Lana Wachowski (b. 1965)

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Biography

Lana Wachowski and Lilly Wachowski are American film and television directors, writers and producers. Together known as the Wachowskis, the sisters are both trans women and have worked as a writing and directing team throughout most of their careers. They made their directing debut with Bound (1996), and achieved fame with The Matrix (1999), a major box-office success for which they won the Saturn Award for Best Director. They wrote and directed two sequels, The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions, and were involved in the writing and production of other works in the Matrix franchise.

Timeline

The story of Lana Wachowski, told in moments.

1999 Event

Co-directed The Matrix with Lilly. A hacker discovers reality is a simulation. Made $463 million worldwide. "Bullet time" redefined action cinematography. The red pill entered the cultural vocabulary.

Did you know The Matrix would redefine action cinema? Was 'bullet time' a technical achievement or an artistic one? Did the red pill mean something personal even then?

2012 Life

Came out publicly as a transgender woman, the first major Hollywood director to do so. Made her first public appearance at the Human Rights Campaign's dinner. Later, Lilly also came out as transgender.

What did coming out publicly as transgender in Hollywood feel like? Was the Human Rights Campaign dinner the right moment? Did visibility change how the industry treated you?

2021 Event

Directed The Matrix Resurrections solo, without Lilly co-directing for the first time. The film explored identity, memory, and the nature of choice. It mirrored her own transition.

Was directing Resurrections solo a statement or just circumstance? Did the film's exploration of identity mirror your own journey? Was the fourth Matrix the most personal one?

Artifacts (15)

The Matrix

Neo, mild-mannered software author by day, feared hacker by night-is recruited into a cell of cyber-rebels, led by Morpheus and the warrior Trinity. They have made a fundamental discovery about the...

1996

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The Art of The Matrix

The art was the best thing about the movie. This book provides an opportunity to appreciate it without the blight of Keanu Reeves' acting. Serving as a pre-production archive of the work related to...

2000

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The Matrix: The Shooting Script

This is the complete shooting script of the movie "The Matrix".

2001

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V for Vendetta

Set in a future where Germany has won World War II and Britain has become a fascist state, this is the story of a young working-class woman, Evey, who is rescued from a life-and-death situation by a...

2004

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Speed Racer: The Art of Speed Racer : Based on the Film Speed Racer

The visionary Wachowski brothers of The Matrix fame use their filmmaking skills to bring to life the iconic Japanese cartoon with their newest groundbreaking film Speed Racer, starring Emile Hirsch,...

2008

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Doc Frankenstein: The Messiah of Science Resurrected. Volume 1

You thought you knew him! You thought him dead! But Victor Frankenstein's creature arises once more, resurrected by the life-giving power of science and evolved by the limitless potential of the human...

2014

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Sublime in the highest style of intellectual beauty, intellect without effort, w...

, literary skill, and philosophy of life. Sailing up the Nile as far as Abu Simbel in January 1850, she wrote of the Abu Simbel temples, "Sublime in the highest style of intellectual beauty, intellect...

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I had the greatest difficulty in repelling Mrs. Seacole's advances, and in preve...

very kind to the men and, what is more, to the Officers – and did some good (she) made many drunk". Nightingale reportedly wrote, "I had the greatest difficulty in repelling Mrs. Seacole's advances,...

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Every day sanitary knowledge, or the knowledge of nursing, or in other words, of...

her nursing schools, though it was written specifically for the education of those nursing at home. Nightingale wrote:"Every day sanitary knowledge, or the knowledge of nursing, or in other words, of...

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Florence and her older sister Parthenope benefited from their father's advanced ...

the abolitionist and Unitarian William Smith. Nightingale's father educated her. A BBC documentary reported that:"Florence and her older sister Parthenope benefited from their father's advanced ideas...

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she was very kind to the men and, what is more, to the Officers – and did some g...

er, that she was worried about contact between her work and Seacole's business, claiming that while "she was very kind to the men and, what is more, to the Officers – and did some good (she) made many...

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