John Adrian Cowell (2 February 1934 – 11 October 2011) was a British filmmaker, born in northern China, in or near Tianjin. He was best known for producing documentaries about Chico Mendes and deforestation in the Amazon and the opium/heroin trade out of the Shan States, Burma (Myanmar).
Cowell was educated at Ampleforth College and St Catharine's College, Cambridge, where he studied history. While a student at Cambridge, he planned (but was unable to take part in) the 1954 Oxford and Cambridge Trans-Africa Expedition, and took part in the 1955-6 Oxford and Cambridge Far Eastern Expedition to Singapore and the 1957-8 Oxford and Cambridge Expedition to South America. It was on the latter expedition team that Cowell met the Villas-Bôas brothers and left the Oxford and Cambridge Expedition to join them on the Centro Geographico Expedition to find the geographical centre of Brazil. This was the beginning of his connection with South America and, in particular, Brazil.
Cowell was awarded the Royal Geographical Society's Cherry Kearton Medal and Award in 1985, and in 1991 won the Founders Award at the International Emmys. In his obituary in The Guardian, Anthony Hayward wrote that he was "one of the most successful" documentary makers of his generation. His documentaries about the rain forest brought the subject significant political attention.
Family Cowell married Pilly Chamberlayne in 1960; they divorced in 2008. Their union produced a daughter, Boojie, and a son, Xingu. Cowell formed an extramarital relationship with Barbara Bramble in 1987. Xingu Cowell died in a canoeing accident in 1986.
Works The Heart of the Forest, 1960 Carnival of Violence, in 3 parts: 1960, 1962, 1966 Raid into Tibet, 1966 The Unknown War, 1966 The Opium Trail, 1966 The Tribe That Hides from Man, 1970 The Kingdom in the Jungle, 1971 The Opium Warlords, 1974 Opium, 1978 The Ashes of the Forest, 1984 Banking On Disaster, 1987 The Crusade for the Forest, 1990
The Heroin Wars, 1996
The Last of the Hiding Tribes, 1999 Fires of the Amazon, 2002
References
External links Official Adrian Cowell web site