John Maclean

Scottish multi-hyphenate John Maclean traded music stardom as a member of the cult rock-electronic group The Beta Band for an even more successful career as a filmmaker with such gritty efforts as the short "Pitch Black Heist" (2011) and the Western drama "Slow West" (2015). Born in the Scottish city of Perth in 1972, Maclean was the son of artists: his father, Will, drew international acclaim for his work in collage and box construction, while his mother, Marian, worked in landscape painting and abstracts. His father also introduced him to popular and folk performers like Bob Dylan and Steeleye Span, but Maclean was also an ardent film fan, regularly attending movies in his teenaged years. While studying drawing and painting at Edinburgh Art College (ECA), he took a job as an usher at the city's historic Cameo Theatre, where he was able to enjoy classic and cutting-edge cinema on a regular basis. He met future bandmates Gordon Anderson and Robin Jones at ECA, and the three began playing music together; after hearing the album Chill Out by the pioneering electronica group the KLF, he became fascinated with the potential of sampling in music, which coincided with his growing interest in film montage. For a period, he worked as a DJ while pursuing a master's degree in painting from the Royal College of Art, but in 1996, he reunited with Anderson, Jones and guitarist Steve Mason to form The Beta Band. A slew of EPs preceded the Beta Band's eponymous first album in 1999, which was not as well received as its predecessors. The album's modest response was a harbinger of the band's subsequent career, with career highlights like a 2001 tour with Radiohead balanced with negative reaction to the albums. By 2004, the band had decided to call it quits, but Maclean had gained considerable experience behind the camera, directing numerous videos and documentaries for the band. He and drummer Robin Jones then formed the Aliens, which released a handful of EPs and albums between 2005 and 2008. In 2009, Maclean shot "Man on a Motorcycle," a short film starring German-Irish actor Michael Fassbender as a courier at his wit's end. The project, shot entirely on a mobile phone, helped to convince Maclean that he should focus his interests entirely on film, which led to his second short, the crime thriller "Pitch Black Heist." Commissioned by Film4, the short, which also starred Fassbender, was a critical success and brought Maclean a BAFTA Award for Best Short Film in 2012. The following year, Film4 commissioned his first feature film, a period drama called "Slow West," which starred Kodi Smit-McPhee as a 19th-century teenager who crosses the American frontier in search of the woman he loves, and Fassbender as his mysterious guide. The film, lensed in New Zealand, was selected to compete in the World Cinema Grand Prize competition at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival.