Neil Johnson

Neil Brook Johnson (born 26 July 1967) is a British film and music video producer, director and editor best known for his long association with heavy metal band Manowar, and for directing and writing science fiction films.

Early life Born in Southampton, England, Johnson emigrated to Australia at the age of five. At the age of 20, he became the youngest (paid) director in Australia.

Johnson's lengthy career includes stints as producer, director, editor, cinematographer, and production manager. Beginning his career as a camera assistant, Neil was obsessed with Science Fiction, and would spend his spare time making short films. His first 40 music videos were made for free before he started earning a living. He has directed 6 feature films. His first film, Demons In My Head (1997) is reputed to be the world's first digital film. to be a major feat before the digital film-making explosion.

From 2005 to 2007, he shot an additional 20 minutes for the first 2 films, re-cut them, updated the effects, re-sized the films up to high definition and renamed the films.

2011 saw the release of Alien Dawn, a direct take on The War of the Worlds. The film was set in modern times and showed Los Angeles decimated with Martian tripods, more akin to George Pal than the original H.G. Wells version. Johnson stated in a number of interviews that he would one day do a proper version of The War of the Worlds once the rights became clear in the UK

In 2012, Johnson made the film Death Machine in the UK, following the death of his best friend, Philip Burthem. He stated in an interview on the Geekscape podcast that this film was his personal favorite, born out of the pain of his loss.

2012 He made the films Starship: Rising and Starship: Apocalypse. Both films were shot back to back and were shot on Johnson's own studio soundstage, Morphius Studios. The films were shot and produced in 4K resolution.

In 2012 he was featured n the Discovery Channel's Television program Stalked. The episode highlighted the problems he had with a stalker, Wendy Feiner, who had stalked him since 2003. It is alleged that she made many death threats against him and when she was finally arrested, she continued the harassment in jail until the day she died of a drug overdose in September 2012. Iva Franks and her brother Michael Martin both died after the incident due to dealing with the stress of the situation. Neil Johnson remains the sole survivor of this incident.

In 2016, he made the film called Rogue Warrior: Robot Fighter, starring Tracey Birdsall. The film was released by Sony Pictures USA. The film was notable for having its spaceship design and poster artwork emulated by Star Wars' Mandalorian Television series that came out two years later.

Between the years 1995 and 2024, Neil Johnson has been working on The Time War, a $10 million, 10 episode TV series, shot in England, Scotland, Iceland, Germany and Malibu California. It was written in 1995 as a feature film, but finally became a television series in 2018, after he was forced to re-shoot footage following the fires in Malibu in December 2018, in which some of the footage was lost to the fire. Despite losing everything he owned to the fire, Neil Johnson has been able to complete the series, albeit slowly before its impending release. The Time War stars Tracey Birdsall, William Kircher, Christopher Showerman, Daniel Logan, Barry Corbin, Christopher Showerman, Stephen Manley, and features the voice talents of Christopher Lee, Paul Darrow and Marilyn Ghigliotti. In 2014, his film Starship: Rising won 4 1/2 awards at the Action On Film festival. Best Science Fiction Film, Best Visual Effects, Best Actor (Darren Jacobs), Best Music (Charles-Henri Avelange), Second Place Best Editing (Dave Edison), and a nomination for Best Art direction In 2015, he won a lifetime achievement award at Action On Film. It was called the Alan Bailey Award for Excellence in the craft of Science Fiction Filmmaking In 2017, his film Rogue Warrior: Robot Fighter won awards for Best Actress and Best Visual Effects Feature Film at Worldfest Houston Film festival, Best Director & Best Science Fiction Film at Los Angeles Theatrical Release Competition Awards festival and Best Film (Staff Pick) & Best Sound Design at Action on Film Festival, USA