Amnon Buchbinder (June 17, 1958 - November 30, 2019) was an American-born Canadian screenwriter and film director,Patricia Robertson
"Film stories feed the soul"
''

Yukon News ''Yukon News'' is one of two newspapers published in Whitehorse, Yukon in Canada. It was founded in 1960, as a weekly until the late 1970s. It currently prints two times a week. Its Monday edition is online-only. The ''Yukon News'' has been the r ...

'', March 4, 2006. most noted for his feature films '' The Fishing Trip'' and ''

Whole New Thing ''Whole New Thing'' is a 2005 Canadian drama film directed by Amnon Buchbinder. The film is a coming-of-age narrative about a 13-year-old boy, Emerson Thorsen (played by Aaron Webber) who lives in an isolated straw-bale house with his counter-cult ...

''.Bill Rankin, "Believable characters keep Whole New Thing from getting old". ''

Edmonton Journal The ''Edmonton Journal'' is a daily newspaper in Edmonton, Alberta. It is part of the Postmedia Network. History The ''Journal'' was founded in 1903 by three local businessmen — John Macpherson, Arthur Moore and J.W. Cunningham — as ...

'', October 4, 2005. Born in Missouri, he moved to Canada with his family in childhood, before studying film at the

California Institute of the Arts The California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) is a private art university in Santa Clarita, California. It was incorporated in 1961 as the first degree-granting institution of higher learning in the US created specifically for students of both ...

. He was based in

Vancouver Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

in the early 1980s, where he was a board member of the

Pacific Cinematheque The Cinematheque (legal name: Pacific Cinémathèque Pacifique), founded in 1972, is a Canadian charity and non-profit film institute, media education centre, and film exhibitor based in Vancouver, British Columbia. The organization’s mission i ...

and a programmer for the

Vancouver International Film Festival The Vancouver International Film Festival (VIFF) is an annual film festival held in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, for two weeks in late September and early October. The festival is operated by the Greater Vancouver International Film Fest ...

. He made a number of short films, most notably 1983's ''Oroboros'', before studying directing at the

Canadian Film Centre The Canadian Film Centre (CFC) is a charitable organization founded by filmmaker Norman Jewison in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, in 1988. Originally launched as film school, today it provides training, development and advancement opportunities for pr ...

. He joined the faculty of

York University York University (french: Université York), also known as YorkU or simply YU, is a public university, public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is Canada's fourth-largest university, and it has approximately 55,700 students, 7,0 ...

as a professor of screenwriting in the film department in 1995, and eventually became chair of the department."Passings: Amnon Buchbinder, filmmaker, director and screenwriter"

, December 4, 2019. ''The Fishing Trip'', his first feature film as a director, was written by Michelle Lovretta, one of his students at York.Judy Gerstel, "Toronto teens get lost in their Fishing Trip roles". ''

Toronto Star The ''Toronto Star'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper. The newspaper is the country's largest daily newspaper by circulation. It is owned by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary of Torstar Corporation and part ...

'', November 13, 1988. In 2005 he published the screenwriting text ''The Way of the Screenwriter'', and released ''Whole New Thing'' as his second feature film. Following ''Whole New Thing'' he worked on ''Mortal Coil'', a television pilot. Although it was never picked up to series, he published a novel based on it in 2014. In 2015 he released the film ''Traveling Medicine Show'', a compilation of three short

docufiction Docufiction (or docu-fiction) is the cinematographic combination of documentary and fiction, this term often meaning narrative film. It is a film genre which attempts to capture reality such as it is (as direct cinema or cinéma vérité) and ...

films in which he and his own family had played fictionalized versions of themselves. The following year he released his final film, the interactive documentary ''Biology of Story''. He died on November 30, 2019 of cancer.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Buchbinder, Amnon 1959 births 2019 deaths 20th-century Canadian screenwriters 20th-century Canadian male writers 21st-century Canadian screenwriters 21st-century Canadian novelists 21st-century Canadian male writers Canadian male novelists Canadian male screenwriters Film directors from Toronto Writers from Toronto American emigrants to Canada Jewish Canadian writers Academic staff of York University Canadian Film Centre alumni Jewish Canadian filmmakers