Maureen Gosling


Maureen Gosling is an American documentary filmmaker, editor, and director. She is best known for her 20-year collaboration with the late director Les Blank.

Life and career

Gosling was born in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Her physician father was a jazz pianist and her mother, who worked in little theater, was a first generation American of Norwegian/Canadian descent. Gosling earned a BA in Social Anthropology from the University of Michigan in 1972 after which she became an apprentice to documentary filmmaker, Les Blank. Their first film together was in 1972, Dry Wood and Hot Pepper, on Black French Louisiana Zydeco music and Creole culture. Their best-known film is the 1982 British Academy Award-winning Burden of Dreams, about the German director Werner Herzog’s perilous filming of FITZCARRALDO in the Peruvian Amazon. In 1982, Burden of Dreams premiered at the Filmex film festival in Los Angeles. She was nominated for Best Editing by The American Cinema Editors for Burden of Dreams in 1983.
Gosling founded Intrépidas Productions in 1997, Yanga Productions with Maxine Downs in 2006, Sage Blossom Productions with Chris Simon in 2012, and Protesta Productions with Jed Riffe and Nina Menéndez in 2018.
In 1996, Gosling was an Editing Instructor in the Cinema Department at San Francisco State University, Fall Semester. She served on the Board of Cine Acción, a Latino film organization from 1996-2002. She is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences 2019.

Filmography