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George Lucas

It should be more accurate to call Lucas producer rather than director, because there are few movies directed by him compared to the huge list of movies he has produced.

Anyway, this man is considered a visionary of the entertainment industry, due to the technological innovations he has promoted through his movie shootings (Star Wars II has been indeed the first ever 100% digital shooted film), and with his style in doing marketing and creating merchandising.

He first wanted to be a proffesional racing driver but a car accident when he was finishing high school definitely ended with that dream. He then retargeted his life to movie making. During the 70s, there has been a generation of filmmakers that took out American movies from their crisis forever. Among them there were, for instance, Steven Spielberg, George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola. After stablishing a friendship with Francis, a bit older than him, George launched a sci-film film called THX-1138 while he was studying. This movie got an ignominious failure. So then he filmed American Graffiti, which became the movie hit of the year. He recovered his self-steam and then he shooted Star Wars. This movie was produced by Fox and George didn't earn a dime for directing it. It got 7 Oscar and broke the box office. Instead, George kept 40% of the box office earnings and all the merchandising rights. He couldn't have done it better. And Fox people thought nobody was going to pay a dollar for the merchandising...

Later, Lucas has got involved in the videogames industry as well, in fact he has been one of the main videogame promoters through Lucasfilm Games (now LucasArts), game firm that succesfully developed lots of videogames during the 80s and 90s, and in the present. Among the titles LucasArts has developed, we can find great classics as The Secret of Monkey Island, Maniac Mansion... etcetera.

George has also helped actors that trusted him: Harrison Ford has built an extraordinary career as an actor, and Star Wars has been perhaps the most influential saga in the film history.

He became millionaire at a short age (about 30), so he managed to build a big ranch in California where he lives and works. And who knows, he might see the Obi Wan Kenobi Ghost walking around from time to time

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