Biography
Tom Waller (full name Thomas de Warrenne Waller) was born in Bangkok to a Thai Buddhist mother and Irish Catholic father. He spent his formative years at a Benedictine monastery school in Yorkshire, England, before pursuing a career in film and television. After attending the Northern Film School in Leeds, England in 1995, he embarked on producing and directing his first feature film project Monk Dawson (1998) aka Passion for the Priest (US video title), based on the award-winning novel by Piers Paul Read. The film was theatrically released in 1998 to critical acclaim.
After 5 years in London, Waller returned to his native Thailand in 2002 as a producer of independent feature films, with Butterfly Man (2002), Ghost of Mae Nak (2005), The Elephant King (2006) amongst the acclaimed titles produced through his production company De Warrenne Pictures. In 2008, he produced Thomas Clay's Soi Cowboy (2008) which was selected for the Cannes Film Festival in Un Certain Regard.
After producing assignments in Thailand on foreign films Bitter/Sweet (2009), Creation (2009) and the The Prince & Me: The Elephant Adventure (2010), Waller decided to return to his passion for directing with Sop-mai-ngeap (2011), his Thai language cinematic directorial debut. The film was nominated for 5 Thailand National Film Association awards including Best Picture and Best Director.
In addition to directing again, he served as a producer on the English language debut of celebrated Thai director Prachya Pinkaew (Ong-Bak: The Thai Warrior (2003)) with the Hollywood action thriller Elephant White (2011) starring two time Academy Award nominee Djimon Hounsou and Golden Globe winner Kevin Bacon.
In 2014, he produced and directed The Last Executioner (2014), a biopic on Thailand's last prison executioner, which won the prestigious 'Tukkata Tong' or Golden Doll awards for Best Picture, given by the Thai Entertainment Reporters Association. The film also earned him Best Director at the Dhaka International Film Festival. In 2016 he served as line producer for the action sequel Mechanic: Resurrection (2016), starring Jason Statham, Jessica Alba, Tommy Lee Jones and Michelle Yeoh.
Since 2004, Waller has been owner and managing director of De Warrenne Pictures Co. Ltd., now one of Thailand's leading full service production companies serving foreign productions based out of Bangkok and Chiang Mai. The company recently handled Wanda Media's psychological thriller Battle of Memories (2017), directed by Leste Chen, which was entirely filmed in Thailand.
In 2019, Waller wrote and directed The Cave (2019), the first narrative feature film about the dramatic Thai Cave Rescue that captivated the world in the summer of 2018. The film premiered at the Busan International Film Festival and achieved over half a million admissions upon release in Thailand. A Director's Cut of the film was released in the US by Lionsgate in 2022 under the title of Cave Rescue (2022).
In 2023, he teamed up with Irish writer/actor Eoin O'Brien to make Kiss of the Con Queen based on a true story of the Hollywood Con Queen scam, which was filmed in five countries and starring Ravi Patel Wonder Woman 1984 (2020) in the titular role.
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