Michel Gondry began his career as a filmmaker directing music videos for the French band Oui Oui, for which he was also drummer. His videos attracted the attention of Icelandic musician Bjork, who sought Gondry’s collaboration for seven of her music videos to date. Gondry has also directed music videos for Daft Punk, The White Stripes, The Chemical Brothers, Radiohead, and Beck, and has also directed a number of television commercials, pioneering the “bullet time” effect made popular by The Matrix. Gondry made his feature film debut with the bizarre film Human Nature, written by Charlie Kaufman. Human Nature received mixed reviews, but his follow-up, the similarly Kaufman-written Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind was a huge critical success, winning Gondry an Academy Award alongside Charlie Kaufman and Pierre Bismuth for the screenplay. In 2006, Gondry directed both the strange and whimsical The Science of Sleep, and the musical documentary Dave Chappelle’s Block Party. Other notable works directed by Gondry include a segment in the anthology film Tokyo!, the music video for Paul McCartney’s song Dance Tonight, an episode of Flight of the Conchords, and The Green Hornet. In addition to his work in film and video, Gondry was an Artist in Residence at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and debuted as an installation artist in New York City’s SoHo gallery district in 2006. He turns 49 today.