In 1981, when John Boorman was filming Excalibur in Ireland, he recruited Jordan as a “creative associate”. A year later Boorman was executive producer on Jordan’s first feature Angel, a tale of a musician caught up in The Troubles played by Stephen Rea who has subsequently appeared in almost all of Jordan’s films to date. During the 1980s, he directed films that won him acclaim, including The Company of Wolves and Mona Lisa, both made in England. The Company of Wolves, a dark and sexually-themed reimagining of the Little Red Riding Hood fairy tale based on short stories by Angela Carter, became a cult favorite.

In 1996, Neil Jordan was honoured with receiving the French Ordre des Arts et des Lettres

Jordan was born in Sligo, the son of Angela (née O’Brien), a painter, and Michael Jordan, a professor. He was educated at St. Paul’s College, Raheny. Later, Jordan attended University College Dublin, where he studied Irish history and English literature. He became involved in student theatre there, where he met Jim Sheridan, who also was later to become an important Irish film director. Of his religious background, Jordan said in a 1999 Salon interview: “I was brought up a Catholic and was quite religious at one stage in my life, when I was young. But it left me with no scars whatever; it just sort of vanished.” He said about his current beliefs that “God is the greatest imaginary being of all time. Along with Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity, the invention of God is probably the greatest creation of human thought.”

Neil Gaiman announced during his The Today Show appearance on 27 January 2009, that Neil Jordan would be directing the film of his Newbery Medal-winning book The Graveyard Book. Jordan also wrote and directed the Irish made film Ondine (2009), starring Colin Farrell and Alicja Bachleda-Curuś. He also directed Byzantium, an adaptation of the vampire play of the same name starring Saoirse Ronan, Gemma Arterton and Jonny Lee Miller.

In 2009, he signed a petition in support of director Roman Polanski, calling for his release after he was arrested in Switzerland in relation to his 1977 charge for drugging and raping a 13-year-old girl.

In 2011, Jordan’s next feature was announced as Broken Dream and featured Ben Kingsley and John Hurt.

In 2018, he has donated his archives to the National Library of Ireland. Jordan’s donation included TV and film scripts, production files, notebooks, storyboards and personal correspondence with artists and political figures.