He made the film “the Wall” to the music of Pink Floyd, such famous paintings as “Midnight Express”, “Evita”, “the Life of David Gale”, “bird”. For the last he received in 1985 the Grand Prix at the Cannes film festival. Exactly Parker founded the British Committee for cinema and became Chairman of the British Guild. He was 76. The last few years he struggled with a serious illness.
Parker was nominated eight times for major BAFTA, three times for a Golden globe and twice for an Oscar. He was born in London and began his professional career in advertising agencies, where he went to work in television, which initially was in advertising. The first samples in the directing became a few short films, and in 1976 came the first feature film Alan “Bugsy Malone”, which was a stylized gangster movie with kids in the main roles – they shot cream machines. Even then, the unusual work drew attention at Cannes. Next was “Midnight Express” about the suffering of a young American drug dealer in a Turkish prison. Thanks to him, about Alan Parker spoke as one of the most talented modern foreign Directors. Then he experimented in different genres from the musical about students at new York high school of arts (the”Fame” 1980) to family dramas (“Go on a cheating” 1982). Remembered by the audience and the film “the Wall” to the music of Pink Floyd, filmed on the eponymous album of the cult band in the style of deployed advertising clip. Quite another story – the already mentioned painting “bird”, the main hero of which was a veteran of the Vietnam war, who presented himself a bird for post traumatic stress syndrome. This is a deep, poignant, emotionally powerful philosophical drama. In 2002 Parker was awarded the Order of the British Empire. It is known that Alan was a big fan of the talent of Andrei Tarkovsky, and in the movie “angel Heart” he beat a famous scene from “Mirrors”: in the past the ceiling it is raining, the British Director has replaced his blood.
