- Born
- Birth namePaul William Scott Anderson
- Height1.91 m
- Paul W.S. Anderson gained a fair bit of notoriety in his native England when he directed the ultra-violent Shopping (1994) (which he also wrote), starring Jude Law and Sean Pertwee in a story about thieves who steal by ramming a car into storefronts. The film was banned in some cinemas in England, and became a direct-to-video slightly edited release in the United States.
Shopping (1994) allowed Anderson to get the chance to direct Mortal Kombat (1995), an adaptation of the hit video game, which showcased his directorial trademarks - visually stunning scenery and quick-cut editing. The film did well enough for him to choose his next project, which was Soldier (1998) with Warner Bros., with Kurt Russell in the lead. Unfortunately, Russell decided at the time to go on hiatus, pushing the release date of that film into 1998. In the meantime, Anderson directed Event Horizon : Le Vaisseau de l'au-delà (1997) from a script by Philip Eisner, which featured Anderson regulars Sean Pertwee and Jason Isaacs. The science fiction/horror film, a Gothic horror version of Solaris (1972), was stylish and scary, but was critically panned and did not do well in the box office, which Anderson blamed on studio-enforced cuts to the story. (Anderson has promised a Director's Cut, though none has been announced as of yet).
Soldier (1998) didn't fare well with critics and box office either, and Anderson's planned 2000 remake of La Course à la mort de l'an 2000 (1975) was canceled. This forced him to think smaller, which led to Vision parallèle (2000), a supernatural mystery movie that was a minor hit. He then resurfaced to direct another video game adaption, Resident Evil (2002). Long rumored among fans to be a choice comeback vehicle for zombie grandfather George A. Romero, the writing and directing credits eventually transferred to Anderson. He next was given the helm for the long-awaited film adaption of the popular Dark Horse comic book, Alien vs. Predator (2004).- IMDb mini biography by: Jonah Falcon < jonahnynla@mindspring.com>
- SpouseMilla Jovovich(August 22, 2009 - present) (3 children)
- ChildrenDashiel Edan Jovovich-AndersonOsian Lark Elliot Jovovich-Anderson
- Visually stunning scenery
- Quick-cut editing
- Tough female characters
- Very often, he uses odd tilted high or low angles for a creepy effect to the atmosphere of his films.
- Dialog and characters that transcend their video game origins, thus highlighting humanity's place in the universe.
- Sick and tired of having to explain the significance of the raining frogs in Magnolia (1999), he added the initials W.S. to his name to avoid confusion with indie filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson. Unfortunately, the modified name is too similar to another celebrated auteur, Wes Anderson, and Paul is constantly fielding questions about what it's like to work with Bill Murray.
- Constantly mentions plans to release director's cut editions of all of his movies on DVD. To date, the only one that has surfaced is Alien vs. Predator (2004).
- Daughter, Ever Anderson, born 3 November 2007. Mother is his fiancée, Milla Jovovich.
- One of only two people to have both written and directed an Alien movie (the other being James Cameron).
- I don't think it would be possible for me to respect people like Ridley Scott or James Cameron more than I already do. They're gods of filmmaking.
- Alien vs. Predator (2004) is not trying to be Alien, le 8ème passager (1979) or Aliens, le retour (1986), and it's not trying to be Predator (1987). Those are genius movies. The impact that these creatures had on audiences was immense. But 26 years on, and dozens of comic books later, everyone knows what the Alien looks like. You've got to do something different with it, and make a slightly different movie. So, in a way, we were definitely making an Alien and a Predator movie, but a different one from the one the other directors had made.
- If you work with a subject matter beloved by a hardcore fan base, then there's going to be a huge amount of discussion of what you've got wrong or right. In some ways you can never please overly obsessive fans, it's just impossible.
- [on casting Kit Harington in Pompéi (2014)] I was a huge fan of Kit from Game of Thrones (2011). He was the one person that I felt really popped in the show, he really stood out from the rest of ensemble. Kit certainly looks like a movie star. I met him and was very impressed. But at that time, he wasn't quite the gladiator that we needed for the movie. But he assured me that he would get there and he became very disciplined and focused on getting that perfect physique -- the gladiatorial physique, which is what you see in the movie. He looks awesome.
- [on the production sets of Event Horizon : Le Vaisseau de l'au-delà (1997)] It took over nine sound-stages at Pinewood Studios in London to shoot the film. Because most of the movie is set on the ship, they had to construct a huge labyrinthine space that one could walk through for days and days and not enter the same room. You could be alone in there and there could be someone else with you, and you wouldn't meet them for a week unless you knew exactly where they were. We really wanted to emphasize that scale, and the best way to do that was to build sets which really conveyed that idea.
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