Julia Loktev
Julia Loktev (born December 12, 1969) is a Russian-American film director and video artist. Early life. Julia Loktev was born in Leningrad, Soviet Union (now St. Petersburg, Russia), and immigrated to the United States as a child. She lived in Colorado, where she lived until college. She moved to Montreal to study English and film at McGill University. Career. Loktev came across Tom Bishell's book of short stories "God Lives in St. Petersburg" and read it because she had been born in St. Petersburg. She decided to adapt the short story Expensive Trips Nowhere into the  film "The Loneliest Planet" transporting the setting from Kazakhstan to Georgia. Loktev was resident at Eyebeam in 2005. In 2015, Richard Brody called her one of the best woman movie directors. Personal. Loktev is Jewish. In 1989, when she was 19, her father was severely injured in an automobile accident. The event was the subject of her 1998 documentary "Moment of Impact".