Floria Sigismondi
Floria Sigismondi is an Italian-Canadian film director, screenwriter, music video director, artist, and photographer.
She is best known for writing and directing The Runaways, for directing music videos for performers including Marilyn Manson, Justin Timberlake, Rihanna, Leonard Cohen, Katy Perry, Björk and David Bowie, and commercials for brands such as Gucci, MAC, Target and Nike. Sigismondi has also directed television including two episodes of The Handmaid's Tale and American Gods.
Life and career
Sigismondi was born in Pescara, Abruzzo, Italy. Her parents, Lina and Domenico Sigismondi, were opera singers. Her family, including her sister Antonella, moved to Hamilton, Ontario, Canada when she was two. In her childhood she became obsessed by drawing and painting. Starting in 1987, she studied painting and illustration at the Ontario College of Art, today's Ontario College of Art & Design University. When she took a photography course, she became obsessed once more, and graduated with a photography major.Sigismondi started a career as a fashion photographer. She came to directing music videos when she was approached by the production company The Revolver Film Co., and directed music videos for a number of Canadian bands. Her very innovative, but also very disturbing video works, located in sceneries she once described as "entropic underworlds inhabited by tortured souls and omnipotent beings," attracted a number of very prominent musicians. She has further described her works as, "Something quite textural and brutal" and something quite beautiful and light. It's like blending two worlds."
With her photography and sculpture installations she had solo exhibitions in Hamilton and Toronto, New York City, Brescia, Italy, Gothenburg, Sweden and London. Her photographs also were included in numerous group exhibitions, together with artists such as Cindy Sherman, Joel-Peter Witkin, and Francesco Clemente. The German art press Die Gestalten Verlag has published two monographs of her photography, Redemption and Immune. Sigismondi also willingly creates her own set props for various music video productions such as, Perfume Genius's "Die 4 U". "If I don't create them myself, I design or draw them, I can get quite tactile detailed as far as what I see." She has an affinity for strange yet alluring things and created a flesh-esque chair to appeal to the sexual tension and desire to the spectator.
In October 2004 she gave birth to a daughter, Tosca Vera Sigismondi-Berlin. Sigismondi resides in Toronto, Rome, and Los Angeles. Her daughter is named after the Italian opera Tosca. Floria herself was named after the main character.
Sigismondi appears in the Canadian documentary films Flicker and . She is a two time MVPA winner of director of the year in 2006 and 2013. She directed Justin Timberlake’s video for the song "Mirrors", which won video of the year at the MTV Video Music Awards in 2013.
Film director
Sigismondi's first feature-length film was The Runaways, a period piece about the 1970s all-girl rock and roll band The Runaways. The film is largely about the relationship between Joan Jett and Cherie Currie. Sigismondi wrote the screenplay based on Currie's book Neon Angel: A Memoir of a Runaway. The film premiered in 2010 at the Sundance Film Festival and was released in Canada and the United States in March 2010.In 2020, Sigismondi directed the horror film The Turning, which was inspired by the 1898 Henry James novella The Turn of the Screw, and stars Mackenzie Davis and Finn Wolfhard.
Filmography
- The Runaways
- Leaning Towards Solace
- Hemlock Grove
- Daredevil
- The Handmaid's Tale
- American Gods
- The Turning
Music videos (selection)
| Title | Year | Artist | Notes |
| "This is My Life" | 1992 | Rita Chiarelli | |
| "A Certain Slant of Light" | 1993 | The Tea Party | |
| "Save Me" | 1993 | The Tea Party | |
| "The River" | 1993 | The Tea Party | |
