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David Osit
View on WikipediaDavid Osit (born May 6, 1987) is an American documentary filmmaker, editor and composer. His documentaries include Predators (2025), Mayor (2020), and Thank You for Playing (2015).
Key Information
Life and career
[edit]Osit was raised in the suburbs of New York City in Tuckahoe (village), New York, where he graduated from Tuckahoe High School in 2005.[1] Osit studied Middle Eastern and North African Studies at the University of Michigan where he was a Wallenberg Fellow,[2] and studied Refugee Law at the American University in Cairo. His first documentary film, Building Babel, was filmed while Osit was in graduate school and followed real estate developer Sharif El-Gamal during the 2010 Ground Zero Mosque controversy. The film was broadcast on PBS in 2013.[3]
He is the director, along with co-director Malika Zouhali-Worrall, of the 2015 documentary Thank You for Playing.[4][5][6] Osit and Zouhali-Worrall also directed "Games You Can't Win," a short film inspired by the feature for The New York Times Op-Docs.[7] Both the feature and short were inspired by the art house video game That Dragon, Cancer. In 2017, Thank You For Playing won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Arts and Culture Documentary.[8]
His third feature documentary, Mayor, follows Musa Hadid, the mayor of Ramallah, the de facto capital of Palestine. The film premiered at the True/False Film Festival in 2020, one of the last film festivals to proceed as scheduled in the first half of 2020 due to the Coronavirus pandemic.[9] It was theatrically released on December 2, 2020, to critical praise. The film was a New York Times "Critic's Pick"[10] and an Indiewire "Critic's Pick",[11] and won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Politics & Government Documentary, and a 2022 Peabody Award.[12][13]
His fourth feature documentary Predators premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and was acquired by MTV Documentary Films and Paramount+ for theatrical and worldwide release. The film was a New York Times "Critic's Pick"[14] and Indiewire "Critic's Pick",[15] and was frequently cited as one of the best documentaries of 2025.[16][17]
Osit has edited and composed for numerous documentary films and television shows, including Live From New York!,[18] which was the opening night film of the 2015 Tribeca Film Festival.[19] and The Vow. He has cited his experience editing true crime television shows as part of the inspiration for making Predators.[20]
Influences
[edit]Osit has cited Roy Andersson, Elia Suleiman, Miloš Forman and Amir Naderi as influences on his work.[22] He has referred to James Longley's Iraq in Fragments as a formative documentary for his generation of documentary filmmakers.
Filmography
[edit]| Year | Film | Director | Producer | Editor | Cinematographer | Composer | Other | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2012 | Building Babel | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2015 | Live from New York! | No | No | Yes | No | No | ||
| 2015 | Thank You For Playing | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2017 | No Man's Land | No | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | ||
| 2020 | The Vow | No | No | Yes | No | No | ||
| 2020 | Mayor | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2022 | Hostages | No | No | Yes | No | No | ||
| 2024 | The Antisocial Network | No | No | Yes | No | No | ||
| 2025 | Predators | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
References
[edit]- ^ "Police union announces scholarship winners". The Bronxville Review Press and Reporter. Gannett Company. 9 June 2005. Retrieved 17 May 2017.
- ^ "David Osit – Wallenberg Legacy, University of Michigan". wallenberg.umich.edu. 19 January 2009. Retrieved 2017-04-15.
- ^ "Building Babel | ITVS". itvs.org. Retrieved 2017-04-15.
- ^ "The Filmmakers". Thank You For Playing. Retrieved 2017-04-15.
- ^ POV. "Thank You For Playing | POV". POV | American Documentary Inc. Retrieved 2017-04-15.
- ^ "Independent Lens Wins Four 2017 News and Documentary Emmys!". Independent Lens. Retrieved 2021-08-24.
- ^ Osit, David; Zouhali-worrall, Malika (2016-03-17). "Games You Can't Win". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2017-04-15.
- ^ @newsemmys (6 October 2017). "The Emmy for Outstanding Arts & Culture Documentary goes to @POVDOCS "Thank You For Playing." #NewsEmmys" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
- ^ "True/False Film Fest 2020: The Value of the Theatrical Experience (Coronavirus Remix) | Filmmaker Magazine". 25 March 2020.
- ^ Kenigsberg, Ben (2020-12-02). "'Mayor' Review: Leading a City With the World Watching". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2020-12-02.
- ^ Kohn, Eric (2020-03-06). "'Mayor' Review: The Best New Film About Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Is a Dark Comedy About Ramallah's Mayor". IndieWire. Retrieved 2020-12-02.
- ^ "Peabody Awards 2022 Winners: 'Mayor'". Peabody. Retrieved 2022-06-09.
- ^ "POV Wins A News & Documentary Emmy Award for David Osit's Mayor | American Documentary". www.amdoc.org. Retrieved 2022-10-01.
- ^ https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/18/movies/predators-review.html
- ^ https://www.indiewire.com/criticism/movies/predators-review-david-osit-documentary-chris-hansen-1235088301/
- ^ https://www.slashfilm.com/1963321/predators-must-watch-doc-true-crime-sensation/
- ^ https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/nov/12/predators-review-grimly-compelling-look-at-reality-tv-revenge-hunt-for-child-abusers
- ^ Armisen, Fred; Baldwin, Alec; Beatts, Anne; Bergen, Candice (2015-06-12), Live from New York!, retrieved 2017-04-15
- ^ "Tribeca". Tribeca. Retrieved 2017-04-15.
- ^ https://www.documentary.org/feature/mirrors-edge-david-osit-discusses-predators-appraisal-catch-predator
- ^ "40 UNDER 40 - CLASS OF 2020". DOC NYC. Retrieved 2022-02-12.
- ^ ""Palestine May Be the Last Bastion of American Ignorance": David Osit on Mayor". filmmakermagazine.com/. 2 December 2020. Retrieved 2020-12-02.