Don Hertzfeldt

Don Hertzfeldt is one of the few animators who genuinely rewires how I think about the medium. With nothing but stick figures and hand-drawn lines he conjures mortality, memory, and cosmic loneliness more piercingly than most big-budget studios. A two-time Oscar nominee with a record nine shorts at Sundance, he proved that independent vision beats technical spectacle. Works like the World of Tomorrow series feel like doodles haunted by the whole universe. What I treasure is his refusal to chase polish; he trusts the idea itself. That's authorship in its purest, most stubborn form, and I find it endlessly inspiring.

Name (English)

Don Hertzfeldt

Name (Japanese)

ドン・ハーツフェルト

Reading

どん・はーつふぇると

Born

August 1, 1976 (age 50)

Zodiac / Chinese zodiac

Leo / Dragon

Origin

Fremont, California, United States

Occupation

film director / screenwriter / animator / cinematographer / writer

High school

Mission San Jose High School

University

University of California, Santa Barbara

• Official sitehttp://www.bitterfilms.com
• Instagramhttps://www.instagram.com/don_hertzfeldt/
• Xhttps://x.com/donhertzfeldt
• Wikipedia (English)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don%20Hertzfeldt
• Wikidatahttps://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q594400

Tags

• California
• film director
• screenwriter
• animator

Last updated

2026-06-21

Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.