Chavez Ravine: A Los Angeles Story

Mechner has written and directed two award-winning short films, Waiting for Dark and Chavez Ravine: A Los Angeles Story. He is also one of the world’s best-known videogame creators. His games — including Karateka, Prince of Persia, The Last Express, and Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time— have sold millions of copies and received worldwide critical acclaim. Mechner is currently working on a big-screen adaptation of Prince of Persia for producer Jerry Bruckheimer and Walt Disney Pictures. He received his B.A. from Yale University.

In 1949, Normark, a freelance photographer, made the still photographs that illustrate Chavez Ravine: A Los Angeles Story. The film dramatizes the events related in his book Chavez Ravine: A Los Angeles Story, published by Chronicle Books. Normark’s photographs of Chavez Ravine, as well as his more recent work, will be exhibited at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art in the summer of 2005. Normark has illustrated many books, and thousands of his travel and garden photographs have filled the pages of Sunset and other magazines. His photographs reside in the permanent collections of several museums.

Andersen has 20 years of experience as a director of photography shooting independent feature films, commercials and television documentaries. He has shot for The Learning Channel, The History Channel, A&E Biography, Lifetime Intimate Portraits, MTV, VH-1, and The Disney Channel, as well as for NASA, the Kennedy Space Center, Amgen, the EPA, Dupont Chemical, the World Health Organization, and the American Cancer Society. Andersen first worked with Jordan Mechner as director of photography on The Last Express.

Moran has worked in various capacities on a wide range of films, including Bee Season (Richard Gere, Juliette Binoche), BASIC (John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson), Secretary (Maggie Gyllenhaal, a 2002 Sundance winner), Sweet Home Alabama (Reese Witherspoon) and Novocaine (Steve Martin). Prior to his film career, he designed and programmed cutting-edge computer games. He started his first company at age 17, which led to his working with Jordan Mechner on the award-winning CD-ROM game The Last Express. Moran graduated summa cum laude from Columbia University with a degree in literature and writing.