Brother of screenwriter Matthew Michael Carnahan, Joe Carnahan has contributed to the film world primarily as a director. After getting his start in the mid-'90s working in the promotional department of a California television station, Carnahan produced several short films and generated a certain amount of excitement within the independent film community for his series of feature-length action flicks: Blood, Guts, Bullets & Octane, Narc, and Smokin' Aces. He was one of the many people in talks to direct one of Tom Cruise's Mission Impossible sequels, but landed his biggest box office hit to that point with 2010's big-screen adaptation of The A-Team. He reteamed with that film's star Liam Neeson two years later for the survival adventure drama The Grey.