“Geordie film director Neil Marshall is the John Carpenter of our times." - Anna Wilson, Clash Music

Neil Marshall (born 25 May 1970) is a film director and screenwriter. Marshall began his career in editing and in 2002 directed his first feature film Dog Soldiers, which became a cult film. He followed up with the critically acclaimed horror film The Descent in 2005. Marshall also directed Doomsday in 2008 followed by Centurion in 2010.

Throughout October and November The Star and Shadow Cinema will be showing Newcastle born Neil Marshall’s entire directed work to date all four of his films will be screened on glorious 35mm prints.

BACKGROUND

Neil Marshall was born in Newcastle upon Tyne. He was first inspired to become a film director when he saw Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) at the age of eleven. He began making home movies using Super 8 mm film, and in 1989, he attended film school at Newcastle Polytechnic (now Northumbria University). In the next eight years, he worked as a freelance editor. In 1995, he was hired to co-write and edit for director Bharat Nalluri's first film, Killing Time.

GUILTY PLEASURES

Marshall identified nine of his "guilty pleasures" in cinema: 1941 (1979), Battle Beyond the Stars (1980), Excalibur (1981), Top Secret! (1984), Race for the Yankee Zephyr (1981), High Risk (1976), Big Trouble in Little China (1986), The Sword and the Sorcerer (1982), and The Legend of Boggy Creek (1972).

BRITISH HORROR

Neil Marshall points out that horror is a natural fit for the low budgets available to British film-makers. The genre requires isolated or confined settings, small casts, un-starry actors and imaginative thinking. Certainly, the British horror boom, begun a couple of years ago by Marshall's Dog Soldiers, Danny Boyle's 28 Days Later and Christopher Smith's Creep, shows no sign of burning out like the British "geezer" genre.

THE 'SPLAT PACK'

With his direction of The Descent, Neil Marshall was identified as a member of the 'Splat Pack'. The Splat Pack is a collection of filmmakers who, since 2002, have directed a large number of horror films.

The term was coined by Alan Jones of Total Film. The group has been credited with bringing back ultra-violent movies, as well as moving away from PG-13 rated movies and into the R-rated spectrum, all while operating with low budgets. The members have repeatedly clashed with the MPAA board over the content of their work but nevertheless continue to find substantial box-office success.

Other members include Alexandre Aja, Greg McLean, James Wan and Rob Zombie.

RECOGNITION

Marshall won the British Independent Film Award for "Best Director of a British Independent Film" for The Descent. The horror film also won a Saturn Award for Best Horror Film.

Variety listed Marshall in its "Ten Directors to Watch," and wrote: "There are some directors, such as Steven Spielberg and Quentin Tarantino, whose genius lies in their ability to shoot their movies in a big but intimate way. It's a bit early to mention Marshall in the same breath, but that same quality of complete identification with the audience has established him, with Dog Soldiers and The Descent, as the most exciting genre filmmaker to arrive on the British scene for many years." - Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide

"Neil Marshall is an unusual talent with an undeniable skill for delivering a true white knuckle ride." - Emily Breen, HEYUGUYS!

“Geordie film director Neil Marshall is the John Carpenter of our times. Producing spare, on budget, sometimes humorous, always inventive, thoroughly effective horror movies.” - Anna Wilson, Clash Music

“Marshall could very well be the Caravaggio of the B-movie.” - Sarah Lilleyman, Time Magazine

ON HIMSELF

‘I see myself more as an action director,’ he explains. ‘All right,’ he grins, ‘I do enjoy intense, bloodthirsty action but I like to blend and cross genres. I don’t want to be too predictable.' - Metro

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