John Milius

Biography: After attending the University of Southern California film school (where he made the animated short Marcello, I'm So Bored), Milius became an assistant to producer Lawrence Gordon, and began co-scripting actioners in the early '70s with Evel Knievel and Dirty Harry (on which he was uncredited). He attracted attention with his scripts for John Huston's The Life and Time of Judge Roy Bean, Sydney Pollack's Jeremiah Johnson (co-scripted by Edward Anhalt), and the Dirty Harry sequel Magnum Force (co-scripted by Michael Cimino). Milius debuted as a writer/director with the tough crime drama Dillinger, and gained fame for his later actioners, most notably The Wind and the Lion, Conan the Barbarian, and Red Dawn. Milius also co-scripted Francis Coppola's Apocalypse Now and Walter Hill's Geronimo: An American Legend.