Ben Young

Festival Ambassador

Ben Young is an award-winning writer and director who began his career in front of the camera at the age of 12. After completing a BA at Curtin University in 2003 and an MA at the WA Screen Academy in 2005, he went on to direct music videos, commercials, fashion films, and television drama. His feature debut, Hounds of Love (2016), won numerous awards worldwide, including at the Venice Film Festival. His second feature, Extinction (2018), starring Michael Peña and Lizzy Caplan, premiered on Netflix. He later directed two episodes of Netflix’s Clickbait (2020) and the season finale of Amazon’s The Wilds (2021). That same year, he helmed the feature Devil’s Peak, starring Billy Bob Thornton, Robin Wright, Jackie Earle Haley, and Hopper Penn, which reached number three on Hulu’s most popular films list in the US. In 2023, Young directed four episodes of Population 11 for Stan and three episodes of The Twelve for Foxtel. In 2024, he directed the full season of Scrublands: Silver for Stan. Most recently, in 2025, he directed the first two episodes of season two of The Artful Dodger for Disney+ and four episodes of Run for Binge, where he also serves as executive producer.