Early Life and Education San Francisco (1990S)
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AMATO BIO + LINKS Matt Amato is an American film writer and director. A "radical filmmaker,” his work has been described as "gorgeous, incredibly cinematic” and “visionary". As an influential music video director, he has worked with some of the greatest musicians of this generation. His major works include music videos for popular artists such as Barbra Streisand, Beach House, Bon Iver, Dido, Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, Soko, and Wild Nothing. He also co-founded the iconoclastic Los Angeles based visual arts collective, The Masses. In 2020, he completed his debut feature, Never My Love. Amato is now documenting the efforts of historic preservationist Larry Giles at the National Building Arts Center. Amato is a radical filmmaker, willing to make a movie that travels like a river, or unfolds like a piece of music or a real human life, something that seems alien after we’ve slumped in theater seats, overdazzling our retinas with exploding cars and exploding planets. He realizes the transformative power of seeing—and not seeing. Of showing the full spectrum of a full human life, with a slice hidden in shadow. That unsettled, mysterious place makes room for the watcher but throws down the challenge to do more than just watch. - Stefene Russell, St. Louis Magazine Early life and education Amato filming Red House Painters music video in San Fransisco, CA. Amato grew up in St. Louis, MO and was educated by the Benedictine monks at St. Louis Priory. He briefly attended film school at Columbia College in Chicago before venturing to California. San Francisco (1990s) Amato began his directing career in the mid-1990s while living in San Francisco. Shooting on 16mm, he created music videos for San Fransisco's most eminent musicians, American Music Club, Red House Painters and Tarnation. Amato’s videos were broadcast on pioneering MTV shows such as 120 Minutes and Subterranean. One notable collaborator at this time would be cinematographer, Eric Alan Edwards. A music video Amato directed for another San Fransisco band, Imperial Teen, was shot on 35mm by cinematographer great, Tim Ives. Experimenting with 8mm for the band Tipsy, Amato’s work became a ubiquitous presence on MTV’s electronic- music based, Amp. It was with Tipsy that Amato started Vjing under the guidance of Mix Master Mike who taught him the similarities of mixing music and images. Amato continued to make progress at Palm Pictures with a video for Tijuana's Nortec Collective and live visual presentations for Supreme Beings Of Leisure. It was there that he utilized animation for the first time on a music video for the band, Earlimart. The animator was Jon Ramos and in 2002 they founded the Los Angeles based visual arts collective, The Masses. 1 of 17 AMATO BIO + LINKS Los Angeles + The Masses (2000s) Masses logo designed by Daniel Auber Amato sustained his innovative work in music videos by embracing digital film-making. Music critic Randall Roberts hailed Amato’s Ima Robot video “one of the great music clips of the 21st century.” In 2006, Amato established a partnership with his best friend, Heath Ledger. Together, they hatched a plan to include a music company under the Masses umbrella. Michelle Williams said, "I think that music became more important to him because he could do something creative without it costing him his privacy. He could be more in the background. He could be in charge, but invisible.” Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros and Grace Woodroofe were the first artists cultivated by the now mythic, Masses Music Company. Amato and Ledger considered all their projects to be music driven, a natural progression from music videos and their shared passion for music. Amato told the Los Angeles Times in 2009, “What Heath brought to us at the Masses was his pure creative energy, chessboards and surfboards.” It was also a place of serious work where Heath became confident behind the camera, honing his skills shooting and editing. The Masses started developing their own movie projects. Amato discovered the Walter Tevis novel, The Queen's Gambit, while listening to a vintage interview with Tevis he found buried within the Criterion supplements of The Man Who Fell To Earth DVD. Upon reading the novel, Ledger decided it would be his maiden voyage as a director. He prepared a screenplay with screenwriter Allan Scott and started crafting the shot-list with his favorite cinematographer, Edward Lachman. During this time, Ledger also developed the screenplay with Amato for what would be Amato's first movie, Never My Love. “I was very well aware of the movies Heath wanted to make, because we shared the same values,” Amato reflects. We definitely wanted to make