Gavin Hood (b. May 12, 1963 in Johannesburg) - South African director, writer, producer and actor, best known for winning the Academy Award for Foreign Language Film at the 78th Academy Awards for the 2005 film Tsotsi.
Hood was born in Johannesburg and educated at St Stithians College and the University of the Witwatersrand, where he studied law, and at the film school of the University of California, Los Angeles.
He first came to the South African public's attention when he starred in the SABC TV production The Game, a drama series focusing on the game of rugby union.
Hood got his start at directing when he was commissioned to make several short educational dramas for the South African Department of Health. He directed his first commercial short film, The Storekeeper, in 1998, which earned him his first Academy Award nomination.
His first feature film, A Reasonable Man, followed in 1999. The film portrays the accidental killing of a young child who is mistaken for a tokoloshe. He also starred in, co-produced and wrote the script for this movie. Hood then went on to direct the Polish language 2001 feature film In Desert and Wilderness (W pustyni i w puszczy) when the original director fell ill.
This was followed by Tsotsi in 2005.
In 2000, Variety magazine named him as one of its "Ten Directors to Watch".
He directed Rendition (2007), his first Hollywood feature, for New Line Cinema. He has also been announced as the director of X-Men Origins: Wolverine, based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name, with Hugh Jackman reprising his role from the X-Men films.
He also acts occasionally, most notably in In Enemy Hands and the Stargate SG-1 episode "Lockdown".
