Corey Kupfer is a Wisconsin native. He looks as good in a cheesehead as those vintage pants (left), as comfortable in an aluminum fishing boat as on a meditation cushion, as happy with a PBR as a glass of natural wine.

He received dual BFAs in Film and Creative Writing from UW-Milwaukee. Then, his experimental film and mixed-media installations showed in galleries in Milwaukee and Northern England; with stand-outs like a mattress hanging from meat hooks with a TV inside featuring a bar of soap and an egg cooking together in a frying pan, having a seductive conversation (the egg and soap) using terminology from the descriptions on household self-care products. “You are the basis for any hairstyle, baby. Use me twice daily in the shower. Rinse, and repeat, if necessary.” Furthermore Corey’s original poetry was published in both the US and UK; and subsequently Singapore.

Although at that point Corey was clearly ready to enter the real world workforce with the skills he’d cultivated, he instead decided to expand his film education into the traditional narrative at NYU’s Tisch School, which he chose to complete at their Singapore campus, during which time he filled two passports, participated in filmmaking in more than ten countries, learned to bribe highway police in Borneo, get equipment out of hock in Guangzhao, find help trapped knee-deep in Cambodian jungle mud during a monsoon, and fell in love in Vietnam.

His MFA short film Nindy, premiered at Vancouver IFF, won Best Short at Wisconsin IFF and won an emerging artist grant from a now Me Too-shamed celebrity’s organization whose name I will not taint this page with.

Corey’s focus was then, and remains a dedicated study to acting and directing methods. Drawing from the greatest teachers he’s cultivated his own unique method over the past decade. Along with his cinematographer they’ve developed a shooting style that can look as classic as Kubrick, while giving actors the freedom of Cassavetes.

Corey’s original screenwriting too brings about new experiences in classic ways, inspired equally by American classics like his favorites Silence of the Lambs and Cool Hand Luke, as the more challenging cinema the likes of Lucrecia Martel and Terrence Malick. Corey’s purpose is to make original cinema that does not reinforce, but challenges what an audience thinks they know to be true; and to make it accessible to any audience, with a depth of challenge that is exhilarating, not alienating.

Corey is currently taking his first feature film Seven Days, a self-funded and produced seven part anthology, out to festivals. His prospective next feature screenplay Heart of Man, a Psycho-inspired thriller with modern socioeconomic themes, is looking for representation and development.

COREY@GOLDENMILEFILM.COM