Pablo Larraín Matte is a Chilean filmmaker. He has directed seven feature films and co-directed one television series, including the Academy Award-nominated films No and Jackie. In 2017, Larraín and his brother Juan de Dios were the producers of Sebastián Lelio's A Fantastic Woman, which won the first Chilean Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
In 2003, Larraín co-founded with his brother Juan de Dios Larraín the production company Fábula, through which he develops his cinematic and advertising projects and supports the work of emerging international directors. Larraín directed his first feature film Fuga in 2005. It was released in March 2006 and won international acclaim with several prizes at international film festivals, including Cartagena and :es:Festival de Málaga de Cine Español|Málaga. His following films solidified his international success. In 2011, Larraín directed the television series Profugos, which was the first series produced in Chile by HBO Latin America. The series was nominated for an international Emmy for Best Dramatic Series. In 2008, Pablo Larraín's film Tony Manero about a serial killer with an obsession for John Travolta's character in Saturday Night Fever premiered to rave reviews in Cannes. The film is considered to be the first entry in Larrain's "unintentional trilogy" set during the Pinochet era in Chile. Larraín's next film in the series, Post Mortem, centers on a coroner's assistant during the days of 1973 coup that brought Pinochet to power. The movie premiered at the Venice Film Festival in 2010. The final film in the series is No, in which Gael García Bernal plays an advertising company executive who runs the "No" campaign in the 1988 plebiscite that ultimately voted Augusto Pinochet out of power. No premiered in the Directors' Fortnight section at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival where it won the Art Cinema Award for Best Director. The film was also nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the 85th Academy Awards. Larraín has said, "In Chile, the right, as part of the Pinochet government, is directly responsible for what happened to culture during those years, not only by destroying it or restricting its spread, but also through its persecution of writers and artists." He stated that "Chile found itself unable to express itself artistically for nearly twenty years" and also felt that "the right wing throughout the world is not very interested in culture and this reveals the ignorance that is probably theirs, because it is difficult for someone to make the most of something or to enjoy it if you have no knowledge of it". In 2013 Larraín served as a member of the jury at the 70th Venice International Film Festival. On March 24, 2014, The Wrap reported that Larraín was in negotiations to direct a new film version of Scarface for Universal Studios, with Paul Attanasio writing the script. The new version will be set in modern-day Los Angeles and would revolve around a Mexican immigrant rising in the criminal underworld. However, Larraín left the project. Larraín's film El Club premiered at the 2015 Berlin International Film Festival where it won the Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize. The film was nominated in 2016 for a Golden Globe for Best Foreign Film. In 2016, Larrain reteamed with Bernal for Neruda, about the famous Chilean poet and politician Pablo Neruda during his years of exile. That same year, Larrain made his English-language debut with the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis biopic Jackie, starring Natalie Portman, Peter Sarsgaard, Greta Gerwig, Richard E. Grant, Billy Crudup, and John Hurt. Both films received critical acclaim, with Jackie scoring numerous accolades, including Academy Award, Golden Globe, and SAG Award nominations for Portman, and winning the Platform Prize at the 2016 Toronto International Film Festival. In 2018, it was announced Larraín would direct Ema starring Mariana Di Girolamo and Gael García Bernal. In 2020, Larraín was announced to direct Kristen Stewart as Princess Diana in Spencer.
Personal life
He is married to the Chilean actress Antonia Zegers. They have two children together, Juana Larraín Zegers and Pascual Larraín Zegers. In the 2013 Chilean elections, Larraín supported Michelle Bachelet's center-left presidential candidacy, despite the fact that his parents are members of the conservative right-wing party, the Independent Democratic Union.
