Neil Marshall

**Neil Marshall** (born 25 May 1970) is an English film director, editor and screenwriter. Marshall began his career in editing and in 2002 directed his first feature film *Dog Soldiers*, a horror-comedy film [1] which became a cult film. He followed up with the critically acclaimed horror film *The Descent* in 2005. Marshall also directed *Doomsday* in 2008, and wrote and directed *Centurion* in 2010. He has also directed two prominent episodes of US television series *Game of Thrones*: "Blackwater" and "The Watchers on the Wall", with particular acclaim for his direction on both occasions, as well as a nomination for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series for "The Watchers on the Wall".

## Contents

* 1Life and career
* 2Recognition
* 3Filmography
* 4References
* 5External links

## Life and career[edit]

Marshall was born in Newcastle upon Tyne, Northumberland, England. He was first inspired to become a film director when he saw *Raiders of the Lost Ark* (1981) at the age of eleven. He began making home movies using Super 8 mm film,[2] and in 1989, he attended film school at Newcastle Polytechnic. In the next eight years, he worked as a freelance film editor. In 1995, he was hired to co-write and edit for director Bharat Nalluri's first film, *Killing Time*. Marshall continued to write and develop his own projects, directing his first film in 2002, *Dog Soldiers*, a horror film that became a cult film in the United Kingdom and the United States. In 2005, he followed up with a second horror film, *The Descent*.[3] With his direction of *The Descent*, he was identified as a member of the Splat Pack.[4]

His next film, *Doomsday*, is a 2008 science fiction action film he wrote and directed. The film takes place in the future in Scotland, which has been quarantined because of a deadly virus. When the virus is found in London, political leaders send a team led by Major Eden Sinclair (Rhona Mitra) to Scotland to find a possible cure. Sinclair's team runs into two types of survivors: marauders and medieval knights. *Doomsday* was conceived by Marshall based on the idea of futuristic soldiers facing medieval knights. In producing the film, he drew inspiration from various movies, including *Mad Max*, *Escape from New York* and *28 Days Later*. Marshall had a budget three times the size of his previous two films. The director filmed the larger-scale *Doomsday* in Scotland and South Africa. The film was released on 14 March 2008 in the United States and Canada and in the United Kingdom on 9 May 2008. *Doomsday* did not perform well at the box office, and critics gave the film mixed reviews. *Rotten Tomatoes* reported that 49% of critics gave the film positive write-ups, based on a sample of 69, with an average score of 5.1/10.[5] At *Metacritic*, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the film has received an average score of 51, based on 14 reviews.[6] In February 2015 Marshall and his agent Marc Helwig founded the television production company Applebox Entertainment[7] and signed with this company, a two-year deal with Legendary TV to form his Film dreams.[8]

In May 2017 it was announced that Marshall would direct *Hellboy*, a reboot of the Hellboy franchise.[9] Previously, prior to becoming director of the new *Hellboy* reboot, Marshall had expressed interest in doing a solo *Black Widow* movie for Marvel Studios.[10]

## Recognition[edit]

Marshall won the British Independent Film Award for "Best Director of a British Independent Film" for *The Descent*.[3] The horror film also won a Saturn Award for Best Horror Film.[11] Marshall was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series for his work on the *Game of Thrones* episode "The Watchers on the Wall".