Paul Özgür (Amsterdam, The Netherlands) studied Fine Arts for two years at the School of Arts in Amsterdam. After discovering his passion for moving images, he applied to the Netherlands Film School (NFA) in Amsterdam to attend a 4 year BA-program with a specialization in Cinematography. His graduation film ‘Magnesium’ premiered at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival and won the Best Cinematography at the 2013 Camerimage Film Festival. After graduating, he decided to attend the Master-program in Cinematography at the National Film and Television School (NFTS) in the UK. 

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His first feature film PRINCE opened the Generation section at the 2015 Berlinale Film Festival and received a ‘Special Mention’ by the 14Plus Jury and was released in the US. He received a Best Cinematography nomination at the Dutch Film Festival.

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Paul continued his career shooting the controversial yet groundbreaking film THE WOUND directed by John Trengrove. It was screened in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival and opened the Panorama section of the 67th Berlin International Film Festival. The film opened the Tel Aviv International LGBT Film Festival 2017. It was selected as the South African entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 90th Academy Awards, making the December shortlist. THE WOUND has received 19 awards at 44 festivals worldwide, including its win for best first feature at the BFI London Film Festival. 

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Paul’s latest film JOHN AND THE HOLE, starring Michael C. Hall and directed by Pascual Sisto, premiered at the 2020 Cannes Film festival and played in competition at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival in the U.S. Dramatic competition. His recently wrapped projects include STROBE (dir. Taylor Cohen) featuring Suzanna Son, RUBY (dir. Max Bogen) starring Jaeden Martell and Jack Dylan Grazer, and FOR GOOD (dir. Clayton Villa) featuring Paul Raci and Joel Kinnaman

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His commercial and short form work have received international nominations and awards ranging from BAFTA’s to Ciclope awards. He has worked for internationally recognized brands such as IBM, NIKE, BMW, HEINEKEN, HUGO BOSS, SAMSUNG, RIMOWA, VW, YSL, MCDONALDS, NIKON, NBA, GOOGLE.

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Paul Özgür was named “Top 10 Cinematographers to Watch” by Variety in 2018, and is an active Member of the internationally recognized Netherlands Society of Cinematographers (NSC).