Accomplice Media has signed comedy director Ben Whitehouse for exclusive representation in the United States. The British-born director launched his career in 2009 and since then has established a reputation in character-driven comedy through work for Subway, Amazon, Enterprise, KFC, Specsavers, Phones 4U and others.
Starting his career as a researcher and treatment writer, Whitehouse collaborated with many top commercial directors including Traktor, Jonathan Glazer, Tom Hooper and Ivan Zacharias. This work was international including many U.S. jobs for shops like Anonymous Content and Smuggler.
Whitehouse credits these early experiences working with top directors for his ability to transform concepts into successful ads. “I learnt from the best how to structure an argument, how to focus on the core idea and how important it is to be brave and wholeheartedly commit to an approach.”
His directing career began through Joy@RSA, a division of RSA films, before joining Agile in trendy East London which continues to represent him for U.K. projects. While versatile, Whitehouse has developed a signature cinematic style combining elements of visual humor, punchy comedy and character-driven narratives.
His latest multi-campaign work for the insurance company Royal London is a classic example. The British obsession with talking about the weather is brilliantly observed through unlikely mundane moments in history ranging from Medieval witch burnings to Napoleonic battlefields.
Whitehouse was attracted to Accomplice Media by its track record in helping European directors break into the U.S. market. “Jeff [Accomplice EP Snyder] and Mel [EP Gragido] have worked around the world and understand the market that I come from,” he says. “They know how to work with directors with a British or European sensibility and how to make that fit the American market.”
Jennifer Kent On Why Her Feature Directing Debut, “The Babadook,” Continues To Haunt Us
"The Babadook," when it was released 10 years ago, didn't seem to portend a cultural sensation.
It was the first film by a little-known Australian filmmaker, Jennifer Kent. It had that strange name. On opening weekend, it played in two theaters.
But with time, the long shadows of "The Babadook" continued to envelop moviegoers. Its rerelease this weekend in theaters, a decade later, is less of a reminder of a sleeper 2014 indie hit than it is a chance to revisit a horror milestone that continues to cast a dark spell.
Not many small-budget, first-feature films can be fairly said to have shifted cinema but Kent's directorial debut may be one of them. It was at the nexus of that much-debated term "elevated horror." But regardless of that label, it helped kicked off a wave of challenging, filmmaker-driven genre movies like "It Follows," "Get Out" and "Hereditary."
Kent, 55, has watched all of this — and those many "Babadook" memes — unfold over the years with a mix of elation and confusion. Her film was inspired in part by the death of her father, and its horror elements likewise arise out of the suppression of emotions. A single mother (Essie Davis) is struggling with raising her young son (Noah Wiseman) years after the tragic death of her husband. A figure from a pop-up children's book begins to appear. As things grow more intense, his name is drawn out in three chilling syllables — "Bah-Bah-Doooook" — an incantation of unprocessed grief.
Kent recently spoke from her native Australia to reflect on the origins and continuing life of "The Babadook."
Q: Given that you didn't set out to in any way "change" horror, how have you regarded the unique afterlife of "The... Read More