movies for smart women. I think he had his daughter in mind, as well. We hated violence in our culture. We’re very against it. We wanted to flip that paradigm and focus on women and love, and chess. Amato was on location in Eau Claire, WI directing Bon Iver’s first video the day Ledger died. “It was no longer about just making a Bon Iver music video anymore,” the group’s singer- songwriter Justin Vernon says. “This was now our chance to be there with Matt as he grieved. It was a three-day wake." 2 of 17 AMATO BIO + LINKS The Masses 2.0 (2010s) Still from Amato's 40 Day Dream Amato joined forces with Executive Producer Jack Richardson in what was essentially the Masses 2.0. A new group of music video directors and musicians were attracted to the inclusive ethos and creative spirit of the Masses where Amato served as the creative director. The Masses functioned as a directors agency representing a new wave of music video directors in Los Angeles: Ben Fee, Ben Kutsko, Chris Coats, Alistair Legrand, Isaiah Seret, Elliot Sellers, Raúl Fernández, Eli Stonberg, Alex Pelly to name just a few. The Masses also assisted in the creation of OMG! Cameras Everywhere!, an exuberant music video making summer camp for young people in Los Angeles, London and NYC. Known for their epic parties at their offices on La Brea Ave. with DJ sets from the Dublab crew, live performances from bands like The Lumineers and in conjunction with Cinespia the numerous poolside movie screenings at the Roosevelt Hotel, the Masses became a bright spot on LA's cultural landscape. The annual screenings of their work from the previous year would sell out The Downtown Independent. Amato's "natural and soulful” videos are known for their intimacy, spontaneity and sense of place often filming on location. Singer-songwriter Madi Diaz reflected on their collaboration this way, "He has an indescribable presence; this warm loving serene calm with intense interest and excitement bubbling beneath his exterior. He’s some sort of amazing mind reader and balances it with his trust in you and yours in him.” Amato says, “It's about connecting with people. I've had some great opportunities to connect in a very personal way with some of the artists I worked with on music videos. There is that sense of nostalgia, even while you're there, on some music videos. I'm thinking particularly of the family I stayed with in Scotland when I did the Withered Hand video. Or working with Justin out in the woods during the Bon Iver video. Those are very powerful memories for me.” The bona fide word in the halls of Columbia Records is that renown perfectionist Barbra Streisand loved Amato's video so much she requested no revisions. "While Streisand had recorded the unreleased song in 1970, Amato did not direct the video until 2012. Consequently, he had to jog the memories of the original producer, Richard Perry, about important details of the original recording. Amato reproduced small details such as the original type of microphone preferred by Streisand and the setting of the recording. Amato describes it as “an exercise in verisimilitude.” Amato invited "Kodachrome-drenched journeying” actress Michelle Williams to work with him on a “wistful" and "visually arresting” music video for Wild Nothing's Paradise. 3 of 17 AMATO BIO + LINKS In it, Williams recorded a voice over of a mystical passage from Iris Murdoch's A Word Child. William's stirring vocal was recorded at the fabled Rare Book Room by Nicolas Vernhes. Amato "comely grasps the elusive feeling of the song" and captures "Williams’ especially moving and elegant performance that elevates the video to absolute emotional harmony." I Am Heath Ledger (2017) Ledger behind-the-scenes of his music video for Ben Harper's Morning Yearning Amato signed on as an Executive Producer and creative consultant on the documentary film, I Am Heath Ledger. He traveled to Perth, Australia to work with Ledger's family and to insure it would be a magnanimous sketch of his friend and partner. It premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival with a Q+A involving Amato and Ledger's sisters, Ashleigh Bell and Kate Ledger. The "uncommonly tender" documentary is heralded for its sensitivity while reflecting on the actor's artistic nature as told by his most faithful friends and loved ones. "I Am Heath Ledger is a cinematic portrait of Ledger the artist. Devoid of gossip and any hint of salaciousness," one reviewer noted. "The result is refreshing, insightful, and also devastatingly sad.” It currently holds an 86% on Rotten Tomatoes. "I'll always have my reservations with the final product. But, overall, it's a very positive portrait of a real lover of life, and his family truly loves it. Their appreciation of it means a lot to me and made it worth doing.” Amato told MTV News.