motion Picture.

Internationally, he is best known for his crime-thriller films, including Prisoners (2013) and Sicario (2015), and the critically acclaimed science fiction drama Arrival (2016).

Villeneuve was born on October 3, 1967 in Trois-Rivières, Quebec, the son of Nicole Demers and Jean Villeneuve. He studied at the Université du Québec à Montréal. He is married to Tanya Lapointe and has three children from a previous relationship. He is the older brother of filmmaker Martin Villeneuve.

Villeneuve began his career making short films and won the Radio-Canada's youth film competition La Course Europe-Asie in 1990–91.

Villeneuve first caught attention for his 2001 film Maelström which screened at festivals worldwide and won dozens of awards, including 8 Jutra Awards and 'Best Canadian Film' from the Toronto International Film Festival. He followed that up with the controversial, but critically acclaimed film Polytechnique (2009) about the shootings that occurred at the Montreal university.