Brett Ratner

Musician, Director, Producer
Brett Ratner
Date of Birth:
Mar 28, 1969
Country:
Miami Beach, Florida, USA
Gender:
Male
Height:
5' 8" (1.73 m)

Biography

Brett Ratner is one of Hollywood's most successful filmmakers. His diverse films resonate with audiences worldwide and, as director, his films have grossed over $2 billion at the global box office. Brett began his career directing music videos before making his feature directorial debut at 26 years old with the action comedy hit Money Talks. He followed with the blockbuster Rush Hour and its successful sequels. Brett also directed The Family Man, Red Dragon, After the Sunset, X-Men: The Last Stand, Tower Heist and Hercules.
 
Ratner has also enjoyed critical acclaim and box office success as a producer. He has served as an executive producer on the Golden Globe and Oscar winning The Revenant, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Black Mass, starring Johnny Depp; and as a producer on Truth, starring Robert Redford and Cate Blanchett; I Saw the Light, starring Tom Hiddleston and Elizabeth Olsen; and the upcoming film Rules Don't Apply, written, directed and produced by Warren Beatty. His other produced films include the smash hit comedy Horrible Bosses and its sequel, and the re-imagined Snow White tale Mirror Mirror.
 
His additional producing credits include the documentaries Author: The JT LeRoy Story, Catfish, the Emmy-nominated Woody Allen - A Documentary, Helmut by June, I Knew It Was You: Rediscovering John Cazale, Chuck Norris vs. Communism, the 5-time Emmy nominated and Peabody Award winning Night Will Fall, Bright Lights and National Geographic's upcoming Untitled Leonardo DiCaprio Environmental Documentary, directed, produced by and starring Leonardo DiCaprio. He also executive produced and directed the Golden Globe-nominated FOX series Prison Break, and executive produced the television series Rush Hour, based on his hit films.
 
Brett, along with his business partner James Packer, formed RatPac Entertainment, a film finance production and media company, in 2013. RatPac has a first-look deal with Warner Bros. and joined with Dune Capital to co-finance over 75 films including Gravity, The Lego Movie, American Sniper, and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. RatPac Entertainment also co-financed The Revenant and Birdman with New Regency. Internationally, Warner Bros. and RatPac have formed a joint venture content fund with China's Shanghai Media Group to finance local Chinese content. In partnership with New Regency, RatPac also finances the development and production of Brad Pitt's Plan B Entertainment.
 
Since inception, RatPac Entertainment has co-financed 52 theatrically released motion pictures exceeding $9.3 billion in worldwide box office receipts. RatPac's co-financed films have been nominated for 51 Academy Awards, 20 Golden Globes and 39 BAFTAs and have won 21 Academy Awards, 7 Golden Globes and 17 BAFTAs.
 
Brett is a Board of Trustees member of the Simon Wiesenthal Center and Museum of Tolerance. He sits on the boards of Chrysalis, Best Buddies and Do Something, while serving on the Dean's Council of the NYU Tisch School of the Arts and on the Board of Directors at Tel Aviv University's School of Film and Television. In 2017, he will receive a coveted star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Souce:- IMDb Mini Biography By: Slate PR
 
Ratner grew up in Miami Beach, the only child of a famous Jewish socialite mother. He attended Miami Beach Senior High and was President of the Leo Club in 1986. He was also a member of the "fraternity" Royal Palm. He attended NYU film school currently lives in a $3.6 M house in Beverly Hills. Ratner is also a good friend of Def Jam mogul Russell Simmons, and has directed music videos for many rap stars.
Souce:- IMDb Mini Biography By: Fratboy2
 

Trade Mark (2)

  • Opens his movies with a character singing
  • Frequently casts Don Cheadle, Chris Tucker and Ken Leung

Trivia (24)

