Atom Egoyan CC is a Canadian filmmaker. He was part of a loosely-affiliated group of filmmakers to emerge in the 1980s from Toronto known as the Toronto New Wave. Egoyan made his career breakthrough with Exotica (1994), a film set primarily in and around the fictional Exotica strip club. Egoyan's most critically acclaimed film is the drama The Sweet Hereafter (1997), for which he received two Academy Award nominations, and his biggest commercial success is the erotic thriller Chloe (2009). He is considered by local film critic Geoff Pevere to be one of the greatest filmmakers of his generation.

Egoyan's work often explores themes of alienation and isolation, featuring characters whose interactions are mediated through technology, bureaucracy, or other power structures. Egoyan's films often follow non-linear plot structures, in which events are placed out of sequence in order to elicit specific emotional reactions from the audience by withholding key information.

In 2008, Egoyan received the Dan David Prize for "Creative Rendering of the Past." Egoyan later received the Governor General's Performing Arts Award, Canada's highest royal honour in the performing arts, in 2015.

Egoyan was born Atom Yeghoyan on July 19, 1960, in Cairo, then part of the United Arab Republic (now Egypt), to Armenian-Egyptian painters Shushan (née Devletian) and Joseph Yeghoyan. He was named Atom to mark the completion of Egypt's first nuclear reactor. He has a younger sister, Eve. In 1963, the family immigrated to Victoria, British Columbia due to the rise of Arab nationalism, and changed their last name to Egoyan.

As a teenager, Egoyan became interested in reading and writing plays. Influences included Samuel Beckett and Harold Pinter. He also attributes his future in the film industry to Persona (1966), which he viewed at age 14, according to an interview he had with journalist Robert K. Elder for The Film That Changed My Life:

It gave me an incredible respect for the medium and its possibilities. To me, Persona marries a pure form and a very profound vision with absolute conviction. It's very inspiring. I felt that it was able to open a door that wasn't there before.

Egoyan graduated from Trinity College at the University of Toronto. It was at Trinity College that he came into contact with Harold Nahabedian, the Armenian-Canadian Anglican Chaplain of Trinity College. In interviews, Egoyan credited Nahabedian for introducing him to the language and history of his ethnic heritage. Egoyan also wrote for the University of Toronto's independent weekly, The Newspaper, during his time at the school.

Egoyan is based in Toronto, where he lives with his wife, actress Arsinée Khanjian, who appears in many of his films, and their son, Arshile (named after the Armenian-American painter Arshile Gorky).

In 1999, Egoyan was made an Officer of the Order of Canada; he was promoted in 2015 to Companion of the Order of Canada, the highest grade of the honour. In 2009, he won the 'Master of Cinema' award from the Mannheim Film Festival, 25 years after receiving his international festival premiere at the same event. In 2017, Egoyan was presented with the Lifetime Achievement Award at the International Film Festival of India.