Born in San Sebastian on 21 October 1958 to a bourgeois family. His full name is Julio Medem Lafont. He began making short films on Super 8mm as a teenager. After graduating in medicine in 1985 he became a film critic, film editor and assistant director. His feature film proposals were rejected, despite the fact that his shorts were highly regarded, until he managed to get his first feature-length film made in 1992. Vacas (Cows) won a Goya award and travels the world in various festivals from Japan to Italy. The year after, his second film La ardilla roja (The Red Squirrel) was successful and the third Tierra (Earth) went to the Cannes Film Festival. Lovers of the Arctic Circle and Sex and Lucia were distributed in Italy. In 2007 Chaotic Ana starring Charlotte Rampling was presented at the Rome Film Festival. In 2012 he was one of the directors in the episodic film 7 Days in Havana.