  • Was engaged to Rebecca Gayheart in the late 1990s.
  • Got his start by directing rap and hip-hop videos for his friend Russell Simmons. When the original director of Money Talks (1997) had to be replaced, Russell Simmons recommended him.
  • Attended and graduated from Miami Beach Senior High School in Miami Beach, Florida (1986).
  • Once vowed he would not direct movies until he had directed at least 100 music videos.
  • Without knowing him, Steven Spielberg and his company Amblin Entertainment sent him $5000 to finish funding for his final film project at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts after he sent out 20 letters to producers asking for help.
  • Was in pre-production for a remake of John Cassavetes' The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (1976) after he finished Rush Hour (1998). This was to be written by Cassavetes' son, Nick Cassavetes and Warren Beatty was set to star. Ratner left the project when he was offered The Family Man (2000).
  • His favorite film is Scarface (1932) and his favorite film director is Hal Ashby.
  • After meeting with real life FBI agents, he decided that this would not be authentic to have Scott Glenn reprise the role of Jack Crawford in Red Dragon (2002), his prequel to The Silence of the Lambs (1991). Instead, he cast Harvey Keitel, in a role originally created by Dennis Farina in Manhunter (1986). Keitel and Farina had also both played Ray Barbone in the crime drama Get Shorty (1995). Ratner was considered for directing the sequel entitled Be Cool (2005), in which Keitel also appears.
  • Ranked #81 on Premiere magazine's 2003 annual Power 100 List. He did not rank on the 2004 list.
  • At Miami Beach Senior High School, he was a drama student of well-known instructor Jay W. Jensen.
  • Replaced director Matthew Vaughn just two months before filming began on X-Men: The Last Stand (2006).
  • Was for some time attached to direct Superman Returns (2006). He left the project because of repeated delays and difficulty in casting a lead actor. The project then went to Bryan Singer, while Ratner went on to direct X-Men: The Last Stand (2006), the two previous movies in the saga having been directed by Singer.
  • In Red Dragon (2002), digital technology was used to smooth over some of Anthony Hopkins's facial features so that he would look younger than he was in The Silence of the Lambs (1991). Similar technology was used in the first scene of X-Men: The Last Stand (2006), so that Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen could play their characters twenty years younger.
  • Considered directing Memoirs of a Geisha (2005).
  • His mother, Marsha Presman, was just age 16 when she gave birth to her son.
  • Lives in Los Angeles, California and Miami Beach, Florida.
  • In the series "The Film That Changed My Life" (Observer newspaper UK/May 2010), Ratner cited Martin Scorsese's Raging Bull (1980) as the singular movie that most inspired him to become a filmmaker. Claims to have seen the movie about 100 times, first when he was only 10-years-old with his mother's permission.
  • His five favorite films are The Kid Stays in the Picture (2002), The Tenant (1976), The Killing (1956), Being There (1979) and Raging Bull (1980). The last of these was the film that made him want to go to film school; Robert Evans, the subject of The Kid Stays in The Picture, was one of his mentors.
  • No longer involved in the production of a new Superman movie. Stated that the repeated delays and difficulty in casting a lead actor made it impossible for him to remain involved.
  • At the Beverly Hills Film Festival, he presented the first annual Living Legends Award to legendary photographer Phil Stern (2008).
  • Was great friends with the late Michael Jackson.
  • Friends with Pierce Brosnan, who wanted Ratner to direct an unspecified 007 film (from the time period involved, the film in question was almost certainly Die Another Day (2002)), but the Broccolis immediately told Brosnan they did not like Ratner's films and would not consider him to ever direct a James Bond film. Brosnan took on a co-lead role in Ratner's project After the Sunset (2004) instead.
  • President of the 'Official Competition' jury at the sixth Beijing International Film Festival in 2016.
  • He was awarded a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6801 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, California on January 19, 2017.

Personal Quotes (14)

