Thomas Vinterberg (; born 19 May 1969) is a Danish film director who, along with Lars von Trier, co-founded the Dogme 95 movement in filmmaking, which established rules for simplifying movie production. He is best known for the films The Celebration (1998), Submarino (2010), The Hunt (2012), Far from the Madding Crowd (2015), and Another Round (2020). For Another Round he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director, the first Danish filmmaker nominated in the Best Director category.
Early life and education
Vinterberg was born in Frederiksberg, Denmark. In 1993, he graduated from the National Film School of Denmark with ' (Sidste omgang), which won the jury and producers' awards at the Internationales Festival der Filmhochschulen München, and First Prize at Tel Aviv.
Career
In 1993 Vinterberg made his first TV drama for DR TV and his short fiction film ', produced by at Nimbus Film. The film won awards at the 1994 Nordisk Panorama Film Festival, the International Short Film Festival in Clermont-Ferrand, and the Toronto International Film Festival. At the turn of the century, Vinterberg participated in the experimental broadcast D-dag, where he and three other filmmakers directed broadcasts on four different channels, with the viewer able to switch between them and create their own viewing experience. A final edit was released in 2001.
In 2003, he directed the apocalyptic science fiction romance-drama It's All About Love, a film he wrote, directed and produced himself over a period of five years. The film was entirely in English and featured, among others, Joaquin Phoenix, Claire Danes, and Sean Penn. The movie did not do well, as critics and audiences found it idiosyncratic and somewhat incomprehensible. His next film, the English-language Dear Wendy (2005), scripted by Lars von Trier, had poor ticket sales in his native Denmark where it sold only 14,521 tickets. However he won the Silver George for Best Director at the 27th Moscow International Film Festival. Vinterberg then tried to retrace his roots with a smaller Danish-language production, En mand kommer hjem (2007), which also had poor ticket sales in his native Denmark, selling only 31,232 tickets.
On 1 August 2008, he directed the music video for "The Day That Never Comes", the first single off Metallica's album Death Magnetic. His 2010 film Submarino was nominated for the Golden Bear at the 60th Berlin International Film Festival. In 2012, his film The Hunt competed for the Palme d'Or at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the 86th Academy Awards.
In 2015, he directed Far from the Madding Crowd, an adaptation of the acclaimed Thomas Hardy novel, starring Carey Mulligan, Matthias Schoenaerts, Michael Sheen and Tom Sturridge. Vinterberg reunited with Matthias Schoenaerts in Kursk, a film about the Kursk submarine disaster that happened in 2000.
In 2019, Vinterberg lost his daughter Ida in a car accident while she was traveling home from Belgium with her mother. As such, he dedicated Another Round (Druk) to her, while filming much of the film in her school with her classmates. Vinterberg was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director for the film, which also won the BAFTA Award for Best Film Not in the English Language and the Academy Award for Best International Feature Film; he dedicated the latter award to Ida.
In 2024, Vinterberg's first foray into directing for TV was broadcast in Denmark. The seven-episode series called Families like Ours explores a near-future Denmark when the country is gradually evacuated due to rising sea levels.
Filmography
Short film
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Year
! Title
! width="65"| Director
! width="65"| Writer
! Producer
|-
| 1990
| Sneblind
|
|
|
|-
| 1991
| Brudevalsen
|
|
|
|-
|rowspan=2| 1993
| Sidste omgang
|
|
|
|-
| Slaget på tasken
|
|
|
|-
| 1994
| Drengen der gik baglæns
|
|
|
|}
Feature film
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Year
! Title
! width="65"| Director
! width="65"| Writer
! Notes
|-
| 1996
| The Biggest Heroes
|
|
|written with
|-
| 1998
| The Celebration
|
|
|uncredited as director, written with Mogens Rukov
|-
| 2003
| It's All About Love
|
|
|written with Mogens Rukov
|-
| 2005
| Dear Wendy
|
|
|
|-
| 2007
| A Man Comes Home
|
|
|written with Mogens Rukov
|-
| 2010
| Submarino
|
|
|written with Tobias Lindholm
|-
| 2012
| The Hunt
|
|
| also producer, written with Tobias Lindholm
|-
| 2015
| Far from the Madding Crowd
|
|
|based on the book of the same name
|-
| 2016
| The Commune
|
|
|written with Tobias Lindholm
|-
| 2018
| Kursk
|
|
|based on the book A Time to Die
|-
| 2020
| Another Round
|
|
|written with Tobias Lindholm
|}
Television
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Year
! Title
! width="65"| Director
! width="65"| Writer
! Notes
|-
| 2001
| D-Day
|
|
| Experimental film, in collaboration with Søren Kragh-Jacobsen, Kristian Levring, and Lars von Trier
|-
| 2024
| Families like Ours
|
|
| Miniseries
|}
Awards and honours
In April 2016, the French government appointed Vinterberg a Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. For his film Another Round he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director and won the BAFTA Award for Best Film Not in the English Language.
