Milla Jovovich Biography
Jovovich began modeling at age 10, when she was discovered by photographer Carlos Reynosa[3] . Later Gene Lemuel convinced Herb Ritts to shoot her for the cover of Lei magazine. Richard Avedon featured her in Revlon's "Most Unforgettable Women in the World" advertisements, and she continued her career with other campaigns for L'Oréal cosmetics, Banana Republic, Christian Dior, Donna Karan, and Versace. In 1988, she had her first professional acting role in the television film The Night Train to Kathmandu, and later that year, she appeared in her first feature film, Two Moon Junction. Following more small television appearances such as the "Fair Exchange" (1989) and a 1989 role as a French girl (she was 14 at the time) on a Married... with Children episode and film roles, she gained notoriety with the romance film Return to the Blue Lagoon (1991). She appeared in 1993's Dazed and Confused alongside Ben Affleck and Matthew McConaughey. Jovovich then acted alongside Bruce Willis in the science fiction film The Fifth Element (1997), and later played the title role in The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc (1999). In 2002, she starred in the video game adaptation Resident Evil, which spawned three sequels: Resident Evil: Apocalypse (2004), Resident Evil: Extinction (2007) and Resident Evil: Afterlife (2010).
In addition to her modeling and acting career, Jovovich released a music album, The Divine Comedy in 1994. She continues to release demos for other songs on her official website and contributes to film soundtracks; Jovovich has yet to release another album. In 2003, she and model Carmen Hawk created the clothing line Jovovich-Hawk, which ceased operations in early 2008. In its third season prior to its demise, the pieces could be found at Fred Segal in Los Angeles, Harvey Nichols, and over 50 stores around the world. Jovovich also has her own production company, Creature Entertainment.
Milla was born in Kiev, Ukrainian SSR, former Soviet Union, the daughter of Bogdan Bogdanovic Jovovic , a Serbian pediatrician, and Galina Mikhaylovna Loginova , a Russian stage actress, and was raised in the Russian Orthodox religion.
Milla's paternal family's estate was in Zlopek near Peć in the northwestern part of Metohija Valley, Serbia. Her paternal great-grandfather, Bogic Camic Jovovic, was a flag-bearer of the Vasojevići clan and an officer in the guard of King Nicholas I of Montenegro; his wife's name was Milica, after whom Milla was named. Her paternal grandfather, Bogdan Jovović, was a commander in the Pristina military area, and later investigated finances in the military areas of Skopje and Sarajevo, where he uncovered massive gold embezzlement. He was punished for refusing to convict a friend of the crime. Later, the government briefly imprisoned him in Goli otok for refusing to testify. When he feared that he could be arrested again, he escaped to Albania and later moved to Kiev. A different version of the story claims that he was the one who took the gold. Milla's father, Bogich, later joined Bogdan in Kiev, where he and his sister graduated in medicine. In 2000, her grandfather, Bogdan Jovović, died in Kiev. Her mother was born in Tuapse (now in Russia) but moved in her childhood to Dnipropetrovsk (now in Ukraine).
In 1980, when Milla was five years old, her family left the Soviet Union for political reasons and moved to London. They subsequently lived in Sacramento, California before settling in Los Angeles seven months later; Milla's parents divorced soon after.
In 1988, as a result of her father's relationship with a woman from Argentina, Milla's half-brother Marco Jovovich, was born. Milla's mother attempted to support the family with acting jobs, but found little success, and eventually resorted to cleaning houses to earn money. Both her father and mother provided house cleaning services for director Brian De Palma. Milla's father was incarcerated for participating in an illegal operation concerning medical insurance; he was given a 20-year sentence in 1994, but was released in 1999 after serving five years in an American prison. According to Milla, "Prison was good for him. He's become a much better person. It gave him a chance to stop and think."
Milla attended public schools shortly after arriving in the United States, and became fluent in English in three months. During school, many of the students had teased her because she had immigrated from the Soviet Union during the Cold War: "I was called a commie and a Russian spy. I was never, ever, ever accepted into the crowd." At age 12 in seventh grade, Milla left school to focus on modeling. She has stated that she was rebellious during her early teens, engaging in drug use, shopping mall vandalism, and credit-card fraud.
International success (2002–2006)
In 2002, Jovovich starred in the horror/action film Resident Evil, released in the United States on March 15, 2002. Based on the CAPCOM video game series of the same name, she portrayed Alice, the film's heroine who fights a legion of zombies created by the evil Umbrella Corporation. Jovovich had accepted the role of Alice because she and her brother had been fans of the video game franchise, saying, "It was exciting for me just watching him play, I could sit for 5 hours and we would sit all day and play this game." Jovovich had performed all the stunts required in the film, except for a scene that would involve her jumping to a cement platform, which her management deemed too dangerous, and had trained in karate, kickboxing, and combat-training. The film was commercially successful, grossing $17 million on its opening weekend, and gaining $40 million domestically and $102 million worldwide. Later, she portrayed the manipulative gang wife Erin in No Good Deed (2002), Nadine in the romantic comedy You Stupid Man (2002), punk rocker Fangora ("Fanny") in Dummy (2003), and provided a guest voice on the television series King of the Hill. The role of Fangora in Dummy, allowed Jovovich to act in film with Oscar-winning Adrien Brody, who was a friend prior to filming. Jovovich found it easy to identify with this role because she felt Fangora, as opposed to previous characters, possessed similar qualities to the actress' own life.
