Joseph Ruben

Template:Multiple issues Template:Infobox person Joseph Porter Ruben (born May 10, 1950) is an American retired filmmaker.

Movie career

Ruben's earlier films, such as The Stepfather, have become cult classics. In the 1990s, he went to direct high-grossing mainstream films such as Sleeping with the Enemy starring Julia Roberts (which grossed over $150,000,000 on box office), the controversial thriller The Good Son starring Macaulay Culkin and Elijah Wood, Money Train starring Woody Harrelson and Wesley Snipes, and Return to Paradise starring Vince Vaughn and Joaquin Phoenix. He frequently collaborated with film editor George Bowers.

Ruben has won awards at various film festivals for his films The Stepfather, True Believer, starring Robert Downey Jr. and James Woods, and Dreamscape, starring Dennis Quaid. His 2013 feature, Penthouse North, stars Michael Keaton and Michelle Monaghan. He will return to direct the serial killer thriller Jack after not working for six years. Ruben is also attached to direct the film The Politician's Wife written by Nicholas Meyer.

The Ottoman Lieutenant was released around the period of the film The Promise, a film depicting the Armenian genocide.^[1] The perceived similarities between the films resulted in accusations that The Ottoman Lieutenant existed to deny the Armenian genocide.^[1]^[2]

Film

Year	Title	Director	Producer	Writer
1974	The Sister-in-Law	Template:Yes	Template:Yes	Template:Yes
1976	The Pom Pom Girls	Template:Yes	Template:Yes	Template:Yes
1977	Joyride	Template:Yes	Template:No	Template:Yes
1978	Our Winning Season	Template:Yes	Template:No	Template:No
1980	Gorp	Template:Yes	Template:No	Template:No
1984	Dreamscape	Template:Yes	Template:No	Template:Yes
1987	The Stepfather	Template:Yes	Template:No	Template:No
1989	True Believer	Template:Yes	Template:No	Template:No
1991	Sleeping with the Enemy	Template:Yes	Template:No	Template:No
1993	The Good Son	Template:Yes	Template:Yes	Template:No
1995	Money Train	Template:Yes	Template:No	Template:No
1998	Return to Paradise	Template:Yes	Template:No	Template:No
2004	The Forgotten	Template:Yes	Template:No	Template:No
2013	Penthouse North	Template:Yes	Template:Yes	Template:No
2017	The Ottoman Lieutenant	Template:Yes	Template:No	Template:No

Television

Year	Title	Note
1980	Breaking Away	Episode "The Cutters"

This article incorporates text from the Wikipedia article "Joseph Ruben", available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License.Retrieved 2026-03-04.