Biography, Filmography And Pictures:

Anna Paquin, the young Canadian whose only acting experience was in small school plays, amazed movie audiences across the country with her role as Holly Hunter's angry young daughter in the romantic drama film "The Piano" in 1993. The film won three Oscar Awards, and Anna was singled out for an Academy Award at the age of eleven, for Best Actress in a Supporting Role.

Anna Helene Paquin was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada on July 24, 1982, to native New Zealand parents, and has an older brother and sister, Andrew and Kate. She went to the audition for “The Piano” only because her older sister was going, and at the time preferred music over acting. But casting and talent directors for the Jane Campion film ask her to audition, and later cast the nine-year-old as Holly Hunter’s daughter. It was the break of a life-time for any child actor.

"The Piano" (1993), is the story of a mute woman, who along with her young daughter, and her prized piano, are sent to 1850's New Zealand for an arranged marriage to a wealthy landowner, who is soon lusted after by a local worker on the plantation. Audiences and critics loved the movie, and the young actress. 

Paquin then relocated to Los Angeles, California with her mother after her parents’ divorce, to focus on her studies and new Hollywood film career. Movie roles flooded in after her Oscar win, and she was soon hired and cast to play a young Jane Eyre in the film version of the Charlotte Bronte book "Jane Eyre" (1996),where orphan Jane Eyre is left to live under the charity of her Aunt Reed, and after living ten years with mistreatment and segregation in her Aunt's home, is sent to a boarding school for young girls. Jane Eyre grows up both physically and mentally during her time at school and becomes a teacher by age eighteen. She then advertises for the position of a governess and is called upon by Mrs. Fairfax at Thornfield. 

She then appeared as a young girl who helps raise a flock of Canadian geese in the charming family adventure “Fly Away Home” (1996), with Jeff Daniels and Dana Delany, about a father and daughter, who decide to try and lead a flock of orphaned Canada Geese south by air. She was nominated for a Young Artist Award for Best Performance in a Feature Film - Leading Young Actress. Anna then took a small cameo role in Stephen Spielberg’s “Amistad” (1997) as Isabella II, Queen of Spain. The film starred Morgan Freeman, Anthony Hopkins and Matthew McConaughey, and is about a 1839 mutiny aboard a slave ship that is traveling towards the Northeast Coast of America. Much of the story involves a court-room drama about the free-man who led a revolt. "Amistad" was nominated for four Academy Awards.

When the actress became a teenager, her roles became more mature and seductive. She portrayed a young sexy runaway given to drug users Sean Penn and Kevin Spacey in “Hurlybury” (1998), an adaptation of David Rabe's well known play about the connected lives of various Hollywood players and wannabes who's personal lives threaten to fall into a catastrophe more interesting than anything they are selling to the movie studios. 

She then took a shot at comedy in the young teen movie "She's All That" (1999), starring Freddie Prinze Jr. and Rachael Leigh Cook, a current version of George Bernard Shaw's "Pygmalion", where Zack Siler (Freddie Prinze, Jr.), plays a Los Angeles high school student who's been dumped by his popular, sexy, but bad spirited girlfriend for a famous volleyball player. Frustrated, Zack accepts a bet from his friends that he can turn Laney Boggs (Rachel Leigh Cook), a nerdy girl into the school's prom queen. The film won a Kid's Choice Award, Teen Choice Award, Young Hollywood Award, and a MTV Movie Award nomination.

Anna return to drama with the co-starring role of Alison Kantrowitz in the romantic drama "A Walk On The Moon" (1999), where the world of a young housewife is turned upside down when she has an affair with a free-spirited dress salesman. She then appeared in the award winning action thriller "X-Men" (2000), starring an A-list group of Hollywood celebrities including Hugh Jackman, Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellen, James Marsden, Halle Berry and Rebecca Romijn. "X-men" is the big screen adaptation of the classic comic book tale about a band of unique super power mutants who live in a world where their species is hated and mistreated by humans. Under the guidance of their leader, Professor Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart), the X-men try to create a world where humans and mutants can peacefully live together. Paquin was again singled our for an award, taking home a Blockbuster Entertainment Award for Favorite Actress - Science Fiction.

Paquin was a full-blown Hollywood movie star, and her celebrity status made her the desire of every film maker and movie producer who all wanted the award winning actress in their movies. Her next role was in the Cameron Crowe musical drama "Almost Famous" (2000), with Billy Crudup, Frances McDormand, Kate Hudson, Cameron Crowe and Jimmy Fallon, where a young high-school boy is given the chance to write a story for Rolling Stone Magazine about an up-and-coming rock band as he travels with them on their concert tour. Again, she found herself in a block-buster award winning movie, taking away an Oscar and 44 other industry awards. She then teamed with Sean Connery in the dramatic "Finding Forrester" (2000), about an African American teen writing prodigy who finds a mentor in a reclusive author (Sean Connery).

She next appeared in the war thriller "Buffalo Soldiers" (2001), where a criminal subculture operates among United States soldiers stationed in West Germany just before the fall of the Berlin wall. She followed with her first block-buster starring role as Regina, in the mystery horror thriller "Darkness" (2002), where her character moves into a remote countryside house with her family only to find that their depressing new home has a horrifying past that threatens to destroy the family. 

She wrapped her year in the Spike Lee crime drama "25th Hour" (2002), starring Edward Norton, where cornered about the DEA, a convicted New York drug dealer Montgomery Brogan (Norton) reevaluates his life in the hours before facing a seven-year prison term. 

In 2003, she revisited her character Rogue in the sequel to "X-Men", “X2: X-Men United” (2003), which saw Rogue joining the X-Men as an official member, where the they band together to find a mutant assassin who has made an attempt on the President's life. She also appeared in the third installment “X-Men: The Last Stand” (2006), where Rogue accepts a controversial cure for her mutant abilities, and lines are drawn among the X-Men, led by Professor Charles Xavier, and the Brotherhood, a band of powerful mutants organized under Xavier's former ally, Magneto.

THe actress then entered her awkward teen-age years and stayed away from moving making for a bit while she grew into more mature opportunities. She returned in full form, and as executive producer, for the comedy "Blue State" (2007), a romantic comedy about a disgruntled Democrat who actually follows through on a drunken campaign promise to move to Canada if George Bush gets re-elected. Anna then jumped back to the horror thriller genre in "Trick'r Treat" (2007), a clever film of four interwoven stories that occur on Halloween: An everyday high school principal who has a secret life as a serial killer; a college virgin who might have just met the one guy for her; a group of teenagers who pull a mean prank; and a woman who loathes the night and has to contend with her holiday-obsessed husband. 

In 2008, she returned to series television in the starring role of Sookie Stackhouse in the fantasy show "True Blood" (2008). The series follows Sookie, a barmaid living in Louisiana who can read people's minds, and how her life is turned upside down when the a Vampire walks into her job two years after vampires 'came out of the coffin' on national television. The following year, Anna took the starring role in the big budget drama "Margaret" (2009), starring Matt Damon and Mark Ruffalo, about a young woman who witnesses a bus accident and is caught up in the aftermath, where the question of whether or not it was intentional affects many people's lives.

She wrapped her year in the horror "Metamorphosis" (2009), a film that takes us into the fantastic mind, obsession and insanity of one of the most influential and important writers in modern literature. 

Watch Anna Paquin In "True Blood" Trailer And Video

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