Michael Kahn

A winner of multiple Academy Awards, celebrated film editor Michael Kahn became best known for his long standing partnership with filmmaker Steven Spielberg. After cutting his teeth in television editing the popular WWII sitcom "Hogan's Heroes" (CBS, 1965-1971) and a slew of B-movie quickies like "Black Belt Jones" (1974), Kahn picked up an Emmy Award for his work on the miniseries "Eleanor and Franklin" (ABC, 1976). "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" (1977), his first collaborative effort with a young Spielberg, portended things to come and soon led to Kahn's first Oscar win for the swashbuckling adventure classic, "Raiders of the Lost Ark" (1981). His prowess on films as thematically and visually distinct as Adrian Lyne's polarizing psycho-thriller "Fatal Attraction" (1987) and Spielberg's WWII drama "Empire of the Sun" (1987) each earned Kahn an Oscar nomination that same year. Second and third Academy statuettes were picked up by the editor for a pair of WWII-centric masterpieces - the harrowing "Schindler's List" (1993) and the visceral "Saving Private Ryan" (1998), respectively. Alongside Spielberg, he continued to work at the forefront of technology and craft in films as diverse as "The Adventures of Tintin" (2011) and the presidential biopic "Lincoln" (2012). Although one of the most Oscar-nominated film editors in history, the prolific and seemingly tireless Kahn showed no signs of slowing, some 50-plus years into his astonishing career.