He is a Scottish writer/director, and a founder of Sigma Films. After graduating film school, he wrote and directed Young Adam, which premiered in Cannes Un Certain Regard in 2003; it won 4 BAFTA Scotland awards. Subsequent films include Asylum, and Hallam Foe, which won a Silver Bear in Berlin in 2007. Perfect Sense, which premiered at Sundance in 2011 went on to pick up awards at festivals across the world. His follow up, Starred Up, which Premiered at Telluride in 2013, won multiple BAFTA Scotland Awards and a BIFA win for Best Actor Ben Mendelsohn. In 2016, a contemporary Western, Hell or High Water which premiered in Un Certain Regard at Cannes, was a box office hit and was nominated for four Academy Awards in 2017, including Best Film. His historical epic Outlaw King premiered at Toronto in 2018 and was subsequently released on Netflix. The film remains the biggest production to shoot entirely in Scotland. In 2022, he executive produced FX’s Under the Banner of Heaven and directed the first two episodes of the adaptation of Jon Krakauer’s book of the same name. Relay premiered at Toronto in 2024. His most recent film, Fuze, debuted at Toronto and is in the official selection of the 45th Istanbul Film Festival making its Turkish premiere before its opening.