Guy Ritchie | |
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Ritchie at the Paris premiere of Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows in 2012
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Born |
Guy Stuart Ritchie 10 September 1968 Hatfield, Hertfordshire, England |
Occupation | Filmmaker, pub landlord, businessman, martial artist |
Years active | 1995–present |
Spouse(s) |
Madonna (m. 2000–08) Jacqui Ainsley (m. 2015) |
Children | 5 |
Guy Stuart Ritchie (born 10 September 1968) is an English filmmaker known for his crime films. He left secondary school and got entry-level jobs in the film industry in the mid-1990s. Ritchie eventually graduated to directing commercials. He directed his first film in 1995, a 20-minute short which impressed investors who backed his first feature film, the crime comedy (1998). He then directed another crime comedy, Snatch (2000). His next two films, the romantic comedy Swept Away (2002) and the crime drama Revolver (2005) were not commercial or critical successes. The next crime drama, RocknRolla (2008), received mixed reviews and a modest box office return. In 2009, he directed his first films in the action mystery genre, with Sherlock Holmes (2009) and its sequel Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2011). Both films were major box office successes, and the two films received positive, and moderately positive reviews, respectively. Ritchie has also directed the movie King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, set to be released in May 2017.
Ritchie was born in Hatfield, Hertfordshire, the second of two children of Amber (née Parkinson) and Captain John Vivian Ritchie (b. 1928), former Seaforth Highlanders serviceman and advertising executive. John's father was Major Stewart Ritchie, who died in France, in 1940, during World War II. John's mother was Doris Margaretta McLaughlin (b. 1896), daughter of Vivian Guy McLaughlin (b. 1865) and Edith Martineau (b. 1866), this last by whom she shares close common ancestors with Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge. The McLaughlins have a pedigree going back to King Edward I of England. Ritchie's mother, Amber, later married a baronet. His father's second marriage was to Shireen Ritchie, Baroness Ritchie of Brompton, a former model and later Conservative politician and life peer.