| "The Birdman" | 1994 | Our Lady Peace | version 1 |
| "Blue" | 1995 | Harem Scarem | |
| "Four Leaf Clover" | 1996 | Catherine | |
| "The Beautiful People" | 1996 | Marilyn Manson | |
| "Anna Is a Speed Freak" | 1996 | Pure | |
| "Tourniquet" | 1996 | Marilyn Manson | |
| "Little Wonder" | 1996 | David Bowie | |
| "Black Eye" | 1997 | Fluffy | |
| "Dead Man Walking" | 1997 | David Bowie | |
| "Makes Me Wanna Die" | 1997 | Tricky | |
| " Trip Like I Do" | 1997 | Filter & The Crystal Method | |
| "Anything but Down" | 1998 | Sheryl Crow | |
| "Sweet Surrender" | 1998 | Sarah McLachlan | |
| "Most High" | 1998 | Robert Plant & Jimmy Page | |
| "Chinese Burn" | 1998 | Curve | |
| "Can't Get Loose" | 1998 | Barry Adamson | |
| "Get Up" | 1999 | Amel Larrieux | |
| "I've Seen It All" | 2000 | Björk | interactive "webeo" version |
| "4 Ton Mantis" | 2000 | Amon Tobin | |
| "In My Secret Life" | 2001 | Leonard Cohen | |
| "Black Amour" | 2002 | Barry Adamson | |
| "She Said" | 2002 | Jon Spencer Blues Explosion | version 2 |
| "John, 2/14" | 2002 | Shivaree | |
| "Untitled #1 " | 2003 | Sigur Rós | MTV Europe Music Award 2003 Best Video |
| "Obstacle 1" | 2003 | Interpol | |
| "Anything" | 2003 | Martina Topley-Bird | |
| "Bombs Below" | 2003 | Living Things | version 1 |
| "Fighter" | 2003 | Christina Aguilera | JUNO Award 2004 Video of the Year |
| "Megalomaniac" | 2004 | Incubus | |
| "The End of The World" | 2004 | The Cure | |
| "I Owe..." | 2004 | Living Things | |
| "Talk Shows on Mute" | 2004 | Incubus | |
| "Bombs Below" | 2004 | Living Things | version 2 |
| "Blue Orchid" | 2005 | The White Stripes | |
| "Bom Bom Bom" | 2005 | Living Things | |
| "O' Sailor" | 2005 | Fiona Apple | |
| "Supermassive Black Hole" | 2006 | Muse | |
| "Red Flag" | 2006 | Billy Talent | |
| "Hurt" | 2006 | Christina Aguilera | |
| "Broken Boy Soldier" | 2006 | The Raconteurs | |
| "Let It Rain" | 2009 | Living Things | |
| "Die by the Drop" | 2010 | The Dead Weather | |
| "Cherry Bomb" | 2010 | Dakota Fanning & Kristen Stewart | |
| "E.T." | 2011 | Katy Perry | |
| "The One That Got Away" | 2011 | Katy Perry | |
| "Har Megiddo" | 2011 | Living Things | |
| "Fake It Baby, Fake It " | 2012 | Living Things | |
| "Anything Could Happen" | 2012 | Ellie Goulding | |
| "Try" | 2012 | P!nk | |
| "Leaning Towards Solace" | 2012 | Sigur Rós | |
| "The Stars " | 2013 | David Bowie | |
| "Mirrors" | 2013 | Justin Timberlake | MTV Video Music Award 2013 Video of the Year |
| "The Next Day" | 2013 | David Bowie | |
| "Montauk Fling" | 2013 | Lawrence Rothman | |
| "#1 All Time Low" | 2013 | Lawrence Rothman | |
| "Fatal Attraction" | 2013 | Lawrence Rothman | |
| "California Paranoia" | 2015 | Lawrence Rothman ft. Angel Olsen | |
| "Oz vs. Eden" | 2015 | Lawrence Rothman | |
| "Users" | 2015 | Lawrence Rothman | |
| "H" | 2016 | Lawrence Rothman | |
| "Sledgehammer" | 2016 | Rihanna | |
| "Die 4 You" | 2017 | Perfume Genius | |
| "Without Love" | 2017 | Alice Glass | |
| "Ain't Afraid Of Dying" | 2017 | Lawrence Rothman ft. Marissa Nadler | |
| "Designer Babies" | 2017 | Lawrence Rothman ft. Kim Gordon | |
| "Jordan" | 2017 | Lawrence Rothman ft. Kristin Kontrol | |
| "Swan Song" | 2019 | Dua Lipa | From ' |
| "Lifetime" | 2019 | Yves Tumor |
Cinematographer'''
- 2000 "4 Ton Mantis", Amon Tobin
Awards (selection)
- 2013 MTV Music Video Award, USA - Winner for Video of The Year, for Mirrors
- 2004 Juno Awards, Canada - Best Music Video, for "Fighter"
- 2003 MTV European Awards - Best International Video Award, for Untitled
- 2003 New York Underground Film Festival - Audio/Visual Award, for Untitled
- 2003 Advertising and Design Awards, Toronto, Ontario, Canada - Special Merit Award for Music Video, for "Fighter"
- 1999 German Kodak Photobook Award, for her book Redemption
- 1998 British Music Video Awards, UK - Nomination for Best Video: "Little Wonder"
- 1997 MTV Music Video Awards, USA - Nomination for Best Rock Video: "Beautiful People"