Robert Kolodny

Robert Kolodny is an American film director, writer and cinematographer. His 2023 debut feature film, The Featherweight, premiered at the 80th Venice International Film Festival. He was a cinematographer for the Peabody Award-winning documentary film All the Beauty and the Bloodshed, released in 2022.

Early life Kolodny grew up in Freehold Township, New Jersey, and attended Freehold High School where he began making films at a young age after developing a fascination with motion pictures. He studied Film Direction at the School of Visual Arts in New York City, where he studied under Manfred Kirchheimer. During this time Kolodny began an artistic collaboration with Chilean poet and artist Cecilia Vicuña.

Career In 2010, Kolodny formed the production company House of Nod. Through this company he began to create commercial work as well as music videos with Brooklyn based artists such as Japanese Breakfast, Frankie Cosmos, LVL UP and Gabby's World.

In 2013 Robert Kolodny won an Emmy for directing a season of the culinary TV program Frankie Cooks. The same year he directed the short film Fly on Out which won the grand prize at the AbelCine Vision Research Miro High-Speed Inspiration Challenge.

Around this time Kolodny began working as a documentary cinematographer, initially on Lenny Cooke by the Safdie brothers and then with Robert Greene on Kate Plays Christine and Bisbee '17. He worked his way up to being the director of photography for Greene's Netflix film Procession, Alex Ross Perry's Pavements and one of the cinematographers of the Peabody Award-winning and Academy Award nominated All the Beauty and the Bloodshed by Laura Poitras. For several years Kolodny was working on a nonfiction film about Bulgarian Olympian Serafim Todorov.

In 2018, he created the film elements for Disappeared Quipu which appeared at the Brooklyn Museum, the Museum of Fine Arts Boston and MALBA. The massive site-specific art art piece included a looping four channel video projection composed of intricately drifting ancient Andean textiles. During the COVID-19 pandemic Kolodny collaborated playwright Taylor Mac on several of musical specials that streamed online and then later were performed live. In 2022 he was named one of Doc NYC's 40 under 40.

Key collaborators in Kolodny's work include his cinematographer brother Adam Kolodny, producer Bennett Elliott, Robert Greene, Alex Ross Perry and Sean Price Williams. Robert Kolodny is a professor of film at his alma mater, the School of Visual Arts, where he teaches directing and screenwriting.

The Featherweight The Featherweight was Robert Kolodny's feature film directorial debut. It tracks the post-retirement career of former world champion boxer Willie Pep and his troubled road to a comeback, as a direct cinema film crew documents his daily life. Starring James Madio, Ron Livingston, Stephen Lang, Keir Gilchrist and Ruby Wolf, the film received critical acclaim for its realism and intricate craft. Guy Lodge from Variety said: "Kolodny puts nary a foot wrong in his precise replication of a midcentury vérité aesthetic and gaze, from the particular grain and thrust of the camerawork to the authentically abrasive tone and tenor of the performances."

The Featherweight premiered at the 80th Venice International Film Festival in the Orizzonti competition. Later it was selected as the closing film of the 54th International Film Festival of India. Kolodny was received the John Schlesinger Narrative Award from the Provincetown International Film Festival and the Peter Brunette Award for Best Director at RiverRun International Film Festival for his work on the film.

Influences Robert Kolodny has publicly cited the work of several directors as being influential to him, including John Cassavetes and Martin Scorsese as well as the direct cinema movement, specifically the work of D. A. Pennebaker and Albert and David Maysles.

Filmography

Music videos Year Title Artist(s) Role(s) 2013"Nightshade" LVL UP Director 2015"Broken Necks" Gabby's World Director"Really Love" Body Language DP 2016"National Parks" Big Ups Director"The Closing Door" LVL UP Director"Everybody Wants To Love You" Japanese Breakfast Producer"Jane Cum" Japanese Breakfast Producer"Thick Skin" Bellows Director"Tummy Ache" Diet Cig Director 2017"Machinist" Japanese Breakfast Producer"Road Head" Japanese Breakfast Producer"Bobby" Alex G Producer, Editor 2018"Boyish" Japanese Breakfast Editor"Carnations" Palehound Director, Editor"Cut Me Off" Madeline Kenney Director, Editor 2019"Dylan Thomas" Better Oblivion Community Center Editor"Aaron" Palehound Director, DP, Editor"Worthy" Palehound Director, DP, Editor"Wannago" Frankie Cosmos Director, Editor 2021"Sam Jam" Covey Director, Editor"1991" Covey Director, Editor"I Wrote You a Song" Chad Lawson Director, DP"Be Sweet" Japanese Breakfast Editor"Savage Good Boy" Japanese Breakfast Editor"Dig" Barrie Director, Editor"Quarry" Barrie Director, DP, Editor 2022"Harness Your Hopes" Pavement Editor"Metal Myths" Ghost Producer, DP, Editor"Bones" Soccer Mommy Editor"Across That Fine Line" Nation of Language Director 2023"Days Move Slow" Bully Editor"Too Much, Enough" Nation of Language Director"Jesus He Knows Me" Ghost DP, Editor"Tidal Session" Momma Producer, DP, Editor"Ghostwriter" Speedy Ortiz DP 2024"Stopping and Staring" Gustaf Editor"Missing Out" Maya Hawke DP, Editor"Dark" Maya Hawke DP, Editor"I'm A Man" Kim Gordon Editor"After Hours" Christian Lee Hutson DP, Editor"Paradise Pop. 10" Christian Lee Hutson DP, Editor 2025"Orlando in Love" Japanese Breakfast Editor"Picture Window" Japanese Breakfast Editor"Bunky Pop" Sleigh Bells Editor"Stay in Your Lane" Courtney Barnett DP, Editor