Born in the Bronx, New York City in 1951, he directed his first Super 8 films as a teenager and entered into early collaborations with screenwriters Nicholas St. John and John McIntyre. In the late 1970s, he made his first feature films, "Driller Killer" and "Ms. 45." In the 1980s and 1990s, his international successes included "King of New York", "Bad Lieutenant", "The Funeral" and "The Addiction", which was selected for the Berlinale Competition. He won the Honorary Leopard at Locarno in 2011. His work most recently screened in the Berlinale Competition in 2020 with "Siberia".

Source: 74. Internationale Filmfestspiele Berlin (Catalogue)