--- name: "Jim Kouf" canonical: "https://film.one/person/jim-kouf" fi1m_id: "jim-kouf" imdb_id: "nm0467942" tmdb_id: 21155 wikidata_id: "Q3178864" roles: ["Producer","Director"] born: "24 July 1951" reviewed_on_fi1m: 2 average_as: "producer" average_over: 1 updated: "2026-09-26T15:09:29.754923+00:00" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Jim Kouf ## Identity Jim Kouf - **Canonical:** https://film.one/person/jim-kouf - **Type:** Person - **Fi1m ID:** jim-kouf - **IMDb ID:** nm0467942 - **TMDB ID:** 21155 - **Wikidata ID:** Q3178864 - **Same entity:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Kouf, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q3178864, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0467942/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/21155 Producer and director. Born 24 July 1951 in Hollywood, California, USA. ## Details - **Work:** Producer, Director - **Born:** 24 July 1951, Hollywood, California, USA - **Active:** 1997–2011 - **Titles on Fi1m:** 2: 1 directing, 1 producing - **Fi1m score by decade:** 1990s 74 (1), 2010s 63 (1) - **Elsewhere:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Kouf, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q3178864, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0467942/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/21155 ## Streaming the US now - **Peacock:** [*Grimm*](https://film.one/tv/grimm.md) (63) For United States; add `?region=XX` for another country. ## Fi1m on Jim Kouf > Jim Kouf has spent forty years putting two people who do not want each other in the same car, in *Stakeout*, *Rush Hour* and *Grimm*. The pairings are dependable and often funny; the plots around them rarely rise above the pitch. Watch any Jim Kouf story for ten minutes and two people who would rather be elsewhere will have been made to work together. In *Grimm* (2011) it is Nick Burkhardt, a detective who has begun to see animal faces under human ones, and Monroe, the grumbling, reluctant creature who turns out to be the show's best company. Kouf has written that pair in one costume or another since the 1980s: two policemen in *Stakeout* (1987), Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker in *Rush Hour* (1998). The plot exists to keep them talking. He started in comedy, writing with David Greenwalt on *Class* (1983) and *Secret Admirer* (1985), then directed *Miracles* (1986) himself. *Stakeout* made his name, and in the same year, under the name Bob Hunt, he wrote *The Hidden*, a science-fiction horror about a creature that has since gathered a small cult following. That is the shape of the next two decades: studio scripts (*Another Stakeout* in 1993, *Rush Hour*, *Snow Dogs* in 2002, *Taxi* and *National Treasure* in 2004) alongside films he directed, *Disorganized Crime* (1989) and *Gang Related* (1997). Around 2000 he moved to television, working on *Angel* and *Ghost Whisperer*, and in 2011 he, Greenwalt and Stephen Carpenter made *Grimm*. *Grimm* is his largest piece of work and the one we can speak to. Sewing a fairy tale into every police case is a good hook, and it carried 122 episodes over six seasons, from 28 October 2011 to a short final run in 2017. It is also pleasant, tidy and a little less than it might have been. David Giuntoli is a bland lead, the creature effects are rubbery, and the mythology grows until the show can no longer hold it. We kept watching, and after a while we noticed we were watching for Silas Weir Mitchell, whose Monroe complains his way through the whole enterprise and is funnier and warmer than anything the cases give him. He is worth the evening. The show will not frighten you. The strengths and the weaknesses hold across the career. Kouf builds high-concept premises a studio can sell and gives them enough character to survive the meeting; *National Treasure* is the clearest case, a script that kept a large adventure moving. What he does not do is let a premise breathe once it has been bought. The reviews of *Taxi* called it formulaic, and *Another Stakeout* showed what happens when a pairing that worked once is asked to be broader the second time. His most constant collaborator is Greenwalt, with whom he shares some thirty credits, and his most recent screenplay of note is *Money Monster* (2016), about television and money. Kouf has said: "It's all about the characters. And the world they have to survive in. And I don't want to bore anybody. So I try to keep things moving." He rarely bores. He also rarely stops long enough to find out what his characters would do if nobody were chasing them. ## Biography Jim Kouf is an American screenwriter, producer and director. Born on 24 July 1951 in Hollywood, California, he graduated with a B.A. in English from California Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo in 1974. He began writing for film in the early 1980s. Kouf wrote the screenplays for *Stakeout* (1987), for which he received the 1988 Edgar Award for Best Motion Picture Screenplay, *Rush Hour* (1998) and *National Treasure* (2004). He co-created the NBC series *Grimm* (2011–2017) with David Greenwalt and Stephen Carpenter, serving as executive producer and writer on all 123 episodes and directing several. His other credits include writing *Taxi* (2004) and *Money Monster* (2016), and directing the films *Miracles* (1986) and *A Fork in the Road* (2009). He is married to producer Lynn Kouf. *Sources: en.wikipedia.org, imdb.com.* ## On Fi1m (2) ### Directed (1) - *Grimm* (2011), Fi1m 63, Creator, Story, Producer, Writer, Director — [page](https://film.one/tv/grimm.md) ### Produced (1) — the average rests on these - *Con Air* (1997), Fi1m 74, Executive Producer — [page](https://film.one/film/con-air.md) ## Complete filmography (41) Every credit, newest first. Titles without a page can be requested for review on the HTML page. - *Thine Ears Shall Bleed* (2024), Producer - *National Treasure: Edge of History* (2022), series, Characters - *Money Monster* (2016), Screenplay, Story - *Rush Hour* (2016), series, Teleplay - *Vasos de papel* (2016), Writer - *Grimm* (2011), series, Writer, Producer, Story, Director, Creator — Fi1m 63, [page](https://film.one/tv/grimm.md) - *A Fork in the Road* (2010), Director, Writer - *National Treasure: Book of Secrets* (2007), Characters - *Ghost Whisperer* (2005), series, Writer, Producer - *National Treasure* (2004), Screenplay, Story - *Taxi* (2004), Screenplay - *The Handler* (2003), series, Producer, Writer - *Snow Dogs* (2002), Screenplay - *Angel* (1999), series, Writer - *Rush Hour* (1998), Screenplay - *Gang Related* (1997), Director, Screenplay - *Con Air* (1997), Executive Producer — Fi1m 74, [page](https://film.one/film/con-air.md) - *Operation Dumbo Drop* (1995), Writer - *Silent Fall* (1994), Co-Producer - *The Hidden II* (1993), Characters - *Another Stakeout* (1993), Screenplay, Producer - *Kalifornia* (1993), Executive Producer - *White Fang* (1991), Executive Producer - *Vandanam* (1989), Original Story - *Disorganized Crime* (1989), Director, Writer - *The Hidden* (1987), Screenplay - *Stakeout* (1987), Screenplay, Producer - *Miracles* (1986), Director, Writer - *Secret Admirer* (1985), Writer - *Shaker Run* (1985), Writer - *American Dreamer* (1984), Writer - *Up the Creek* (1984), Story, Screenplay - *Last of the Great Survivors* (1984), Writer - *Class* (1983), Writer, Associate Producer - *Utilities* (1983), Story, Screenplay - *White Water Rebels* (1983), Teleplay, Co-Producer - *Wacko* (1982), as Prisoner · Writer - *Pink Motel* (1982), Screenplay - *The Boogens* (1981), Screenplay - *Secrets of the Bermuda Triangle* (1978), Researcher - *Untitled Grimm Reboot Film*, Executive Producer ## Awards ### Other awards — 1 won - Edgar Awards 1988: Edgar Awards (won) *From Wikidata, which records wins more completely than nominations.* --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/person/jim-kouf