Mike Mills (director)

Mills was born in Berkeley, California, the son of Janet L. Dowd, a draftsperson, and Paul Chadbourne Mills, an art historian and museum director.[3][4][5][6] He graduated from Cooper Union in Lower Manhattan, New York City. His mother died of brain cancer in 1999. Six months after she died, his father Paul came out as gay at the age of 75 and after 44 years of marriage. Five years later, his father died of lung cancer.

Mike Mills has created music videos for musical acts including Moby, Yoko Ono and Air. Air named the fifth song on their album Talkie Walkie after Mills.[7]

He has also worked as a graphic designer on promotional material and album covers for such acts as Beastie Boys, Beck, Sonic Youth, They Might Be Giants, and Ol' Dirty Bastard. In addition he has created graphics for X-Girl, Marc Jacobs, and produces his own line of posters and fabrics called Humans by Mike Mills.[8]

Mills played guitar and performed background vocals with the short-lived indie rock band Butter 08 along with Yuka Honda and Miho Hatori of Cibo Matto, Russell Simins of the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, and Rick Lee of Skeleton Key. The band released one self-titled album in 1996 on the now defunct Grand Royal record label.[9]

Thumbsucker (2005) was his feature-film directorial debut, for which he also created the film posters. In 2007, Mills filmed the feature-length documentary Does Your Soul Have A Cold?, which explored the issues around the introduction of anti-depressants to Japanese culture. The film premiered at SXSW Festival and was part of IFC's documentary film series.[10] He followed this up with Beginners in 2010.[11] Mills next directed 20th Century Women, starring Annette Bening, Greta Gerwig, Elle Fanning and Billy Crudup.[12][13][14] The film had its world premiere at the New York Film Festival, and was released on December 28, 2016, by A24.[15][16]

He has released some of his art/documentary photography works with the two books, Gas Book 11 (2003) and Humans (2006). In 2009, the Berlin-based culture magazine 032c devoted an issue to Mills. For the occasion Mills was interviewed by Nick Currie, best known for his work as Momus, in a piece called "Getting Through the New Depression".[17]

In 2019, he directed the short film I Am Easy to Find starring Alicia Vikander, which accompanied the album of the same name by The National.[18]

Mills is married to fellow artist and film director Miranda July,[19] with whom he has a child, born in February 2012.[20][21]

• Gas Book 11 (2003)
• Thumbsucker (2005)
• Humans (2006)
• Fireworks (2008)
• Graphics Films (2009)
• Drawings From the Film Beginners (2011)

• Official website
• Mike Mills' Blog
• Mike Mills at IMDb
• IONCINEMA.com TIFF 2010 Viral: Mike Mills' Beginners