James Benning
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Not enough rated films yet to compute a weighted score.
Roles are weighted by involvement: director 1.0, screenwriter 0.7, lead 0.8, supporting 0.4, crew 0.1.
Over the past thirty-five years James Benning (b. 1942) has played a central role in the history of American independent cinema by offering his rigorously structured yet wonderfully graceful films as extended meditations on the American landscape and its social and environmental histories. Benning’s life and work have been shaped by his passionate wanderlust—born in Milwaukee, he lived for intervals in Colorado, the Missouri Ozarks, Illinois and Oklahoma before settling in Val Verde, California in 1987, with car and motorcycle journeys around the country generating such films as I-94 (1975) and Four Corners (1997). His career has been equally restless, ranging from his early experimentation with an avant-garde aesthetic to his embrace, during the 1980s and 90s, of explicitly autobiographical elements and increased human content. With his “California Trilogy” (2000-2001) Benning entered a new phase, refining his formalist style and political concerns while distilling his abiding interest in place and exacting organizational structures.
Known for
Credits
20 Little Films (2012)
Director
YouTube Trilogy: 4 Songs, History, Asian Girls (2011)
Director
Grand Opera: An Historical Romance (1979)
Director
North on Evers (1992)
Director
Ten Skies (2004)
Director
Telemundo (2018)
Director
BNSF (2013)
Director
Faces (2011)
Director
Eight Bridges (2026)
Director
Two Moons (2019)
Director
Landscape Suicide (1987)
Director
Pig Iron (2010)
Director
Him and Me (1982)
Director
Small Roads (2011)
Director
The United States of America (1975)
Director
El Valley Centro (2000)
Director
11 x 14 (1977)
Director
From Bakersfield to Mojave (2021)
Director
daylight (2019)
Director
Tulare Road (2010)
Director
Michigan Avenue (1974)
Director
Panama: Exploring the Panama Canal (1995)
Director
Los (2001)
Director
Natural History (2014)
Director
The United States of America (2022)
Director
Used Innocence (1989)
Director
Twenty Cigarettes (2011)
Director
13 Lakes (2004)
Director
wavelength (2016)
Director
The War (2012)
Director
Little Boy (2025)
Director
Among Enemies: Jeonju Digital Project 2010 (2010)
Director
American Dreams (Lost and Found) (1984)
Director
Eden (—)
Director
Hwy 1 (—)
Director
Measuring Change (2016)
Director
Birth of a Nation (2018)
Director
O Panama (1985)
Director
One Way Boogie Woogie (2012)
Director
I-94 (1974)
Director
One Way Boogie Woogie/27 Years Later (2005)
Director
Spring Equinox (2016)
Director
Two Cabins (2011)
Director
Nightfall (2012)
Director
Easy Rider (2012)
Director
In Process... (2021)
Director
Maggie's Farm (2020)
Director
Stemple Pass (2012)
Director
Sogobi (2002)
Director
Ruhr (2009)
Director
One Way Boogie Woogie (1977)
Director
8½ x 11 (1974)
Director
Deseret (1996)
Director
Breathless (2024)
Director
Did You Ever Hear That Cricket Sound? (1971)
Director
Reforming the Past (2010)
Director
Allensworth (2022)
Director
Postscript (2012)
Director
after Traylor. Thoreau cabin (2008-2018) (2018)
Director
Utopia (1998)
Director
52 Films (2015)
Director
L. Cohen (2018)
Director
RR (2007)
Director
glory (2018)
Director
Exquisite Moving Corpse (2022)
Director
Casting a Glance (2007)
Director
US 41 (2014)
Director
Readers (2017)
Director
Four Corners (1997)
Director
John Krieg Exiting the Falk Corporation in 1971 (2010)
Director
On Paradise Road (2020)
Director
74.78 (2005)
Director
9-1-75 (1975)
Director
Ash 01 (2016)
Director
Cuba, an Historical Romance (2024)
Director
Perimeter (2015)
Director
thinking of red (2016)
Director
HF (2014)
Director
Chicago Loop (1976)
Director
Time and a Half (1972)
Director
PLACE (2020)
Director
Fire & Rain (2009)
Director
SAM (2018)
Director
3 Minutes on the Dangers of Film Recording (1975)
Director
Fall Equinox (2016)
Director
Dancing in the Street, 11 grados de separación (2020)
Director
After Warhol (2011)
Director
FUCK ME (green) (2014)
Director
scorched earth (2016)
Director
Fresh Air (2016)
Director
Faces 1973 (2010)
Director
Pascal's Lemma (1984)
Director
TEN YEARS LATER (2022)
Director
Two Skies (—)
Director
Untitled Fragments (2017)
Director
signs (2014)
Director
Concord Woods (2014)
Director
FUCK ME (orange) (2014)
Director
Data Entry (2014)
Director
TABLE TOP (1988)
Director