Although Alex Garland gets the most attention for his directorial career, the multi-talented director has credits beyond the director’s chair. Besides being a screenwriter, outside film and television, Garland is a published novelist and video game writer. The English filmmaker is arguably one of his generation’s most versatile directors.
Alex Garland comes from a generation of creatives. Garland’s father, Nicholas Garland, is a British political cartoonist (notably for The Daily Telegraph). His maternal grandmother, Jean Medawar, wife of British Nobel laureate Sir Peter Brian Medawar, was a renowned British author. A writer at heart, Alex Garland has more credits as a screenwriter/story developer than as a director. However, with fantastic work as a director, here’s a look at Alex Garland’s iconic directorial career.
Ex Machina (2014)
Alex Garland made his directorial debut in 2014 with Ex Machina. The movie is one of Hollywood’s top films about sentient humanoid robots. Oscar Isaac leads the cast as Nathan Bateman, the CEO of search engine company Blue Book. In Ex Machina, Isaac’s Nathan Bateman rigs a contest to have programmer Caleb Smith (Domhnall Gleeson) win a one-week visit to his luxurious, isolated home. Nathan Isaac intends to have Caleb Smith administer the Turing test to a secret humanoid robot he has been working on.
Ex Machina also starred British actress Sonoya Mizuno, who played Nathan Bateman’s in-house attendant. Mizuno, who has become a frequent collaborator of Garland, has appeared in all of Alex Garland’s directorial projects. Garland conceived the idea for Ex Machina when he was 10 to 11 years old. As he grew older and began discussing sentient Artificial Intelligence, he began working on the screenplay. He made Ex Machina, an AI film, on a small budget ($15 million) to have creative control of the story and script. Unsurprisingly, Ex Machina resonated with audiences and was a massive success, with Box Office earnings of $37.3 million.
Annihilation (2018)
Two years later, Alex Garland returned with his sophomore directorial project, Annihilation (2018). The science fiction cosmic horror movie starred Natalie Portman, Oscar Isaac, Gina Rodriguez, Tessa Thompson, Gina Rodriguez, Jennifer Jason Leigh, and Benedict Wong. Alex Garland was hired to write the screenplay in October 2014. Although based on Jeff VanderMeer’s first book in the Southern Reach Trilogy, Garland chose to work the story in his unique direction (with VanderMeer’s approval). Annihilation received above-average reviews from critics and audiences but wasn’t a box-office success.
Devs (2020)
Alex Garland took a break from the big screen to make his television directorial debut. Alex Garland’s directorial career may not be as extensive as his feature directorial career, but he set the bar high. Garland created the science fiction thriller miniseries Devs for Hulu. The 8-episode miniseries aired from March 5 to April 16, 2020. Actress Sonoya Mizuno led the cast of Devs, playing Lily Chan, a software engineer at Amaya. In the miniseries, Lily Chan tries to unravel the death of her cybersecurity specialist boyfriend, who died on his first day of work as part of the Devs team at Amaya. Devs was a critical success by every measure, with nothing short of praise from critics and audiences.
Men (2022)
Successfully, Alex Garland returned from television to the big screen in 2022. Unlike his previous works in movies, Garland wrote and directed the 2022 British folk horror Men. Grossing $11.2 million at the Box Office, it became Alex Garland’s least-performing feature film. Men received mixed to average reviews from critics, while several audiences found the storyline confusing. However, Irish actress and singer Jessie Buckley and English actor Rory Kinnear’s performances received praise. Men is one of Alex Garland’s movies distributed by A24. Actress Sonoya Mizuno also has credits in Men, albeit in a voice role as a police operator.
Civil War (2024)
With his screenwriting background, Alex Garland’s directorial career is filled with movies whose screenplay he wrote. Garland, who has earned a reputation for his thought-provoking films, returned with the dystopian action film Civil War in 2024. After Annihilation (2018), Alex Garland’s directorial career has seen him direct a project every two years. Civil War is arguably Garland’s best work yet. In Civil War, Garland’s screenplay is set during the onset of the Second American Civil War.
Seen through the eyes of a team of journalists, events unfold as the three-term President declares war on the separatist Western Forces, led by Texas and California. Civil War is led by the remarkable performance of Kirsten Dunst, who plays Lee, a renowned war photojournalist. After his appearance in Devs, Nick Offerman worked with Garland again in Civil War as the President of the United States. As always, Sonoya Mizuno also starred in the movie as Anya. If you enjoyed reading about Alex Garland’s directorial career, read the Top 10 directorial deature film debuts in 2023.
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