Alex teaches Filmmaking at the University of Texas at Austin, and is the Creative Director of the non-profit University of Texas Film Institute, where he produced Dance with the One, starring Gabe Luna (Matador), which premiered in main competition at SXSW, and was made entirely by students but mentored by film industry professionals.
THE BROTHERS SMITH hail from western Montana. Winter in the Blood is their second feature. It had its World Premiere in June 2013, in the Dramatic Competition, at the Los Angeles Film Festival, and has gone on to play at over 20 film festivals, garnering many awards. They wrote and directed the award-winning feature film, The Slaughter Rule, starring David Morse and Academy Award Nominees Ryan Gosling and Amy Adams. The Slaughter Rule premiered at Sundance 2002 to critical acclaim and went on to play all over the world, including New Directors/New Films at the Museum of Modern Art. It won the FIPRESCI International Critic’s Prize at the Stockholm International Film Festival, and was nominated for the John Cassavetes Indie Spirit Award. Their ‘eco-rotic’ short film the keeningpremiered at Sundance 2000 and played at festivals worldwide.
As a screenwriting team, the Brothers Smith were named among Variety Magazine’s Ten Screenwriters To Watch. They are currently writing a dramatic cable series that collides folk tales with the 20th century for Warner Horizon. They recently wrote a feature adaptation of David Quammen’s prize-winning short story, Walking Out, which they will direct in spring 2015, and they are adapting Wallace Stegner’s first novel, Remembering Laughter, for acclaimed filmmaker Rodrigo Garcia. They also adapted the graphic novel Son of the Gun by legendary filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky for Fox Searchlight. They have collaborated with Terrance Malick, Lars Van Trier and David O. Russell and have written scripts for Columbia Pictures, HBO, Warner Brothers, Framestore, Disney and ESPN Films.