Paolo Sorrentino — Director | Biography, Movies & Career

Biography

Paolo Sorrentino (Italian: [ˈpaːolo sorrenˈtiːno]; born 31 May 1970; Naples) is an Italian film director, screenwriter, and writer. He is considered one of the most prominent filmmakers of Italian cinema working today. He is known for visually striking and complex dramas and has often been compared to Federico Fellini and Michelangelo Antonioni. He has received numerous accolades including an Academy Award, BAFTA Award two Cannes Film Festival prizes, four Venice Film Festival Awards and four European Film Awards. In Italy he was honoured with eight David di Donatello and six Nastro d'Argento.

Sorrentino made his directorial film debut with the Italian comedy-drama One Man Up (2001) for which he received the Nastro d'Argento for Best New Director followed by The Consequences of Love (2004), The Family Friend (2006), and This Must Be the Place (2011). The biographical drama Il Divo (2009) was awarded the Cannes Film Festival Jury Prize. He received critical acclaim with the art drama The Great Beauty (2013) which won the Academy Award, the Golden Globe, and the BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Language Film. He followed with Youth (2015), Loro (2018), and The Hand of God (2021) the latter of which was nominated for the Academy Award for Best International Feature Film. He is also known for his work on television creating and directing the HBO drama series The Young Pope (2016), and The New Pope (2019). He worked with songwriters Antonello Venditti, Paloma Faith and Mark Kozelek and written three books published in Italian.

He works with authors and producers including Francesca Cima and Nicola Giuliano, Toni Servillo and Luca Bigazzi. Actors in his films have included Sabrina Ferilli, Michael Caine, Fanny Ardant, Harvey Keitel, Isabella Ferrari, Elena Sofia Ricci, Sean Penn, Riccardo Scamarcio, Jude Law, Fabrizio Bentivoglio, Nanni Moretti, Filippo Scotti, Carlo Verdone, Antonio Albanese, Frank Langella and Jane Fonda.