John Lee Hancock


John Lee Hancock Jr. is an American screenwriter, film director, and producer. He directed the sports drama films The Rookie and The Blind Side, and the historical drama films Saving Mr. Banks, The Founder and The Highwaymen.

Career

Hancock's debut as a screenwriter and director came in 1991 with Hard Time Romance. He worked on two more films as a screenwriter with A Perfect World and Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil before making his next directing effort in 2002 with the sports drama The Rookie, starring Dennis Quaid, whose performance was lauded. The film was a critical and commercial success. In 2004, he wrote and directed The Alamo, a remake of the 1960 film. It starred Dennis Quaid, Billy Bob Thornton, Jason Patric and Patrick Wilson, but it was met with negative reviews and was a huge box office bomb.
After a five-year absence, Hancock directed The Blind Side, a biographical sports drama film about Michael Oher, starring Sandra Bullock and Quinton Aaron. With a budget of $29 million, the film grossed over $309 million, becoming Hancock's highest-grossing film to date and received two Academy Award nominations, with Bullock winning the Academy Award for Best Actress.
In 2013 Hancock directed Saving Mr. Banks, a film about the life of P. L. Travers and her difficult negotiations with Walt Disney over adapting her novel Mary Poppins into a feature film. He also directed The Founder, about the McDonald's fast food chain, and co-wrote the upcoming musical film The Goree Girls. In 2019 he directed his first Netflix movie The Highwaymen.
Hancock also directed the pilot of the television series Paradise Lost, which premiered on April 13, 2020.

Filmography

YearFilmDirectorWriterProducer
1991Hard Time Romance
1993A Perfect World
1997Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil
2000My Dog Skip
2002The Rookie
2004The Alamo
2009The Blind Side
2012Snow White and the Huntsman
2013Saving Mr. Banks
2016The Founder
2019The Highwaymen
2021Chaos Walking
2021The Little Things
2021Infinite