George Sluizer

Biography

George Sluizer worked as a director, producer and writer. He was born in Paris to Norwegian-Dutch parents. From 1954 to 1956, he studied at the film academy IDHEC in Paris and worked as an ssistant to the directors Michael Anderson and Bert Haanstra. In 1961 he made his debut with the documentary De lage landen, with which he immediately thereafter won the Silver Bear from the Berlin Film Festival. Sluizer directed and produced a number of other documentaries and commissioned films. In 1971 his first feature film, João en het mes, was nominated for the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival. After the success of Spoorloos in 1988 - adapted from the Tim Krabbé novel Het gouden ei - he directed an American version of the same film called The Vanishing (1993). In Hollywood he also made the thriller Crimetime (1996), starring Stephen Baldwin and Geraldine Chaplin. In 2009 he was awarded membership in the Dutch Directors Guild in honour of his contributions to film in the Netherlands.