The Unorthodox Director
Texas' favorite filmmaker named one of world's 100 most influential people
To be named one of Time's 100 Most Influential People is no small honor. The annual list encompasses leaders and innovators from all over the globe, including the likes of Barack Obama, the Dalai Lama, Steve Jobs and Oprah Winfrey.
This year, one of Texas' most beloved filmmakers has joined the esteemed group: Richard Linklater.
Billed as "The Unorthodox Director" in the artists category, Linklater joins 2015 honorees John Oliver, Christopher Nolan and Julianne Moore, just to name a few. Most recently, Linklater made waves with Boyhood, the 12-year epic that garnered multiple Academy Award nominations and a win for actress Patricia Arquette.
The effects of the film have been felt worldwide, but in Austin, his legacy comes in the form of the Austin Film Society, which he founded in 1985.
Linklater's write-up comes from Ethan Hawke, who has starred in many of the director's films, including Boyhood. Says the actor of his friend and colleague:
We may never understand Rick's unorthodox path and how it led to movies like School of Rock, Before Sunrise and Boyhood: the vegetarian baseball star from Huntsville, Texas; the years of hard labor on offshore oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico; teaching himself the history of film through the ingenuity of starting the Austin Film Society (with the help of a local Kinko's and a 16-mm projector). But the consistent thread in Rick's career has been a passion for cinema that cannot be defeated or undermined in any way.
Others honored on the 2015 list include Kanye West, Kim Jong Un and Jeb Bush.