In 2004, Jovovich reprised the role of Alice in the sequel to Resident Evil, Resident Evil: Apocalypse. The role required her to do fight training for three hours a day, in addition to the three months prior to filming in which she had "gun training, martial arts, everything". Apocalypse received even more negative reactions from the critics than the first film, but it was an even more commercial success, ranking number one at the box office unlike the first film. Following the release of the film, Jovovich was unhappy with the critical results and director Alexander Witt's effort. She noted during an interview that year that her large action films take care of the commercial part of her career, while she acts in "independent little films that never come out" to appease her artistic side, and "It's a good balance". The following year, she was featured in Gore Vidal's faux trailer remake of Caligula, as Drusilla. In 2006, Jovovich's film, the science fiction/action thriller Ultraviolet, was released on March 3. She played the title role of Violet Song jat Shariff, a role that also involved heavily choreographed fight sequences and Gun Kata, a fictional martial art combining statistical analysis and gunplay. It was not screened for critics, but when reviewed, it was critically panned, grossing $31 million worldwide. That year, Jovovich also starred in .45, as Kat, the revenge driven girlfriend of an illegal gun and drug dealer with English actor and DJ Angus Macfadyen.
Media personality
Jovovich has been noted for her careers as a model, singer and actress. Music channel VH1 has referred to her as the "reigning queen of kick-butt" for her roles in various sci-fi and action films and Rebecca Flint Marx of Allmovie said that despite the negative critical response for the Resident Evil films, the franchise has turned Jovovich into an "A-list action star." Her action roles have given her a geek following for which MTV said she was "Every Geek's Dream Girl."
In 2004, Jovovich was ranked #69 on Maxim magazine's "Top 100 Hot List", ranked #82 in 2005 and ranked #21 in 2010. Maxim also named her #11 on their list of "Hottest Nerd Crushes." In 2008, she was ranked #90 on Ask Men's Top 99 Women of 2008 List. In 2011, Jovovich attended and sang at the birthday celebration of Mikhail Gorbachov. The actress also gave a speech in which she thanked Gorbachov, saying that when she and her family left the Soviet Union in 1980 they were sadly sure that they would never see their relatives again and that thanks to him they have been reunited again.
Personal life
Jovovich currently resides in homes in Los Angeles and New York with her husband, film writer and director Paul W. S. Anderson, whom she married on 22 August 2009. The two met while working on Resident Evil, which Anderson wrote and directed, and in which Jovovich starred. Anderson proposed to Jovovich in 2003, but the two separated for a period of time before becoming a couple again. On November 3, 2007, Jovovich gave birth to her and Anderson's first child, a daughter, Ever Gabo Anderson. The child was born at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California, one day before Jovovich's due date of November 4.
Prior to her relationship with Anderson, Jovovich married on-screen boyfriend Shawn Andrews in 1992 while filming Dazed and Confused together. Andrews was 21, while Jovovich was 16; the marriage was annulled by her mother two months later. Shortly after the annulment, Jovovich moved to Europe with her friend and musician Chris Brenner where she met and then lived with her new boyfriend, Jamiroquai ex-bassist Stuart Zender, in London from May 1994 to October 1995. From 1995 to 1997, she dated photographer Mario Sorrenti. In Las Vegas, she married The Fifth Element director Luc Besson in 1998 where they went skydiving directly after the ceremony; they divorced in 1999. Between 1998 and 2001, she befriended the young poet and musician, Anno Birkin, and each was the other's inspiration behind many of their compositions. Jovovich became involved with Birkin romantically just before his death in a car accident in late 2001. Jovovich also dated former Red Hot Chili Peppers guitarist John Frusciante, for seven months in 2000.
In 2006, Jovovich mentioned her interest in publishing her private diaries as an autobiography. She had kept a diary since childhood, writing about the locations she has traveled and "all the mad things that [she's] done". Jovovich has stated that she views publication as a way to "get it all into a book—like an autobiography", and it would have a "diary feel to it". However, she also commented that she was "...not sure how interested anyone would be in publishing it, or reading it, for that matter." However, in 2010, Jovovich claimed the autobiography to be pure rumor stating, "I have no idea where that came from. I guess somebody said something about me publishing my diaries online and when I heard that I was like, 'No way.'"
In addition to being a smoker, Jovovich has advocated the legalisation of cannabis, and appeared in a spread and on the cover for High Times. In an article published in 1994, she admitted that her only vices were cigarettes and cannabis. She practices yoga and meditates often in attempts to live a healthy lifestyle; although not affiliating with any specific religion, she prays and considers herself a "spiritual person". She avoids junk foods and prefers to cook for herself. She practices Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu in addition to other varieties of martial arts. Jovovich also enjoys playing the guitar, writing in a diary, and writing poems and lyrics for songs.
Jovovich has establish a charitable foundation to help Ukrainian children in 2005. At the time she referred to herself: ”I am a strong Ukrainian girl, that is why I work a lot”.
Jovovich can speak Russian and English fluently, and a little French.