  • There's no difference between a tacky Jew from Miami and a rap star. They both want the Cadillac and the Rolex with the diamonds.
  • In Hollywood, you gotta keep the movement. You gotta have three or four projects and whichever one comes in first, or better, that's the one you're going to do.
  • There are very few perfect films. I think Reservoir Dogs (1992) is close to being a perfect film.
  • Why do I need final cut? Final cut is for artistes quote unquote -- directors whose movies don't make a lot of money. Maybe Scorsese should have final cut because a guy like Harvey Weinstein or a studio might change it to make it a little more accessible or a little more commercial and he has a vision of what he wants it to be. He wants it to be four hours long or whatever.
  • [on recasting the role of Jack Crawford with Harvey Keitel in Red Dragon (2002)] When Jonathan Demme said make your own version, I couldn't see anyone but Anthony Hopkins and I couldn't see anyone but Anthony Heald as Dr. Chilton. I can't see another acting doing it. But what happened was I went down to the FBI, and discovered they're like tough New York Cops. They weren't like Scott Glenn.
  • No matter how successful you are, you are not invincible. The studio is writing the checks. It's all about leverage and who has the power. The goal is to get the biggest deal you can, because you are going to have to give something back to the studios anyway.
  • Am I Orson Welles? Obviously not. But 50 years from now, who knows how, as a person, I'll have grown. I've already changed, from being a 26-year-old kid to a 38-year-old guy - I'm not a man yet, really. But as I get older, who knows how my experiences and my knowledge, this past 12 years making movies, how that's all going to affect the movies that I make? I know that the life I lived from 16 to 26 allowed me to make a movie like Rush Hour (1998), so now let's see...
  • In an action movie, I don't want to move the camera too much, because the movement should be within the frame. The same goes for comedy. You don't want to push in for a joke; it's plenty in a medium shot. Watch my jokes, they're never in close-up. If the audience feels the camera, it's horrible.
  • As a producer, I want to service the director and help him make the film he wants to make. That's the great thing about RatPac - it's not just a financing company. There's a content creator - me, a filmmaker - behind it. I found that directors are embracing us as their partners. They're saying, "Hey, Brett, can you come in with this or that?" I understand their plight, you know? Harmony [director Harmony Korine] brought me his last script first. He wrote it in my house in Miami. People don't know this about me: I'm a cinephile and I love these filmmakers. I just produced a Martin Scorsese short film with Brad Pitt, Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro. I haven't necessarily made a movie like that myself, but I produce them. [2015]
  • [on supporting young filmmakers] When I was a film student at NYU, there wasn't a platform like the internet for filmmakers. HBO was the only company that was buying short-form content, and it was only a little bit every month. But there were thousands of short films being made. Now, of course, with the globalization of film, there are so many more opportunities. The cool thing is that while you can make a film with your iPhone, it's still an expensive medium if you want quality - if you want a mix, if you want to do color correction. Even though there's software for editing, there's not really a post-production program for home use. That will happen eventually, but it still costs money to do something of quality. So there wasn't an outlet for that. Now, Steven Spielberg has someone every month prepare the best of YouTube. There's so much short-form content better than feature films out there. So there are huge opportunities now for young filmmakers out there to get something seen. As a young filmmaker, I could make something, but how would you get somebody to see it? (...) I got an agent out of the NYU film festival. Thank God that there was an agent there. She just happened to be there the night my short film was showing. Now, I think there are more opportunities. But the reach goes both ways. After I made my short film, I sent a letter to 40 of my favorite people in the business. I got 39 rejection letters. Katherine Kennedy was the one who gave me money. The interesting thing about that wasn't that it made me an overnight sensation. Yeah, maybe I got a little popular at NYU. But the truth is it gave me tremendous validation and confidence. That's what I hope this program I'm supporting at Key West can do. It should give tremendous validation to a young film student - the confidence to continue to pursue what they want to do. The hardest part for me was not quitting. There were talented people at NYU film school who are probably stock brokers or real estate agents now. The only reason I'm one of the most successful guys out of NYU is because I didn't quit. [2015]
  • [his advice for young filmmakers] You have to be in it for the right reasons - because you love storytelling. That's the skill set of any filmmaker. They have to love that part of that. If you want to do it because you want to be famous, get laid, get rich, or whatever, it's not going to happen for you. Everyone from Spielberg to Mike Leigh had a strong desire to tell stories. [2015]
  • The guy who directed Son of Saul (2015) is probably getting offered 20 movies right now, but he's choosing to go do a movie in his native Hungary. That's my advice to filmmakers: Have your next movie ready to go. Don't sit around. Go shoot. I only got to where I am because I'd shot millions of feet of film before I shot my first movie. Then I was ready to make them back to back. I wasn't sitting around reveling in the success of Rush Hour (1998). I shot like seven movies in seven years. Then I started taking my time to be more strategic about it. But don't be strategic about it - just go shoot a movie. At the end of the day, it's about a body of work. Nobody's judged by one film, right? You can't judge Coppola on The Godfather (1972). There's The Conversation (1974) and Apocalypse Now (1979) and The Outsiders (1983). That's what you have to look at. [2015]
  • If a short film on YouTube or whatever affects me that way, it comes to my attention and makes me interested in that filmmaker's ability to take me on a journey. Having a point of view is important. The problem is that a lot of filmmakers are trying to define their style. They want to be the next Spielberg or Scorsese. You don't have to do that with your first film. You just have to discover who you are and what your interests are. When I was in film school, they separate the wheat from the chaff was films that had a feature look. They had the quality of a feature film. But that's not as important anymore. It's just the story that's being told. That's why we accept a film shot on an iPhone 5, or something like The Blair Witch Project (1999). Once all these digital formats came out, companies like Panavision had to step up their game. Then came the RED camera. Technology was simplifying the whole medium. At NYU, to get recognized by Hollywood, you had to make a short film with a feature-length look to it - lit-well, in focus, beautiful photography. I financed and produced The Revenant (2015). It's breathtakingly beautiful, but I'd finance it even if it was shot with something else. That only enhances your experience of the movie. If you shot something on an iPhone, it's going to look grainy blown up on the big screen. So you have to use a different format for that. But there are different formats and media whereas before, you could only make a movie for the big screen. [2015]
  • The worst thing that we have in today's movie culture is Rotten Tomatoes. I think it's the destruction of our business. I have such respect and admiration for film criticism. When I was growing up film criticism was a real art. And there was intellect that went into that. And you would read Pauline Kael's reviews, or some others, and that doesn't exist anymore. Now it's about a number. A compounded number of how many positives vs. negatives. Now it's about, 'What's your Rotten Tomatoes score?' And that's sad, because the Rotten Tomatoes score was so low on Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016) I think it put a cloud over a movie that was incredibly successful. People don't realize what goes into making a movie like that. It's mind-blowing. It's just insane, it's hurting the business, it's getting people to not see a movie. In Middle America it's, 'Oh, it's a low Rotten Tomatoes score so I'm not going to go see it because it must suck.' But that number is an aggregate and one that nobody can figure out exactly what it means, and it's not always correct. I've seen some great movies with really abysmal Rotten Tomatoes scores. What's sad is film criticism has disappeared. It's really sad. [2017]

