Danish director who won acclaim for his unique visionary prowess, Niels Arden Oplev was born Niels Pedersen in 1961 in Denmark. He initially followed an agricultural education like his father had, but switched directions and ventured into film. He enrolled on the National Film School of Denmark, where he directed a prize-winning documentary about his father’s farm titled Hugo From Himmerland. By 1989, he graduated as a director from the prestigious film school and quickly began directing plays and short films. In 1996, Oplev made his feature film directorial debut Portland (1996), a violent story about two brothers navigating the criminal underworld of a small town. After directing his second film, Fukssvansen (2001), Oplev began working on TV shows. Two of them, Unit One (2000-04) and Ornen (2004-06), nabbed the Best Foreign Language Television Series at the International Emmy Awards and brought recognition to the Danish director. Still, he is best known for directing the international Swedish blockbuster The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2009). The film broke box office records in Europe, grossing over 100 million US dollars. However, Oplev decided not to continue directing the second and third parts of the Millennium Trilogy due to time constraints.

Instead, in 2013, he directed Dead Man Down, a film starring Colin Farrell, Noomi Rapace, Dominic Cooper, Terrence Howard and F. Murray Abraham. He continued to alternate between filming in English and Danish: coming-of-age Danish drama Speed Walking (2014), American science fiction psychological horror Flatliners (2017) with Eliot Page, Diego Luna and James Norton and Danish biographical film Daniel (2019) about Daniel Rye, who was held hostage by ISIS for 13 months.