Gus Van Sant is an American film director, screenwriter, photographer and painter. Born in Kentucky, he moved westwards in his twenties and devoted the majority of his subsequent work scrutinizing life in the American West and Midwest. Ever since his debut film Mala Noche (1986), he has been focusing on the lives of marginalized people, often homosexuals, and creating space for their stories in American film. After the success of this film, Van Sant moved to Oregon and worked on scripts for Drugstore Cowboy (1989) and My Own Private Idaho (1991). Both films continue focusing on marginalized people, while the latter competed in Venice. This success went hand in hand with more popular topics, which also brought him commercial success. Even Cowgirls Get the Blues (1993), where physical deformity was used as a means of for scrutinizing distinctness, was followed by To Die For (1995) and Good Will Hunting (1997), with nine Oscar nominations. Van Sant continued to balance between commercial and popular films, such as Finding Forrester (2000), and those exploring the margin, such as Elephant (2003), winning him the Golden Palm in Cannes, Last Days (2005) and Paranoid Park (2007). His film Milk (2008) brought Sean Penn an Oscar for the title role. Since then, Van Sant has made four films with his signature devotion to unusual, marginalized and troubled people. Whether he explores cancer patients (Restless, 2011), environmental crisis (Promised Land, 2012), suicide (The Sea of Trees, 2015) or handicap (Don't Worry, He Won't Get Far on Foot, 2018), Gus remains devoted to depicting the margin and publicizing its drama.