Kimberly Peirce

Director 

In her unflinching debut feature film, the acclaimed, Boys Don't Cry, Kimberly Peirce staked her place as a director of singular vision and craft, while shining a light on the shifting landscape of gender, identity and assimilation.

The film received the International Critics prize for Best Film at both the London and Stockholm Film Festivals, the Satyajit Rai Foundation Award for Best First Feature at the London Film Festival, and was named "the Best American Feature," by Janet Maslin.

For her part, Peirce won honors as Best Debut Director from the National Board of Review and Best New Filmmaker from the Boston Society of Film Critics.

Peirce has co-written, with novelist Mark Richard, Stop-loss, a topical and emotionally penetrating drama inspired by the real life stories of American soldiers fighting in Iraq (including her own brother) and a government policy that has affected the lives of more than 80,000 of America's bravest men and women in uniform. The enforcement of the stop-loss policy, which retains soldiers in service beyond their expected term, widely known as the "Back Door Draft," makes soldiers walk the fine line between doing their duty and doing what's right.

Continuing her tradition of writing real life stories inspired by America and the American family, Peirce is co-writing to direct a darkly entertaining tale of Sex, Secrets and Taboo in Suburbia. Kimberly is also writing Untitled Romantic Comedy '08 in the vein of Pedro Almodovar and Woody Allen in which a "guy's" group of friends resuscitates him from the worst possible breakup, and trains him to find true love in this gender twist on the classic romantic comedy. Other projects include the Untitled New Orleans Project - inspired by true stories, Peirce takes a look at the lawless streets of New Orleans as they become the breeding ground for a great American gangster.

Peirce has been featured in the documentaries Women in Film, This Film is Not Yet Rated and Hollywood Brats. In addition to her feature work, Peirce has contributed non-fiction film and theater articles to Kansai Time Out, Grey City Journal and Chicago's Screen Magazine. Kimberly is a graduate of the University of Chicago's BA, Columbia University's MFA and the Sundance Institute's Writing and Directing Lab programs, where Peirce first rose to prominence with her 16-mm experimental short The Last Good Breath, which ran in the Leopard of Tomorrow Program at the 1994 Locarno International Film Festival. The film won several awards, including second place at the Canada International Film Festival, a Golden Award in the Experimental Division at the Chicago International Film Festival and first place at the Suffolk Film Festival.

Visit Kim's Site to learn more about her new film Stop-Loss: http://www.stoplossmovie.com/