Michael Mann's life is not as open and public as many of his colleagues and
rivals in Hollywood, but over the last few years he has been brought into the forefront
through his increasingly impressive work, which will hit a peak this year with the
release of his latest offering, Ali.
Mann was born in Chicago on 5th February, 1943. After High School, he
attended the University of Wisconsin, from there he moved to London, and the
London International Film School. All in all, Mann spent 7 years in London, attending
Film school, and also directing commercials and documentaries.
Mann moved back to USA after his time in England, and in the 70's began writing for
American television, working on shows such as Starsky and Hutch. In 1979, Mann
directed his first TV movie, The Jericho Mile, which won him an award for
Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Specials, and acted as a 'springboard' for his
move away from television, and towards Hollywood.
Mann's first foray into film directing was Thief (1981). Even though this was a
critical success, the relatively unknown director, caused Thief to be a box-office
failure. One of the main things that Thief did was introduce many tropes that run
throughout Mann's work to this day. Mann, in many ways, is an old-fashioned
director. He likes to create the right atmosphere for all his films, and scenes within,
and there is more than one example of this in Thief. Attempting to recreate rush hour
at 2am, complete with rain, Mother Nature failed to provide this, so he ordered a
60,000 gallon water truck to keep both the streets and actors soaked, for 12 hours.
This among other examples in Thief, such as the scene where Caan blows up his
character's house, a real house was used and the immediate neighbours were moved
to a hotel for the three days of shooting, which showed that Mann was and still is a
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