{| class="wikitable"
|+
!Award
!Date of ceremony
!Category
!Nominated work
!Result
!Ref.
|-
| rowspan="3" |Academy Awards
|March 2, 2014
| rowspan="2" |Best International Feature Film
|The Hunt
|
|
|-
| rowspan="2" |April 25, 2021
| rowspan="2" |Another Round
|
| rowspan="2" |
|-
|February 10, 2013
|The Hunt
|
|
|-
| rowspan="3" |April 11, 2021
| rowspan="3" |Another Round
|
| rowspan="3" |
|-
|Best Direction
|
|-
|Best Original Screenplay
|
|-
| rowspan="4" |Cannes Film Festival
| rowspan="2" |May 24, 1998
|Jury Prize
| rowspan="2" |The Celebration
|
| rowspan="2" |
|-
| rowspan="2" |Palme d'Or
|
|-
| rowspan="2" |May 27, 2012
| rowspan="2" |The Hunt
|
| rowspan="2" |
|-
|Prize of the Ecumenical Jury
|
|-
| rowspan="2" |César Awards
|March 6, 1999
| rowspan="2" |Best Foreign Film
|The Celebration
|
|
|-
|March 12, 2021
|Another Round
|
|
|-
| rowspan="10" |European Film Awards
|December 4, 1998
|European Discovery of the Year
|The Celebration
|
| rowspan="10" |
|-
|December 6, 2008
|Achievement in World Cinema
|
|
|-
| rowspan="3" |December 1, 2012
|Best Film
| rowspan="3" |The Hunt
|
|-
|Best Director
|
|-
|Best Screenwriter
|
|-
|December 9, 2017
|People's Choice Award
|The Commune
|
|-
| rowspan="4" |December 12, 2020
|Best Film
| rowspan="4" |Another Round
|
|-
|Best Director
|
|-
|Best Screenwriter
|
|-
|University Film Award
|
|-
| rowspan="2" |Film Independent Spirit Awards
|March 20, 1999
| rowspan="2" |Best International Film
|The Celebration
|
|
|-
|March 1, 2014
| rowspan="2" |The Hunt
|
|
|-
|Goya Awards
|February 9, 2014
|Best European Film
|
|
|-
|Ordre des Arts et des Lettres
|April 27, 2016
|Chevalier
|
|
|
|-
| rowspan="17" |Robert Awards
|1994
|Best Documentary Short
|'
|
| rowspan="17" |
|-
| rowspan="2" |1999
|Best Danish Film
| rowspan="2" |The Celebration
|
|-
|Best Screenplay
|
|-
| rowspan="3" |February 6, 2011
|Best Danish Film
| rowspan="3" |Submarino
|
|-
|Best Director
|
|-
|Best Screenplay
|
|-
| rowspan="4" |February 26, 2014
|Best Danish Film
| rowspan="4" |The Hunt
|
|-
|Best Director
|
|-
|Best Screenplay
|
|-
|Audience Award
|
|-
| rowspan="3" |2017
|Best Danish Film
| rowspan="3" |The Commune
|
|-
|Best Director
|
|-
|Best Adapted Screenplay
|
|-
| rowspan="3" |February 6, 2021
|Best Danish Film
| rowspan="3" |Another Round
|
|-
|Best Director
|
|-
|Best Original Screenplay
|
|-
|February 1, 2025
|Best Danish Television Series
|Families like Ours
|
|-
|Satellite Awards
|January 17, 1999
|Best Foreign Language Film
|The Celebration
|
|
|}
Notes
References
External links
- CNN interview with Thomas Vinterberg
- Thomas Vinterberg: About a scene by Ingmar Bergman Video interview by Louisiana Channel, 2013