born Sept. 15, 1946, New York, N.Y., U.S.
U.S. film director.
He attended Yale University and served in Vietnam before studying filmmaking at New York University. He made his directorial debut with Seizure (1974) and wrote screenplays for several films marked by their rapid pace and violence, including Midnight Express (1978). He wrote and directed Platoon (1986, Academy Award), drawing on his Vietnam experience; it was followed by movies such as Wall Street (1987), Born on the Fourth of July (1989, Academy Award), JFK (1991), Natural Born Killers (1994), and Nixon (1995), some of them noted for their anti-establishment and often controversial interpretations of history.