John FrazierBirth Place: Richmond, California, USA Date of Birth: September 23, 1944 Heritage: American Contact John Frazier |
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Spider-Man 2 Background: John Frazier is a special effects coordinator best known for his Academy Award winning contribution on the big blockbuster hit “Spider-Man 2” (2004), from which he also won a Saturn Award and a BAFTA Film, Golden Satellite and Visual Effects Society nominations. He also has been nominated for Oscar for “Twister” (1996, also won a BAFTA Award), “Armageddon” (1998), “The Perfect Storm” (2000, also won a BAFTA Award), “Pearl Harbor” (2001), “Spider-Man” (2002) and more recently, “Poseidon” (2006). In film from 1977, Frazier has become the special effects coordinator on more than forty vehicles. Other movie credits include “Ferris Bueller's Day Off” (1986), “Basic Instinct” (1992), “Speed” (1994), “The Haunting” (1999) and “The Island” (2005). He has served as special effects director on the movies “Spider-Man 3” (2007), “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End” (2007) and the forthcoming “The Kingdom” (2007), among others.
Childhood and Family: John R. Frazier was born on September 23, 1944, in Richmond, California. His family relocated to Southern California when he was a child. After graduating from Canoga Park High School, John enrolled at Los Angeles Trade Tech, from which he learned about high-rise construction and freeway design.
Career: Richmond-born, Southern California-raised John Frazier started designing special effects properties at age 19 at the Haunted House nightclub in Hollywood, California. His work attracted the attention of the owner, who then landed him a job on NBC. He joined Local 44 seven years later in 1970 and began working special effects for feature films. Frazier made his motion picture debut with “Wes Craven's 'The Hills Have Eyes'” (1977), which he followed with gigs in episodes of the TV series “Space Academy” (1977) and movies like “When You Comin' Back, Red Ryder?” (1979), “Airplane!” (1980) and “White Dog” (1982) as well as the TV films “Working” and “Cry for the Strangers” (both 1982). With the Dan Aykroyd comedy vehicle “Doctor Detroit” (1983), for the first time in his career Frazier served as special effects supervisor, and by the 1986 he had become the special effects coordinator on the film “Ferris Bueller's Day Off” (1986), directed and written John Hughes and starring Matthew Broderick. In the 1990s, Frazier focused his attention on motion pictures, during which time he collected more than twenty project under his belt. His credits include Clint Eastwood's “The Rookie” (1990), Sharon Stones' star-making vehicle “Basic Instinct” (1992), David Mamet's “Hoffa” (1992), Jan de Bont action hit “Speed” (1994) and James Keach's “The Stars Fell on Henrietta” (1995). In 1996, Frazier received notice for his work on the amazing action/adventure film “Twister,” which starred Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton and helmed by the “Speed” director Jan de Bont. For his effort, he was handed a BAFTA Film for Best Achievement in Special Visual Effects, a Saturn nomination and most notably, an Academy Award nomination for Best Effects, Visual Effects. He shared the honors with Stefen Fangmeier, Habib Zargarpour and Henry LaBounta. After Morgan Freeman's “Hard Rain” (1998), the special effects supervisor bolstered his fame with his next Oscar nomination for his contribution in the Michael Bay mega-blockbuster film “Armageddon” (1998), from which he also shared a Saturn nomination i the category of Best Special Effects. Frazier closed out the decade by coordinating special effects for the movies “Forces of Nature,” “True Crime” and “The Haunting” (all 1999). Entering the new millennium, Frazier proved his career was still on the rise by nabbing a BAFTA Film for Best Achievement in Special Visual Effects, as well as another Oscar nomination and a Saturn nomination, which this time he shared with Stefen Fangmeier, Habib Zargarpour and Walt Conti, for “The Perfect Storm,” a 2000 adventure starring George Clooney, Mark Wahlberg, Diane Lane and directed by Wolfgang Petersen. He went on to work on such popular films as “Almost Famous” (2000), “Cast Away” (2000), “Pearl Harbor” (2001, netted an Oscar nomination), “Spider-Man” (2002, earned an Oscar nomination), “xXx” (2002, nabbed a Saturn nomination) and “Bad Boys II” (2003). However, Frazier did not achieve the peak of his fame until the following year, when he was tapped to serve as the special effects director for the even massively successful sequel “Spider-Man 2.” The Sam Raimi-helmed movie brought him a 2005 Academy Award for Best Achievement in Visual Effects, a Saturn for Best Special Effects, in addition to a BAFTA Film, Golden Satellite and Visual Effects Society nominations. After the huge victory, Frazier could be seen working on “xXx: State of the Union,” “The Island,” “Stealth” and Domino” (all 2005) before taking up his next Academy Award nomination for “Poseidon” (2006), adapted from the Paul Gallico's novel. He then lent his special effects talents for “Deja Vu” (2006), “Spider-Man 3” (2007), “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End” (2007) and “Transformers” (2007). Currently, he has completed his special effects directorial duty for the upcoming film “The Kingdom” (2007) by Peter Berg. The action/drama/thriller will star Jamie Foxx, Chris Cooper, Jennifer Garner and Jason Bateman.
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