Salary (5)

  • The Family Man (2000) $5,000,000
  • Rush Hour 2 (2001) $5,000,000
  • Red Dragon (2002) $6,000,000
  • X-Men: The Last Stand (2006) $8 .000.000 + A percentage of final net gross
  • Rush Hour 3 (2007) $7,500,000

Gallery

Photo Gallery

Awards

2018
Winner
EDA Special Mention Award
Hall of Shame
Shared with:
Harvey Weinstein
Kevin Spacey
Showbiz Sexual Tormentors: Harvey Weinstein, Kevin Spacey, Brett Ratner, et al.

2017
Nominee
Primetime Emmy
Exceptional Merit in Documentary Filmmaking
Bright Lights: Starring Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds (2016)
Shared with:
Alexis Bloom (produced by)
Fisher Stevens (produced by)
Sheila Nevins (executive produced by)
Nancy Abraham (executive produced by)
2012
Nominee
Primetime Emmy
Outstanding Nonfiction Series
American Masters (1985)
Shared with:
Susan Lacy (executive producer for American Masters)
Robert B. Weide (producer)
Erik Gordon (executive producer)
Andrew S. Karsch (executive producer)
Michael Peyser (executive producer)
Fisher Stevens (executive producer)

2017
Winner
Star on the Walk of Fame
Motion Picture
On January 19, 2017. At 6801 Hollywood Blvd.

2016
Nominee
Fantastic Fest Jury Award
Best Documentary Feature
S Is for Stanley (2015)
Shared with:
Alex Infascelli (Director, Producer)
Inti Carboni (Producer)
Federica Paniccia (Producer)
Lorenzo Foschi (Producer)
Davide Luchetti (Producer)

2016
Winner
Emmy
Outstanding Historical Programming - Long Form
Night Will Fall (2014)
Shared with:
André Singer (director)
Sally Angel (producer)
Richard Melman (executive producer)
Philippa Kowarsky (co-producer)
Signe Byrge Sørensen (co-producer)
Stephen Frears (executive producer)
James Packer (executive producer)

2015
Winner
FOCAL Award
Award for Best Use of Footage in a History Production
Night Will Fall (2014)
Shared with:
André Singer (Director)
Sally Angel (Producer)
Adam Turner (Footage Archive Researcher)
Best Use of Footage in a Cinema Release
Night Will Fall (2014)
Shared with:
André Singer (Director)
Sally Angel (Producer)
Adam Turner (Footage Archive Researcher)
2015
Nominee
FOCAL Award
Best Use of Footage in a Factual Production
Night Will Fall (2014)
Shared with:
André Singer (Director)
Sally Angel (Producer)
Adam Turner (Footage Archive Researcher)

2015
Nominee
ITN Source
Best Historical Documentary
Night Will Fall (2014)
Shared with:
André Singer (Director)
Sally Angel (Producer)

2013
Winner
Ally Award
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2002
Nominee
Best Film
Red Dragon (2002)