Budding actress Alice Englert rose from relative obscurity to international fame in 2012 and 2013 with a pair of diametrically opposite but high-profile film projects: the independent drama "Ginger & Rosa" (2012) and the fantasy "Beautiful Creatures" (2013). Born in Sydney, Australia in 1994, Alice Englert came from a filmmaking family. Her mother was Oscar-nominated director Jane Campion, while her father, Colin Englert, was a television director who served as second unit director on Campion's acclaimed features "The Piano" (1993) and "Portrait of a Lady" (1996). Englert was raised largely in her mother's country of origin, New Zealand, where she dabbled in music, writing and theater. Hours spent in her mother's editing room inspired her to explore the possibilities of storytelling through acting, which she began with a leading role in "The Water Diary" (2006), a short film about drought directed by her mother which was eventually incorporated into the feature "8" (2008), a collection of shorts inspired by the Millennium Development Goals.